Background

Three years ago, pulp-fiction became a catalyst for personal change. "Four Days to Vera Cruz" certainly entertained and intrgiued me with the fictional travails of an adventure racer but it also peaked my interest in the sport all together.

While I was fairly active, I was moving into middle age on autopilot surrendering too easily to the Sirens of Sedentary Living and participation in the corporate rat race. Sure, I trotted out a few miles running each week (or maybe every two) and could still chase a soccer ball for a few minutes before finding a good excuse to ease up the chase ("I'm okay, not a problem, just a little sore from pushing away from the table last night, guys.")

That book got me thinking. And there's no doubt that subconciously, pending middle-age crises perhaps had some impact. But Phillips energized me and motivated me. I decided I had to try this sport (sans drug smuggling cartels with psychotic trackers).

Enter my friend, we shall call "Racer X". RacerX was equally bonkers and a match with our Type A physical proclivity to self-inflict pain. We liked to push ourselves. Little did we know we'd need it.

The stage was set. And we found our first trial: the Silver Sage, part of the Big Blue Adventure Race 12 hour race series. We trained (or so we thought) and found out how much we really needed to train more.

Fast forward 2 years. We're training for our 3rd year of racing and have steadily moved up and become pretty competitive for an amateur team. We ride hard. We learned to navigate effectively. And race more efficiently. We took on a personal trainer to help us train better. Sure, we're mid-40's, but not doing too badly for old farts.