GetGoing NC! » Kids

This weekend: surf, night hike give a Hoot

JoeMiller — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 17:30:14 +0000

We’re down to our last month of summer before the ceremonial start of fall come Labor Day. Get out and make the most of what’s left of the season.

Coast

Two weeks ago we suggested you check out the 6th Annual Reef/Sweetwater Pro-Am Surf Fest at Wrightsville Beach. If you did, we’re guessing you were intrigued by the thought of riding the waves on a long board. Intrigued, but perhaps at a loss as to how to take the first step toward participating in 7th Annual Reef/Sweetwater Pro-Am Surf Fest. Step 1: Enroll in surf camp, specifically the “Get Stoked Surf Camp” offered by Hot Wax Surf Shop in Emerald Isle. The 2-hour class begins at 8 a.m. and includes surfboard rental; all you need to bring are some cool surfing shorts (and water and sunscreen and a rash guard). $70.

Call 252.354.6466 or go here for more info.

Piedmont

It’s supposed to be cooler this weekend, but even in the low 90s you’re not inclined to head out into the mid-day heat. So don’t. Instead, wait until 8 p.m. and take a night hike with a ranger at Eno River State Park in Durham. The forest is a cool place after dark as a whole new contingent of surprisingly vocal wildlife emerges. Your ranger guide can help identify who’s who in this critter cacophony. The hike begins Saturday at 8 p.m. from the main park office. It’s free but participation is limited to 12; preregister by calling 919.383.1686.

DIY: Planning a backyard rec room

JoeMiller — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 17:46:05 +0000

Spence March has long been concerned over whether his kids are getting enough exercise. Four years ago, he enrolled them in a running program. And being a good dad and realizing that kids pay more attention if you practice what you preach, he enrolled with them. It was a good experience for all, but March wasn’t content to let it be a one-time event.

Like most parents, March likes the idea of his kids, ages 7 and 9, getting out to play in the neighborhood. And like most parents, he has his reservations about letting a 7-year-old and a 9-year-old roam too far. If they could only play outside, but close to home, he thought. The answer came to him when he read a post on this blog in May: “Recreational paradise … in your own backyard.” The post was based on a story in the New York Times about UCLA’s CLEF project. The Center on Everyday Lives of Families was created in the wake of September 11 to take an in-depth look at the lives of middle class Americans. Among their findings: Our houses are crammed with stuff, save for our yards, which go virtually unused. That post and a subsequent one looked at turning your backyard into the aforementioned recreational paradise. March wrote asking for advice. He was particularly intrigued by climbing holds we had anchored onto the supports of our second-floor deck. “I’d like to do a climbing wall or climbing net but I’m not sure how I could do it.”

GGNC’s Recreational Consulting Team decided to pay a visit. As we pulled into the March neighborhood, it was immediately apparent that this would either be a piece of cake or we would keep on driving and pretend we couldn’t find their place. Half the houses “I hope their house backs up to the forest,” my stepson/creative assistant Ben observed.

Fortunately, it did.

Hammer plywood to this end support, paint it something colorful, attach holds and you'g got your own personal climbing wall.

The March home is ideally situated. It’s on a relatively small lot, good for minimizing maintenance. And it backs up to a heavily-wooded greenspace that screams “play in me!”

“Do your kids bike?” I asked.

“Sure,” he said. “On the sidewalks, in the neighborhood..”

I laid out my plan for an off-road trail network that would wind through this backyard forest dominated by young pines. With a rake and a shovel (and perhaps a mattock to remove stubborn rocks and the occasional root) I described how he could create a short, fun trail network that would let his kids ride their bikes in the much more entertaining woods, sans car traffic. We even discussed throwing in minor obstacles, such as a log stack or a low-lying skinny.

“I like that,” he said.

March had already been busy in the forest. Two hammocks were strung between pine trunks, there was a new chin-up bar and a tire swing that had met with mixed reviews. “It tends to be more of a spinning device than a swing,” he said. A tetherball pole had gone over well until it wobbled itself out of the ground.

