This is Chris. Happy. Carefree. Eating a burrito. Not a worry in the world.
And this is Chris after having entered an online cycling Challenge to climb 105,312 feet in elevation between March 15 - April 30th. Do you notice any difference between 'Chris before' and 'Chris after'? Somebody does not want to ride his bike anymore.
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| April 29, 2012: 14,500 feet down, 812 feet to go |
Why would Chris... or anybody... do such a thing? Because anyone who climbed 105,312 feet in the allotted time won a water bottle. Yes, that's right. A w-a-t-e-r b-o-t-t-l-e. You know, one of those plastic things you can buy for $10.
The Challenge was sponsored by Strava, an online cycling website. If you have a bike computer with GPS (which we do), you can upload every ride to Strava's website and it tracks all kinds of cool geeky statistics about your rides. Including elevation climbed. Lots of cyclists have GPS and lots of them upload their rides to Strava. When Strava put out the Challenge, a total of 10,948 cyclists worldwide signed up to ride their legs off. You could watch everyone's progress online to see how you compared and who was in first place and so on. Of the 10,948 who entered, only 703 finished. Chris ranked 648. He squeaked by with 105,600 feet. Bring on the water bottle.
I came along on his last ride of the Challenge for moral support and pictures.
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| Man vs. Beast |
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| Time to Smile. It's Over. 105,600 feet |
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| The final ride. 2,967 feet. It's a Wrap. |
Coincidentally, it's also the end of the month, so time for our year-to-date numbers. Chris is a little ahead of me in the elevation department.
But Who's Counting, We're Just In It for the Scenery
| YEAR-TO-DATE | |
|---|---|
| Distance | 605 mi |
| Time | 50 hours |
| Elev Gain | 56,121 ft |
| Rides | 27 |
CHRIS YEAR-TO-DATE, ENDING APRIL 2012
YEAR-TO-DATE
| |
|---|---|
Distance
|
1,769 mi
|
Time
|
129 hours
|
Elev Gain
|
199,524 ft
|
Rides
|
59
|
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Finally, a shout out to Chai, much beloved cat of Gary and Shauna, who died unexpectedly last week. May you rest in catnip heaven.
Whooosh! Congratulations to Chris. That's wildly impressive and in my book not squeaking by at all! And ... I'm hoping for a report on your event last Saturday. Hope it went well!
ReplyDeleteHi Susan,
DeleteWorking on it. We were in Healdsburg, CA (north of Sonoma) for a week following TUC, so just getting our legs back under us here at home. Read your ride report, sounds like you nailed it.