Two months ago I challenged my friend, Adam, to a bet aimed at motivating us to get into shape for the snowboarding season. We awarded points for mileage and elevation gain, which we tracked using Garmin GPS devices and Strava's web application. (You can see the official log of our rides in this spreadsheet.)

I don't think either of us expected at the time how far either of us would go, what we would learn about oursleves, or how our lives were about to change. All told we combined to shed over 30 pounds while crossing over 3,000 miles and climbing 160,000 feet of elevation. Not bad for a couple of guys who were in no way considered cyclists before...

For those coming in at the end here are the posts from the first 6 weeks of the bet:

• The Great Bike Bet of 2011
• More mileage, camaraderie, and road rash as The Great Bike Bet of 2011 gets interesting
• Injuries heal, centuries are ridden, & my first 300 mile week *ever* as the Great Bike Bet hits the home stretch!

Adam Wins!

Well, Adam won, but no one really lost this one... Sure, maybe I'm a bit biased because I'm the one who didn't actually come out on top, but here are the cold hard numbers:

In six weeks of riding (one was lost to injury for me and work for Adam) I rode my bike 52 times, totaling 120 hours 6 minutes and 45 seconds of moving time on my bike (that's 5 days!), while covering 1,445 miles and 74,142 feet of elevation gain! In that same time Adam spun his wheels 35 times, riding 111 hours 8 minutes and 29 seconds, while covering 1,589 miles and 85,858 feet of elevation gain!

We rode our last ride of the bet together, doing an 80+ mile ride in Marin covering Alpine Dam and Paradise Loop while chatting about all we had gone through, what we had learned about ourselves, and what our plans were going forward.

The resounding conclusion we had both come to was simple... We are both severely prideful and imbalanced individuals, our bodies are capable of far more than anyone (including ourselves) had imagined possible, and we don't ever want to get caught in a contest of wills with one another again! As Adam put it, "Imagine what we could do if we put our minds to something useful!"

Congrats Adam, you are a complete bad-ass! I couldn't imagine that you'd respond the way you did to the pressure I put on early. Thanks for forcing me to endure more pain, doubt, and fatigue than I thought possible. It was more fun and spiritually refreshing than I could possibly describe! Thanks also to my friends, Karie (the most supportive girlfriend around), and everyone at work who put up with our shenanigans. I hope it was 1/100th as rewarding for you as it was for us.

Six weeks ago I challenged my friend Adam to what would become an epic cycling endurance contest. We track our mileage and vertical elevation gain using Strava and get points for every mile and 100 vertical feet we ride. (You can see the official log of our rides in this spreadsheet.)

You might be interested in my post on the first three weeks, "The Great Bike Bet of 2011". During those three weeks I built an early lead by coming out of the gate hard and setting the bar by riding 230 miles a week! Adam, to his credit, didn't let me pull away after my fast start. Picking at my lead little by little.

See also, my post on weeks four and five, "More mileage, camaraderie, and road rash as The Great Bike Bet of 2011 gets interesting." The highlight of these weeks being Adam's take over of the lead and my injury on a Point Reyes truce ride with him.

This is a post about week six, my first week back on the bike and the second to last of the competition. To say it was pivotal is an understatement!

My First Century

Saturday morning was my first day back on the bike. I still had a pretty big series of scabs, but I was feeling good enough to ride. I met friends at about 9 and set out across the Golden Gate Bridge and into Marin to ride the 100 mile ride that had taken me out the Saturday previous.

After riding a ways past Fairfax (about 30 miles) my support had to turn back as I turned onto Sir Francis Drake past the spot where Janice picked me up last week and into Inverness toward the hill on which I crashed. I arrived at The Busy Bee bakery around noon and hopped off the bike for some food. Realizing I had forgotten my debit card I turned pale, but the woman behind the counter told me not to worry, gave me my receipt, and told me to pay her on my next time through town. Without those calories the rest of that ride probably would have been unbearable.

I continued on past the spot where I had crashed the week prior and out towards the ocean. I turned back (stopping to shoot this picture of the Point Reyes cows) at the 50 mile mark and continued on through Nicasio, into Fairfax, got lost and found, and eventually stopped with 100 miles under my legs!

Adam rides 200 miles in two days, and I chip away at his lead!

While I was riding my first century ever, Adam was completing his second. Then, on Sunday, he repeated the feat! By the time Monday rolled around he had amassed a 346 point lead, the largest of the competition. So, I did what I had to and responded by riding 200 miles over three days, finishing the week with 300 miles (all over four days), and narrowing the deficit to 76 points on the strength of three 55 mile night rides of Paradise Loop!

