Congratulations to Larry Oslund who set the 24 hour Self-Supported Road record in the following categories: Male, 60-69, Recumbent. Amazingly this attempt ended on Larry’s 65 birthday!
Larry also set 8 other WUCA and Guinness records in these non-age group categories. All records set during this single attempt are listed below.
| Distance Event Kilometers | Time | Avg Sp (Km) | Avg Sp (Miles) | Men, 60-69, Recumbent , Self-Supported existing records | |
| 100 Km Road | 02:39:13.03 | 37.68 | 23.42 | Larry Oslund 64 03/30/2024 00:02:33:26.63 24.30 mph | |
| 200 Km Road | 05:20:11.49 | 37.48 | 23.29 | Larry Oslund 64 03/30/2024 00:05:07:51.29 24.22 mph | |
| 300 Km Road | 08:09:14.38 | 36.79 | 22.86 | none for 300 Km | |
| 500 Km Road | 14:11:09.47 | 35.25 | 21.90 | none for 500 Km | |
| Distance Event Miles | Time | Avg Sp (Miles) | Avg Sp (Km) | Men, 60-69, Recumbent , Self-Supported existing records | |
| 100 Mile Road | 04:16:44.73 | 23.37 | 37.61 | Larry Oslund 64 03/30/2024 00:04:06:44.26 24.32 mph | |
| 200 Mile Road | 08:46:35.75 | 22.79 | 36.67 | none for 200 Mile | |
| 300 Mile Road | 13:39:16.39 | 21.97 | 35.36 | none for 300 Mile | |
| 500 Mile Road | 23:40:56.08 | 21.11 | 33.98 | none for 500 Mile | |
| Timed Event | Miles | Kilometers | Avg Sp (Miles) | Avg Sp (Km) | Men, 60-69, Recumbent , Self-Supported existing records |
| 6 Hour Road | 139.510 | 224.519 | 23.25 | 37.42 | none for 6 Hour |
| 12 Hour Road | 268.528 | 432.153 | 22.38 | 36.01 | none for 12 Hour |
| 24 Hour Road | 506.328 | 814.857 | 21.10 | 33.95 | none for 24 Hour |
| Existing Record | |||||
| Oldest Male 500+ miles in 24-Hours | 65 yrs – 0 days | Mark Baloh 57 yrs, 42 days |
Larry Oslund – 24-hour Self-Supported Record Attempt Ride Report
500 Miles in 24 hours – It is the Holy Grail of an Ultracyclist.
Here is the story of my dream and quest for it!
My brief History with 24-hour events and Ultracycling
Feb 14, 2015 – My first 24-hr attempt happened at the famous Sebring event. This was my 2nd Ultra-event of my short and sad career so far. My first was a 247 mile effort in Aug,2014 on my (new to me) Cruzbike Silvo. At Sebring I was riding a Cruzbike Vendetta. It was literally freezing at the start and then at times through the night as well. I was off the bike 1h:36m mostly because of the cold that I was unprepared for. I finished with 430 miles – my farthest single ride. I was not super pleased, as I really thought I could do 500 miles on this try. I rode 255 miles in the first 12 hours – all non drafting of course. I was pretty strong for my age at 55, but did not really know how to go fast yet, how to fuel myself, or how to plan for 24 hours. I also crashed in a large crack on the raceway (on the last lap) and tore my right rotator cuff. What memories!
Over the next 10 years I trained hard, and rode in many Century, 12-hour, and even some 24-hour events. I was never able to truly finish another 24-hour event as something always happened to thwart me: Accident, injury, fueling, weather, mechanical. This window of time also includes a heart attack in 2022 (which sadly damaged my heart and left me with about 50% of my previous blood pumping power) and 4 stents.
For a more extensive read on my history with Cruzbike go here
To me, the 24-hr event was always something I kept dreaming about – however it did not take much reminiscing to remind me how hard it was to actually finish one well.
