About 30 years ago, my dad rode his bike across the country. He was able to secure seven weeks off of work, fly out to Seattle, and bike back home to Rhode Island. It was quite a journey and I grew up hearing all sorts of stories from it.
6 years ago, when I was a senior in high school, a family friend suggested he do it again. Suspecting that they weren't seriously committed to it, my dad suggested a bike trip to Maine. That person ended up backing out, so he made me and my brother tag along with him. The trip lasted six weeks and was an absolute blast.
Apparently, the desire to do this again was lingering. Because when I got furloughed a few weeks ago from a communications firm I was working at due to the pandemic, my dad told me he wanted to do the cross country bike trip again. At 58, he would only do it if someone went with him. I could tell he really wanted this and it was very appealing to me. He is a school teacher and has the summer off, so I had to wait a little bit for him to be on vacation. I had reservations about taking all this time off from working but ultimately concluded that I probably wouldn't have an opportunity like this again until my hair turned grey. So I figured I would take the leap and just do it.
I'm 23 and a year out of college. My career is not where I wanted it to be, but what the heck, this was a cool opportunity.
I was a cross country and track runner back in my high school days. When we did the last trip, I was in my physical prime and the trip was not very physically challenging for me. This time around, however, I was certainly not in that kind of shape.
Prior to this trip, the last time I had seriously ridden a bicycle was that trip to Maine. There had been a few quick mountain bike rides and short road rides, but nothing over 7 miles.
Contrast that with my dad, who prior to the pandemic, had been commuting over 40 miles a day round trip to and from work. He was using a Copenhagen electronic assist wheel, but still. He is also a serious mountain biker and had been training for this trip in the weeks leading up to it by biking 40 miles a session.
I knew I should've been training for this, but I figured the first week of the trip would be my training. I spent the time building up to the trip, preparing job applications, hanging out with friends (social distancing), doing a few upper body workout sessions, and going on a few runs. I did very little training for this.
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