After six weeks (three of which I beat Adam and three of which he beat me) we have each ridden more than 1,300 miles and ~70,000 vertical feet of ascent. With six days left to ride we are separated by a very slim margin!

Regardless, with effort and drama like that which we've gone through we've both already won. We achieved our goal of motivating ourselves to get in better shape. We've both become stronger riders, lost weight, and done things no one thought we could do. What happens next is anyone's guess!

If you aren’t in the know, let me catch you up. A month ago I challenged my company’s CTO to a bike-off. We’d track our mileage and vertical elevation gain using Strava, a cool website that let’s you visualize workout data collected on your GPS device or smartphone. We'd get a point for every mile and 100 vertical feet and keep a log of our rides in a spreadsheet. (Need to catch up on weeks 1-3? Check out The Great Bike Bet of 2011.)

So, things were off the rails... Neither Adam or I were what you could call a cyclist before the bet. Yet, here we were doing things novices aren't spotted doing all too often. Waking up early in the morning and riding Hawk Hill in the fog. Going on a 55 mile Tiburon ride on the way home from work. Riding a bike with platform pedals and cages 230+ miles a week for a month.

Adam was putting the pressure on by riding 511 miles in two weeks. Meanwhile, we were both getting weary, sore, and even a little sick of biking at times, but we were also learning new routes, experimenting with our gear, forming rituals, curing common injuries, reading magazines and blogs, and becoming initiated into the Marin cycling culture. 

Week Four: My bike starts fighting me.

In the first week I had gone through three tubes, a tire, a spoke, and a little skin. So, as I was telling my girlfriend how much easier everything had gotten she cringed warning me to, "Knock on wood, or something..." I laughed, but it turns out that maybe she was right. 

So, Sunday I went for a ride in the afternoon planning to go for a long Paradise Loop ride into the evening when I met Adam coming back from his ride! He and I chatted on the Golden Gate Bridge about his day and my plans before he went his way and I went mine. Then the first minor disaster struck. I got a flat on the bike trail and before I could fix it my CO2 bike pump exploded (see picture) stranding me only 14 miles into my ride. I sent an SOS text to Karie and got picked up. Adam had taken the lead.

The next day after work I went to ride P-Loop again, but about 20 miles in I hit a pot hole and popped a spoke off my rear wheel. I pulled the spoke off, saw that my wheel was only kinda warped and rode the rest of that night's ride and the next morning's 30 miler with a wobbly wheel. The bike was starting to make lots of unidentifiable noises, shifting improperly, and the brakes were almost non-existant. So, Thursday, after finishing up a 260+ mile week with another P-Loop ride, I took my bike in to get tuned up and fitted with clippies.

Meanwhile: We have day jobs, you know?

Getting up before the sun is not on my list of common activities. At Yammer, where I work, it's pretty much common knowledge that if you see me before 8 in the morning that there's a high probability that I didn't sleep the night before. But, "War does funny things to men." as Max Fisher (played by Jason Schwartzman) put it in Rushmore.

At about this time we were working hard trying to launch a daunting set of game changing features as part of Yammer 3. Adam, as the CTO, was incredibly busy working with teams of engineers, QA, and product people trying to get everything banged out on time. Meanwhile, I was working on building landing pages for our marketing materials and help troubleshoot sticky cross browser issues. 

So, our lives had become rather interesting... there was Yammer 3, cycling, eating, and sometimes sleep. Everything else was on hold.

Week Five: Drama

Well, on day one of week five I had what felt like a new bike. I had a new rear cassette, chain, brakes, pedals, handle bar tape, etc. So, for the first two days I just rode some short recovery mileage getting the lactic acid build-up flushed from my legs and dialing in my new pedals (because I've heard that one can get a nasty knee injury if you get this wrong.) Then, on Saturday Adam and I planned to ride a century to Point Reyes and back together. A truce ride with friends. A chance to not worry about points while pushing ourselves a little.

That's when the unthinkable happened... About 52 miles into the ride we were coming down a hill at about 30 miles per hour when I locked up my wheel and skidded through the other lane and into the shoulder. I was shaking and had a one-word vocabulary (guess which word.) I just kept repeating that word on exhale as though it was my meditation mantra... Dan, who caught the event out of his peripheral, came back up the hill to help me. He offered to help me put my chain back on. I thanked him, pointing out that my hands were, "F"ed.

"I hate to break this to you, but your butt is 'F'ed too!" he replied, fixing my chain (see picture.)

We hopped on the bike and rode another 12 miles in an attempt to get closer to home, but eventually got picked up and carted off to Dan and his wife, Janice's, house. My girlfriend picked me up and Adam rode the rest of the way with his GPS off out of solidarity. 