Fast forward to Jan 2024: I started riding a Century a day for a World UltraCycling Assoc (WUCA) challenge (90% indoors on Zwift) and got to a pretty good fitness level for a 64 year old guy with half a heart! This is the year I also took over the Sebring event. Since I could not ride in it, I decided to go down early and try a 24-hour record attempt a few days before the Sebring event. The only problem is that I did not think and plan early enough and was unable to secure the necessary officials and crew willing to hang with me for a 24-hour attempt. Two Sebring participants (Thanks: Robert Huiest & Andrew Clayton) had pity on me and agreed to help for the first 12 hours or so, but understandably they did not want to go through the night: just 3 nights before they were going to be riding through the night themselves in the Sebring event. Therefore, I had to settle for a 500km attempt. I did very well, amassing 278 miles in the first 12-hours, and 310 miles (500km) in 13h:35m. I would have only had to average 18.24 mph for the next 10h:25m to break 500. So close but yet so far, but I really had the feeling now I could probably do it.
In July (after still averaging at least 100 miles a day), I dipped my toe into Randoneering with Tor Hovland and rode the Sweden N-S event. This was a Self-Supported ordeal and we had to carry our gear. Imagine riding a 55lb Vendetta up 15% inclines – what a challenge, especially for someone who never really rides any real hills! But thanks to the amazing planning and encouragement from Tor, I was able to complete this epic ride. We completed the 1340 miles (with about 51,000’ climbing in 144 hours) and our goal was 150 hours, so that was a great result. Read about Length of Sweden here.
Because of these last 2 adventures, I once again got the itch to try and ride a 24-hour attempt and break that 500 mile barrier before my body just got too old and weak for the challenge. My feeble brain teased me that it would be easy compared to the Length of Sweden! In reality it was, but it was also harder in a different way since I did it alone and was not as fit.
A WUCA and Guinness Self-Supported attempt
Since WUCA has recently opened up Self-Supported record attempts for time and distance records I thought I might as well try the 24-hour attempt that way, then I would not have to worry about securing the necessary staff of people to help. Of course it is harder because you have to do everything yourself, and anytime you stop to do anything you are losing miles. In a supported attempt you get to have a crew follow you – hand you food, etc. You never have to stop unless you need to. Then I thought: “It would be really cool to end the attempt on my 65th birthday. If I broke 500 miles, then I could also claim the Guinness title of “oldest male to ride a bike >500 miles in 24 hours”.
So in late Sept, I sold myself on this dream and began to plan and test for it.
I had continued to ride about a Century a day (mostly on the trainer while working but not as hard) so I was still in pretty good fitness, but nothing close to what I had in March unfortunately. This was partly due to many vacations to visit family kind of far away.
Here is a graph of my fitness level for the last year.
This chart is a rolling 6-week average of training stress. (You would get 100 points if you ride 1 hour at your maximum power, and linear less per hour at different levels below that.)
The far left is 1 year ago – when I started riding and training more regularly. My fitness level was 85 on Nov 21, and it rose to 184 on Mar 3, 2024 before I started tapering for my Sebring 500 km attempt. You can see how I quickly went down in fitness from that point on. My fitness level was at 133 when I started the Length of Sweden ride on July 6. That ride itself – since it was so hard and long, raised my fitness level to 169 by July 12. You can also see the huge dip my fitness took when I did no riding at all for the last 2 weeks of Aug (while on vacation) where it was at about 120 – It has stayed at that level more or less until I did this 24-hr attempt on Nov 12.
Where I rode
The route I picked was a 1.13 mile loop in my subdivision. They had just paved it this summer and the asphalt is still really nice and smooth There are no stop signs, and the only real encumbrance to speed is the sharp left turn back onto the loop at the southern end. I started riding this route a lot and even did several multi hour rides in total darkness to get a feel for the route at night. It is also really nice that it is only 1 mile from my house. Probably the worst part of this course is the 20+ manhole covers sporadically placed for maximum surprise. Sadly, when they laid the new asphalt, they did not raise the sewer top levels. Therefore each one represents a bone-jarring-bike-rattling 1” drop, and then immediate 1” rise. If you are not riding tubeless you would get a pinch flat every time you hit one! I knew where they all were after all my test rides, but that did not stop me from hitting them if I lost focus for just a few seconds. The other really irritating part of this course was the left turn. I did not have to stop, but the cars coming the other way were supposed to. Sometimes they did, sometimes they didn’t, and sometimes they just kept creeping forward into the road making it harder for me to turn and forcing me to slow down a lot to make sure there was not a collision.
