Gary’s Fitness Blog

The picture above is of a bike set-up just prior to our 400km Brevet. (To learn more about Brevet and what it is check out www.rusa.org). We actually rode 250 miles so it wasn’t exactly 400km.

To give all the details about how the ride went would take, well 25 hours or so. The short version follows:

It was very cold to start the day off. We started at 5:00am. I decided to not take too many extra clothes because it was suppose to get into the 80’s during the day. It did, but I froze until the sun came up. We rode pretty conservatively, but the wind turned out to drain the energy more than I expected. Even though the wind pused my energy levels down, the weather was PERFECT! We could not have had better weather. At 122 miles we stopped and ate at McDonalds. I had a Big Mac, supersized with a Coke. I wanted a lot more fries! I really wanted an Ale-8… I missed Kentucky. But I didn’t miss Kentucky too bad because the course was almost completely flat… Kentucky is not completely flat!

* Half Time *

The second half started off in tired spirits. George got a cramp and I thought for sure we were doomed. George didn’t take long to ride strong again. It got dark. We used headlights and all the nice gear to ride at night.

Oh Yeah… we rode with some great people. We rode the most with Jimmy and John. John is 69 years old! What an inspiration to me!

It got cold again. I bought a pair of pantyhose at a store to help out my freezing body. It actually helped a lot. I still need to do better next time!

The ride came to a close at 6:08am as we signed the sheet back in Edwardsville. I can’t believe that I had just ridden 250 miles at one time….. excited to ride a 300km Brevet in Atlanta next week! (Well until I woke up tired!)

End of Brevet Cliff Notes

I appreciate anyone that still has faith in my blogging abilities. I know that I have left you hanging and have not contributed with any advice, stories or lessons learned lately. Now that I have my simplified life almost in order… you’ll get to see me more and more again!

Time is short….. but soon things will be back to normal. The last few weeks (specifically since March 22nd - when we closed on our townhouse) have been pretty pathetic in relation to working out. Not only has the house taken some time from my life, but I also quit my job at the university around the same time. So I have been a lot busier personal training….

Going into the weekend I was completely unsure about how fit I was, but decided to stick with the plan. Run / Walk the minimarathon (I had contemplated trying the full back in March) and use the data to compare July’s half ironman race to.

Strategy: run to 2nd aid station (about 3.5 miles), walk 45 seconds, then walk 30 seconds every 11 mins.

Results: Jeff and I started a little quick, but slowed down and fell into a good pace after the first mile. By the time I got to the first walk (aid station 2) I was completely ready for the opportunity. It took some discipline and ability to overcome my ego watching all the people run by me, but I stayed true.

I ended up running a 1:25:05, which was a pretty decent result. The great thing about the results was that my pace didn’t decrease at all throughout the race. My 10k split was 40:19, 15k split was 1:00:31. Both those splits work out to 6:29 mile.

It definately felt good to be that strong at the end of the race…..

Now I hope that I can get back to normal training. May 4th is last day working two places…. that should be good for the training log - if nothing else.