I felt totally dejected... Had I just lost the bike bet? Was this *really* the way this was going to go down? I couldn't believe it. The pain was ridiculous. I wanted to ride, but it was impossible. For the next few days sitting was excruciating, walking was difficult. Just the idea of riding a bike was painful.

What is Next?

All week I had the anxious feeling that I might be out of this thing for good. Adam, himself, was bummed out, because neither of us wanted to win this way. But, here I am today, with thirteen days of "The Great Bike Bet of 2011" left and a 130 point deficit. I can thank the product launch for taking Adam away from riding this week and he can thank my injury for keeping me from mine. Come tomorrow, however, we'll both be hopping back on our bikes and riding for keeps...

One thing is certain, things will come down to the wire!

Making the Bet

Then came a question from someone listening in nearby, "What about distance climbed?" Okay, we'd award one point for every mile and one for every 100 feet of vertical.

"So, what's the prize?" Something snowboarding related. A new Lib Tech snowboard? Cool, but not embarrassing. So, how about a new snowboard and the winner gets to write a two minute speech. The loser would then give this speech at work while presenting the new board! Everyone got a little giddy at the sound of that...

"When should it end?" Since Thanksgiving is the unofficial start of most people's ski season how about midnight on Wednesday before that? We had a bet, I was to be the underdog. 

Week One: Setting the Pace

I don't think anyone saw it coming... I just came out of the gate hard and before Adam had a chance to react I was 95 points ahead (375 to 280) with a 236 mile week including almost 14,000 feet of vertical. I managed to cross the 200 mile mark (the first time I've ever done even 1/2 of that in a week before) for the week on the Golden Gate Bridge. This photo was taken shortly after reaching the top of Hawk Hill.

For a contest that the "experts" within the office handicapped at 800 total miles, I was launching a "shock and awe" attack, upping the ante, but also paying the price. I had three flats, wrecked in the rain, broke a wheel spoke, and got hit by a car. Not to mention how my body felt...

Ending the week by playing in a game for Yammer's full court basketball team was perhaps a bit too much hubris.

Week Two: Maintaining

Week one was my first week on a bike for consecutive days in something like six months. Passing 230 miles was cool, but my legs were shot. So, I rested Thursday (the first day of week 2) and used a big weekend to do my damage.

I stored up biking supplies and food at my cousin's house in the Presidio and rode 130 miles, doing laps across the bridge and resting at my cycling command center that weekend! This photo was taken during a refueling stop at my secret bike depot just after the largest portion of my 85 mile Saturday.

Meanwhile, Adam was launching his own attack. A steady barrage of 30 mile rides (5 in three days) helped him pile up 252 miles. He lost another 9 points for the week due to all the vertical feet I rode, but he had recoverd and reached his own stride.

Week Three: Getting in Shape

During the third week I wanted to play with recovery rides, riding faster over some rides, and pounding hills harder on others. I managed to not lose ground by folding a ride to Santa Cruz into my Saturday plans to skydive. I started feeling strong on hills for the first time. I had a bit more pep in my step too, riding a noticible amount faster this week.

The photo was taken at Pescadero Beach along the way to Santa Cruz Saturday. It was a beautiful day (78 and sunny) and a rad ride along the coast! Then I jumped from a plane, landed on the beach, and watched the sunset over the ocean. Not a bad day!

But, Adam's 170 mile weekend briefly brought him to within a couple points of the lead. It was the first week where Adam scored more points than me (44), but he ended down by 60. I finished it off by making it my third straight 200 mile week on the strength of my last ride, a 55 mile spin ending at 9:45 pm. 

I'm certain it will only get more interesting from here. There are four weeks left, but in the first 21 days I've already logged 29 rides, 701 miles, 39,573 feet of vertical ascent, and lost 14 pounds. I have more energy, my legs are a lot stronger (when fresh), and I've slept much better. One fun side effect of the bet is that my vertical ascent for the month (starting with the bet on the 6th) places me somewhere around 150-170th of 2784 cyclists (changes realtime) in Strava's KOM Challenge. UPDATE: I ended the month in 169th place with 45,872 feet of vertical ascent.

Trying to stay feuled up, hydrated, and rested is a constant effort. The fear of overtraining is legitimate. I'm always looking for ways to allow my body to bounce back and heal. Sometimes I just try and ride at a pace I can maintain while not exerting myself at all. I soak in epsom salts, I try to stretch religiously, my girlfriend rubs Tiger Balm into my quads until *her* skin burns, and I eat constantly. I took my first day off in two weeks today (10/27), but have had other days where I've ridden small 5-12 mile recovery rides in the place of off days. 

What do I have planned this week? Will Adam keep crawling into the race? Will he take over completely? Will I make a move? I'll try to keep you informed. If the first three weeks are any indication, it's gonna be crazy.