Here is a map of the course I rode 445 times during my attempt: I rode this loop CCW. The water to the right is the sound – about ½ mile further right is the Atlantic Ocean.
Part of doing a WUCA Self-Supported time or distance record attempt like this was to get the course surveyed to the exact length. This means measuring the shortest possible distance it could be ridden: to the cm. (note: Garmin or Strava GPS are not really accurate enough and usually are a little high). I also had to have a WUCA official follow me and video a 1-hr “test ride” around the course on the bike I was going to ride. I also had to collect all atmospheric data, my weight, and also collect and provide my Power and HR data. All of this data must be submitted to WUCA prior to the event. This gives them a baseline of what the rider’s capabilities are – and really helps prevent someone from cheating since they also have to collect power and HR data during the attempt and submit as part of the evidence.
Next was to get together everything I was going to need: Basically a backup for everything. Complete bike, GPS unit, batteries, shoes, clothing, cleats – anything that could break or stop the attempt. Then I tested doing pit-stops and swapping out bottles, fuel, etc. I got to where I could do it in about 90 secs, but never tried it at night (or super tired), which ended up taking me longer during the actual attempt.
I started tapering about a week before the attempt. I did a pretty long and hard effort (200 miles) 8 days before and slowly reduced the effort and the time through the week. It is a great feeling to be that rested and ready to go. It gives you something extra for the first 4-6 hours, but after that you are really just riding on empty and you have to push through it.
I spent most of Monday (Nov the 11th) getting everything totally ready (even mixed all my fuel bottles) and loaded both bikes in my van. Historically I have had huge issues falling asleep and getting much rest before major events like this, but I made sure I did not rest much or ever take a nap this day. I went to bed like normal about 9:30pm. Due to the time of the year I knew it would have to be 7am to be light enough for no headlight so I was prepared to start about that time. It also gets dark enough to need a light at 5:30pm. That is the downside of doing a 24-hr during this time of year. Thankfully I fell asleep within 30 minutes and felt like I slept pretty well. I woke up about 4am and decided right then to just get up and get going and figured I would ride at least an hour before sunrise.
I cooked and ate my normal breakfast of scrambled eggs, ham and cheese, with OJ. Then I made my egg-salad sandwiches for the attempt, and packed all the other food items I would need. I Gathered all the fuel bottles from the fridge and loaded everything in coolers and into the van (in the dark of course). I collected all the USB storage banks that were charging that I would need during the ride, my phone, Garmin, etc. Then I did my normal 10 minute stretching exercises which I do every morning before I ever ride. This entire process took me over 90 minutes – but I was not really trying to hurry – I was more concerned about being thorough and not forgetting anything. More important now since this is a Self-Supported attempt and I could just not call Gayle and have her bring me something later.
At about 5:30 am I finished all my packing and left for the course location in my minivan. It was kind of surreal: I had been planning and dreaming of this moment for a long while and here it was right in front of me. So different from every other event I have done – since there were always other people around. Odd loneliness, quietness, peacefulness. I drove around the course and blew off some of the areas that had large mounds of pine straw laying around, especially on the turns. I also removed all the pine cones, sticks, gum balls, and other debris I could find that may give me an issue if I hit it. I parked my car in the parking lot on the north end and got my bike out and got everything on it I needed: Garmin, light, batteries, phone, camera, 3 bottles of fuel, etc. I took off on my Cruzbike down toward the start line, which was a white piece of duct tape I put down yesterday about 100 yards from the left turn at the south end of the course. I pulled up to the start line and came to a stop: as all attempts must be started from a dead stop. I adjusted my front light to point a little more up so it illuminated farther down the road and I was ready. I double checked that my Garmin, phone, and camera were all functioning and plugged in – closed my eyes, said a short prayer, hit play on my worship music, hit the start button on my Garmin, and took off on my quest! It was about 5:50 am, Nov 12, 2024.
