Training....and drywall repairs to do.

So what does training look like for us?
I (Mark) have been working out in the mornings with some guys from school.  We are in the Unity Christian weightroom at 5:30 AM most mornings.  I have never done any "lifting" in my life, so this was a steep learning curve.  Also, mornings should not be that early, ever.
However as the weeks have ticked by I have found that it is easier to do and I actually look forward to doing whatever workout Bill Lutke comes up.  Most of what we do comes from CrossFit and it has been cool to learn so much about lifting.  I still hate pull ups because I am not very good at them!  I call our little group the Billy Club.
Saturday was gorgeous here in Michigan so I went cross country skiing for 2 hours at Pigeon Creek.  The snow was so beautiful that I kept singing (in my head):

"O mighty God, when I behold the wonder
Of nature’s beauty, wrought by words of thine,"

Sunday I went to Rozema Car Care and joined a spinning group of Triathletes.  (Here I considered the beauty of my sweat upon the oil stained floor as I gasped for more oxygen).
I hate the trainer.  It is pretty tough to be motivated to go nowhere, just burning calories.  However, as my butt will attest--nothing beats specific training.  My "sit bones" felt awful after the "ride" so, I will have to earn the saddle butt callouses one pedal stroke at a time just like anyone else does.
Last night during dinner there was a crash.  My bike rack fell off the wall with both mine and Katie's bikes.  The rack itself took a chunk of drywall with it when it fell.  My first concern was the bike itself, as I have already broken 2 carbon fiber frames.  I haven't inspected it yet to see if it has any cracks.

Our rack looks like this, without the feet.  I guess I will be making feet for it to stabilize it.   So another item for the to do list along with some drywall repair and paint touch-up.

Katie has been doing some P-90X videos and we are going to get some spinnerval DVDs from Kevin Rozema to inspire some more trainer time.  The dread of the saddle is strong for both of us.  Hopefully we can get some quality-time in this week on the trainer.  We will continue to watch for falling bikes!

A day of training in the dirt and ice. Shadows and tracks of others joing us in our efforts

This morning I picked up my brother James for some training.  We rode the Barry Roubaix course on my tandem (White Lightning).  The Barry Roubaix is a gravel road race that also includes several miles of two-track.  It is located in the the hilly county of Barry just south of Grand Rapids.  For the last three years James and I have raced it on the tandem together and have really come to love/hate it.
There have been many rides, and many different experiences, you can say we have a history.  Here is a few favorites for the highlight reel.
1.  Finishing 4th place our 2nd year--only to realize that James had vomited all over my back.
2.  Breaking a chain, only to be rescued by other bikers with a tool (note to self, put a chain tool  in bag).
3.  Riding a massive downhill only to get the wheel ride into a frozen rut.  As I steered it out it failed, at 28 M.P.H.
4.  The ride where I bonked so hard I could not pedal any longer.  James Volunteered to  captain so we switched seats.  I was so exhausted and disoriented that I could not hold on to the handle bars and coordinate with James' pedaling, so I  fell off.
5.  Riding the two-track where the off road trucks had packed fallen snow into ice and we slid down the hill on our sides still clipped into our tandem-now-bobsled.
6. Last year's race we flatted with 15 minutes to the start of the race.  Flatted 2 minutes into the race and flatted again 10 minutes later.
7.  Last Saturday the Barry County Road Commission graded the roads churning up the gravel to a nice 2-3 inch layer of fluffy sand and dirt and stones like riding a scree field of glacial till on the beach in winter  we were filthy.   The effort it took felt like we were like riding in glue--smiles all around.

7.   The bike got so filthy that the drive train was coated and the chain broke at mile 10.  (Previously placed chain tool as missing from bag!) Which made for a long walk until a good Samaritan stopped and gave us a lift back to our car in Hastings, from the middle of nowhere.

 

So Barry Roubaix and I have some history.  The question of the day is what kind of ride would it be?
 It is supposed to get really cold this weekend thanks to a Canadian Arctic air mass that is coming.  (No offense meant to any potential Canadian readers out there, but I feel like this gets written to the closet, so if you object, do reply!)  So we figured it would be really cold and snow is probably coming--better get a ride in while you can, or end up on the trainer (a.k.a. soul drainer).
The ride began with the temps around 40 degrees, perfect!  The gravel was hard and smooth, what a difference a week makes back here!  In the shady spots the snow pack was more like polished ice.  We occasionally broke traction briefly in the rear whilst climbing, but such moments were rare and do little to get the heart rate moving. 
Where it gets more interesting is in the low sections where water often gathers and ruts that are frozen make for a rough ride.  (see #3 above as to why I care.)  We generally took our time more and just took it pretty easy on most downhills.
The first 2 track was where the chain broke last weekend and we rode it very gingerly, keeping light and constant pressure on the chain.  We did not have to dismount and it went just fine!  The next stretch included some downhills on chip-sealed pavement. We hit speeds around 35 MPH for most of it!  The next 2 track was much rougher.  When the thaw came the off road rednecks really tore it up.  There were many new ruts that made for some interesting moments and, several of the deeper puddles were just frozen solid. we dismounted twice for ice, so as to keep our clavicles intact.
After the 2 track we were on gravel for the rest of the ride and we were beginning to see clear tracks of another bike or two out there.
I began to think of other Sea-to Sea riders who were out training.  They are invisible to me, but I know that they are out there, just like these other riders.   It is encouraging to take part of something as big as Sea to Sea and think about the impact that it can have on the world.  However, as the hills continued to roll at us hard I stopped all beautiful thoughts of Sea to Sea and began to wonder when we find the car.  The course changed this year and this is the first time that we made it past the 10 mile mark on the new route, so we were still getting our bearings on the new layout.
Then I began to get discouraged.  This is hard.  Really hard.  Both James and I were cramping up after the 2 hour  mark.  We certainly were not being very smart in terms of nutrition--and now it was time to pay. 
We made it back to the car.  And we greedily drank our recovery Gatorade, but were still famished.  So we rolled into downtown Hastings and got a burger before driving home. More training.  It needs to happen.
Here is a link to the Garmin site where you can see where we were.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/263776340 
Thanks for reading.
~ Mark
If you would like to send us some encouragement we would love for you to donate to Sea to Sea for either myself or James

The journey of Sea to Sea begins!

Sea to Sea is a cross country bike ride raising awareness and funds to fight poverty.  The CRC and RCA churches have partnered together to form the largest cross-continental bike ride ever!
I wish we had participated in 2008 when the last ride was held, but the excuses were easy to come by.
This round of the tour 5 years later life is still very full.  Excuses are still abundant, but God's call to step out was also still beckoning.
Katie and I discussed this a few times and decided to pray about our participation for a week to hear what God had in store for us.   That Sunday was World Hunger Sunday, and God let us know.  Our pastor, Bob Huisman, said that he was glad that we were the kind of church community that our kids grow up involved and have constant reminders of what it looks like to serve.  Our biggest worry and excuse was about the girls.  Questions like who would take them, could we all survive without each other for an entire week?  God was giving us the reassurance to make the commitment to ride.
At school on Monday morning we get prayer partners.  Praying for me that week was Loralee Bruxvoort.  She asked what prayer requests I had.  I mentioned that we were looking for someone willing to take our girls for the week, could she pray that we could find someone.  She replied, "Sure, I'll do it!"  I guess sometimes we can pray together with our eyes open!  This was one of those moments.
So we are in!  We have registered and begun to raise funds.  Katie and I spoke at church today about the ride and we were asked to start this blog.

I hope that this will serve as a way for people to connect with us as we prepare and as we ride the tour.  Katie and I will both be posting here.