I quickly made the left turn and started picking up speed to my target speed when I heard a faint ticking sound. I turned my worship music off and realized it was more than ticking, it was a knocking! I stopped pedaling and the knocking stopped. Pedaled again and heard it. My pedals or shoes were hitting something – good grief! I kept riding easily and stopped at my minivan at the top of the loop to investigate what it was. It turned out that when I adjusted my front light (that happened to be right in front of my pedal) that I rotated it back too far and the bottom of my pedal was hitting each time it came around. I re-adjusted it and no more knocking. Nice! I decided to start over since I had not even ridden a lap, so I rode back down to the start line again and stopped. Zeroed everything out, and started again. It was now 5:57am. Now I was really off and going. What a weird beginning!
It was really nice riding at this time in the dark – not many cars and not much wind. I was able to average about 23 mph during the first hour. The only issue with the night riding is making that sharp left turn at the bottom of the course. This is because they have installed a huge spotlight to illuminate the neighborhood sign at the corner. It is in a position that blinds me right before and during the turn. What I had to learn to do was to focus on a reflector on the road that I know matches the road I am turning onto. I aim for that reflector and lean the bike – when I can finally see I am hopefully near in the middle of the road and adjust as needed. It works great when no cars are there. This is also the “power” spot of the course. Since I always coast up to and around the corner I need to pick the speed back up, so it is like a little 15 second mini-sprint every lap. What makes this left turn harder is when there is a car or truck at this corner and they have pulled right to the edge of the road. Then I am even more blinded and have to slow down even more in case they decide to pull out in front of me (This happened many times). Even if they did not pull out in front I still had to usually slow down more because I need to be ready if they did. Luckily this did not happen all the time, but in the 445 laps I rode this loop, I would estimate that I had to deal with cars or trucks about 75 times. It was a little frustrating and of course slowed me down some each time it happened. During the day I was not blinded, but it was more of an issue making sure the vehicle actually saw me.
OK – back to the attempt. During the 1st hour in the dark I managed to average about 23 mph which was very good for night riding – but I was also very rested. About 8am a security car stopped dead in the road with its flashers on. I thought for sure they were going to flag me down, make me stop and ask me what I was doing or make me stop for some reason. I called someone at the HOA I knew and asked them to call the chief of security and tell them what was happening. I did ask for permission to do the attempt and to park overnight in the parking lot and was assured I would not be bothered (or asked to stop) during the attempt. They never flagged me down or asked me to stop but they were stopped dead in the road for at least 15 minutes. This was rather dangerous as it was my lane they were in and I had to pass them into the oncoming lanes 4 different times. Later I found out the security officer had to chase down, capture, and move an alligator from the area! Yeah – this is kind of a common occurrence in my subdivision! Then at about 9am (3 hours into the attempt) a huge street sweeper showed up. Another traffic hassle and safety issue which I thought riding on this small loop in a private subdivision would be free of! The big sweeper would stop with no warning, do U-turns in the road, and drive straight down the center scrubbing and vacuuming up everything. It was pretty stressful having this around for the next 2 hours as it drove in and out of each side street and up and down the road at least 3 times. But I will have to admit, it was really nice to have all the stuff off the road, especially when it got dark! Even with that, by the time my attempt was over, the windy conditions and just general autumn leaves falling had dropped a lot more. Even through all this action, I continued riding this course for 6 hours non-stop, taking a drink from my fuel bottle every 15 minutes. I did not eat anything. At the end of 6 hours I had ridden 140 miles with an average cadence of 96 and average speed of 23.3 mph! I was very happy with that result, and of course dream of doing it 3 more times! Yes, only a dream!
Now came the first stop to replenship my fuel and batteries. During my testing I did not test changing out my batteries and re-hooking up my cameras, light, phone, Garmin, so it took longer than I expected – Even then I was able to do it in just under 3.5 minutes. Now it was 11am -and partly sunny and I had enough fuel for another 6 hours. My plan was to only stop for fuel every 6 hours, as the case I built for the back could hold 4 – 32oz bottles. I also took 2-½ egg salad sandwiches, a bag of grapes, and a bag of orange sections.
And off I went for the 2nd 6-hour set. It was about 11 am now, but a pretty nice day so far – it was cloudy until about 10 and now nice and sunny. About 11 am the wind picked up some – and this made it a little tougher and of course, slower. The top of the loop is right on the NW side of the sound – and the wind can get pretty brisk. Once the wind started up, my speed dropped to about 22 and of course as I was fatiguing my power dropped too. Also, my double vision reared it ugly head as it always does when I start getting tired. So at the start of this 6 hour set, I was riding with only 1 eye! (But if I could do the 6 days of Sweden N-S with 1 eye, I guess I can suffer through 18 more hours of it here) For the 2nd 6-hours I averaged 21.6 mph (but this also included my break time – on both ends) – My cadence averaged 90 for this period. So now after 12 hours my average was 22.5 mph with a distance of 268 miles, My power avg was 1.7 W/Kg, HR=137, cadence=93 – Total stopped time about 5 mins. It was also totally dark by 5:30 pm which was the last 30 mins of the first 12 hours. Interestingly, each 6-hour set had at least some dark conditions to ride in. My good friend Tor Hovland (from Norway) called me at 3pm and we talked some – that kept me busy for about 3 laps – Thanks Tor!
At my 2nd stop, I switched out all my bottles, food, batteries again – It took about 5.5 mins. I did not take any sandwiches with me this time as I could only eat a ½ during the last 6 hour set and I could not swallow it well.
Now I started my 3rd set of 6-hours at 6pm – It was fully dark now – but since it is still pretty early there was plenty of traffic to dodge for about the next 2 to 3 hours. And of course I get to do that “blind” turn about every 3 minutes at the bottom of each loop because of the sign light. An hour into this set I realized I forgot to take a caffeine pill, so I stopped at hour 13 to do that. That stop cost me almost 2 mins but I got on the bike quick and back up to speed. After the traffic died down and I did not have to worry about dodging vehicles at the turn, it was a lot less stressful but I was starting to feel pretty tired too. Up to this point I had been listening to fast paced worship music on my Noxgear 39g speaker. I had installed the “Audible” app on my phone and bought a couple books for this ride and decided to listen to one of them for a change in pace. Well I got that change in pace and did not like it! It slowed down more than I wanted – possibly because I was focusing on what I was listening to too much. So that lasted about 10 minutes and then I turned the worship music back on and worshiped with it the rest of the 24 hours. This is my “Happy Place” while riding – no doubt about it! Next thing to deal with was my stomach. It was starting to tell me it did not want any more calories. (I normally start refusing fuel after about 14 hours) and I knew if I stopped fueling entirely I would eventually crash and burn. So even though I was nauseous I still tried to take in as much as I could without getting sick enough to vomit. Thankfully during this 6-hour set I enjoyed the distraction of quite a few friends calling me, chatting a short while, and wishing me luck. John & Laura Crawford, Jim & Maria Parker, John Burrell, Vaughn, and David R (who lives in my subdivision). It is so neat that friends could actually talk to me while I was doing this incredibly long ride! My wife (Gayle) also called me to check on me and encouraged me when I was probably near my lowest point near the end of this 3rd 6 hours. I was feeling sick, tired and did not think I was going to be able to go hard and fast enough to get 500 miles. It was nice to have everyone to talk to to encourage me along the way – especially since I could not receive any physical help. At midnight, my 3rd set of 6 hours ended. I averaged just over 20mph (with breaks factored in), on 1.44 W/KG, HR=122, Cad=84. For all 18 hours my averages were: 21.7 mph (387 miles), 1.74 W/Kg, Hr=132, Cad=90. My total stopped time was about 10 min. Not too bad for 18 hours.
Starting the final 6 hours at midnight with my final break – it was about 5 minutes and I can remember losing my balance and almost falling over when getting off my bike to open my van. But I refueled and got back on. Now it was getting tough, but I also knew I was much closer to finishing than 6 hours ago when I was only half way done. After my break, my mileage was 386.8 and I had 5h:54m to do the last 114 miles in. That meant I had to average about 19.2 mph. Now I had my final goal in sight and what was needed to accomplish it. The wind started to blow harder as expected, and it was at around 10 mph – and slowly increased to at least 15 mph by the end. I swear it felt more like 25mph as I was passing the sound on the top of the loop. This of course was going to make 19.2 mph more of a challenge. The wind was so fierce at times at the north end it nearly pushed my bike over as I passed that spot. I always had to hold onto the handlebar drops with both hands in that area! 2 other friends called me just after midnight – Gerry E & Cliff F – Thanks guys – it was great encouragement. I remember not talking long as I knew I needed to stay focused because of the wind and fatigue. The temp was also dropping, from a high of only 73 to the low of 55 F, which is not bad riding temps at all. It is odd how your body tries to get you to quit – and this is when it tries to do it!. You pretty much have to tell yourself: “No – I am going to keep going – no matter how tired I am or how much it hurts”! – that is because it really doesn’t hurt like something is broken, it just hurts because you keep telling it to do the same thing and it is tired and sore. Another thing I remember in these early morning hours of this final set was that I shifted to a harder gear and for the first time was really pressing on the pedals with more force. So instead of spinning near 90 (which I averaged for the first 18 hours, I now was doing only about 70-74). This also reminded me to keep the pressure on – literally.
In this last 6-hour set, I did not once feel sleepy. I think the main reason for that was pure fear! This course is really technical: Staying away from 20 man-holes, turns at least every 15-20 secs where you could ride off the road, and of course the scary blind turn every lap – All these just raised the “danger” aspect enough to keep me wide awake. There were probably a dozen or more times I lost focus for just a couple of seconds and came perilously close to going off the edge. I was really lucky in those instances I did run off the road because who knows when an alligator is waiting for you in a wet ditch! However I did hit those man-holes plenty enough times to make me mad, yell at them, and wonder: “Is this the time my tire is going to get cut”. It never happened though, thank the Lord! To motivate myself during this hardest set, I was always watching my lap times (in groups of 10 – which was about 33-35min) – and making sure I was keeping my pace with what I needed. I never felt like I could let up either so I just plodded along like every pedal stroke was needed to make the goal. It wasn’t that close – but you never know what is going to happen. You really don’t!
The final push and the big black truck
Just after 5am – with about 1 hour left, there started to be a little traffic again as the early risers were getting off to work – but not much. However, right at about 5:30 am just as I was about to make that blind left turn, a large black truck pulled up to the stop-sign right before I came to the turn. He had his bright lights on and as I started doing my “blind turn” (with one eye of course) – the worst possible thing happened: I lost my balance and never came out of my turn and crashed into the back of the truck! Yes, NO JOKE!. I was stunned, laying on the ground – my left knee was screaming at me and the guy in the truck rolled his window down and said he was going to call 911. At that point I just thought my knee hit his rear rim or rear panel. I stood up, did not feel or see any blood spraying from me – and told him I was ok and that I was doing a record attempt and was going to keep going if my bike still worked. (even though I did not really know if I was OK or not – I was able to stand so at least I knew my leg was probably not broken). Of course he knew nothing about what I was saying – how could he. I was desperate to just get on the bike and keep riding, I did not know how many miles I really had, but I knew I was not up to 500 yet. Thankfully the bike still rolled and the cranks still spun – so in under 1 minute I was riding again – and at this point I was wide awake and full amounts of adrenaline pumping through my tired veins! After the fact – and looking at the ride data, I see that at this point in the ride, I had ridden 437 laps (at 23h32m) – which was 497.2 miles. It would have been disastrous if I could not have continued. 497 miles is a great distance for 24-hours, but anyone seeing that total would naturally feel bad for the rider that they were not able to do 500!
So I just kept riding like a scalded cat – knowing I was very close but really needing to finish out the whole 24-hours to make sure of hitting my goal. The guy I hit left and went and reported the accident to the security officer of our subdivision. With about 5 mins to go, they tried to flag me down to stop me, but I refused as I knew I just needed to ride a little more than 1 lap. I am a little surprised they did not try and block the road. Thankful they didn’t because I probably would have had to stop. When I finally stopped after 24-hours, everyone had left and there was no one to talk to about the accident.
I accomplished my goal of riding more than 500 miles in 24 hours! Woohoo!!
Stopping at 6am was kind of anti-climatic – it was still dark and no one was around – there was not anyone to take a picture of me with my bike. I guess that is what Self-Supported truly feels like! Alone at the start and alone at the finish. However there is nothing that would prohibit people from sending you off and being there when you finished. It just did not happen for me since I started and finished so early and in the dark.
I loaded my bike and all my stuff in my minivan, drove along the course and picked up all the bottles and other things I tossed off in a ditch, and then drove the 1 long mile home! I got home and stepped into the guest room shower with hopes of getting to bed for a quick nap. When I came out Gayle said the security officers came to the house, woke her up and wanted to see me. She didn’t know I was in the shower and she told them I was not here. Then they showed her my van. She did not know what was going on or where I was. She forgot to look in the guest shower for me and told them she did not know where I was. When I came out, she said they had to talk to me about “the accident” – which I then had to explain to her. So instead of going to bed, I called them and went and met them so they could take my statement for the accident report. The next day, I had to go and talk to the head of security – that was fun – not. The guy that I hit said I scraped down the entire driver side of his truck – which I totally do not remember. I of course offered to “make it right” which will certainly raise the cost of this attempt a little. 🙁
I want to thank my friends at Cruzbike, World Ultra Cycling Assoc (WUCA), and my church family at Christian Renewal Church (CRC) for encouraging me to dream, train, and attempt this special goal. Special thanks to good friends: Jim & Maria Parker, John and Laura, Cliff Federspiel, Andrew Thompson, Gerry Eddlemon, Dave Rosenburg, Duane Ball, and Vaughn Thorton for calling me while riding. Super Special thanks to my wife Gayle, not only for putting up with my riding obsession but also with me in general and for taking a few videos of me while I was on the attempt. Thanks for other pics and video goes to David Roseburg who lives in my subdivision and rides the same roads I do!
And of course final thanks and praise to my Lord Jesus Chist. Those that know me know that I am a Christian and my ultimate goal is to give God glory for everything. He gave me this love of cycling to spread His love and Good News around to those he puts in front of me.
I would like to end with one of my favorite quotes from the “Chariots of Fire”:
“I believe that God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast and when I run I feel his pleasure.” Eric Liddell
Check this link out for more really interesting information about this quote and Eric Liddel
I just love this quote and just changed the word “run” to “ride” for me:
“I believe that God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast and when I ride I feel his pleasure.” Larry Oslund
It doesn’t matter what you have found in your life that God gave you to feel his pleasure – it is your “Happy Place”. He has a purpose in it, and to be sure it is not only for your happiness, and His pleasure, but ultimately it will be for His Glory!
1 John 3:16-18
16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. 17 If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? 18 Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.
1 John 4:7-12
7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
I also did this ride and attempt in conjunction with a fund raiser for Julia and Lorenzo, who live in Honduras. They lost their home earlier this year to a river that undermined their foundation. I am raising money to buy safer land and build them a house. If you have given, I thank you and bless you for it. If you have not, please prayerfully consider it.
Here is the link with more info: https://gofund.me/b5a8fa09
Mostly useless but otherwise interesting data:
Total Miles: 506 (certified distance)
Avf W/Kg: 1.67
Avg HR: 115
Avg Cad: 86
Age: 65
Rider Weight : 135 lbs (61 Kg)
Total weight of bike, gear, and rider: 183.2 lbs (83.1)
Bike Ridden: Cruzbike Magic
Seat angle 15 degrees
Crank length 145mm
Temps: 55-73 F
Humidity: 69-95%
Barometric pressure: 29.99 – 30.25
Wind: 0-13 mph
Fuel for the ride:
Prepared and ready to use:
- 200oz of gatorade (3 diff flavors)
- 96oz iced coffee, with sugar, creamer, choc syrup
- 100oz of sweet tea (caffeinated)
- 60oz of water
- 6x ½ egg salad sandwiches
- 3x sm bags of grapes (total ½ pound)
- 3x sm bags of mandarin orange slices
What Actually used:
1 cutie orange (it was bitter so I did not like it)
145oz of gatorade
48oz of iced coffee
36oz of sweet tea
No plain water
2 x200mg caffeine pills
3x 1/2 egg salad sand
1 sm bag grapes 1/6 lb