Still, he was taken by the idea of a climbing set-up.

“What about a low-ropes course?” Ben suggested. He went on to describe a low-lying — about a foot off the ground — web of cargo netting and cable that the kids could climb on jungle gym style.

“Is there a playground supply store around here where I could get some cargo net?” March wanted to know.

“You’re probably better off finding it on the internet,” Ben said, noting that it would likely be much less expensive.

We turned our attention to the deck off the back of the March home. Their house is built on a slope, a slope dropping significantly from the street to the back property line. Thus, while the deck comes off the main level, it’s a significant drop to the ground — too significant to anchor climbing holds to the supports like we’ve done at our house. At our place, if you drop, you fall a little more than a foot. Here, you’d be looking at a three-foot fall, four if you’re a typical 7-year-old.

I noticed Ben checking out the substantial corner support system, which consisted of braced 6-by-6 support posts about four feet across.

“Plywood?” I asked.

Indeed, the two sides could be covered with half-inch plywood six- to eight feet up the supports. Climbing holds could then be anchored into the plywood, which is how it’s done at many neighborhood climbing gyms. March was intrigued by the idea, but it was tempered by that tell-tale look of reservation at the prospect of tacking up plywood to the outside of your house.

“It could be done very creatively,” I said. “You could paint the plywood, and the holds come in some pretty cool shapes and colors.”

Don't forget that the backyard should also be an adult paradise.

We kicked around some more ideas, but it was 100 degrees in the shade (literally) and March seemed content — for now — with the trail, the low ropes course and the climbing wall. He’d have his hands full, his weekends accounted for, for a little while. He seemed genuinely motivated to turn his sedate suburban backyard into an outdoor playground. Still, we weren’t about to let him off the hook.

“Sound good?” I asked.

“Oh, yeah,” he said. “I think we’ve come up with some good ideas here.”

“Great,” I said. “We’ll be back in a couple months to see how you’ve done.”

We’ll report back in a couple months to see how March has done.

* * *

Resources
Intrigued by the notion of building a low ropes course, a climbing wall or a mountain bike trail in your own backyard? Below are some online resources that will provide direction. Obligatory warning: Any of the following projects can result in injury if not executed properly. If you don’t know a shovel from a saw, find someone who does and can do the job for you.

Climbing wall. Even if you aren’t a DIYer, the Instructables web site is great browsing. Here, you can find out how to build an incredible array of … stuff, including a climbing wall. The site has several tutorials. Your best bet is visit the site, then type “build your own climbing wall” into the search engine. You’ll not only learn how to make a wall, you can learn how to make your own holds.

Mountain bike trail. A general Google search on “build your own mountain bike trail” will turn up pages of DIY sites. If you want to do it right, though, we suggested you consult the folks who set the standard for fun and enviro-friendly mountain bike trail: the International Mountain Bicycling Association. Go here and learn everything from blazing a simple trail to building a ladder bridge.

Low ropes course. Perhaps because of the liability factor, you won’t find quite as many sites with directions for building your own ropes course. One that shows you some of the more popular elements of a low ropes course is the AdventureSmith site. Check it out here.

Photo: Spence March with his tire swing. And bird house.

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Aha! Proof that the BMI is flawed

JoeMiller — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 21:22:58 +0000

Those of you who are in great shape yet feel betrayed — and baffled — by your BMI, take heart. A study released earlier this month by the American College of Sports Medicine finds that you can be in great shape, yet deemed overweight by your BMI.

Seventy-one high school football players from seven schools were poked and probed in a variety of ways to determine their fitness levels. Based on their their body fat percent (or BF% in industry shorthand), 45 were declared of normal weight. But based on their BMI, only 26 fell into the normal category. Likewise, 18 were considered overweight based on their BF% and 21 using BMI as a measure, while six were considered obese under BF% guidelines, 24 when judged by their BMI. Said the ACSM: “These larger players’ muscular body composition may lead to overstated body mass indexes.”

Durham’s Solite Park: a Gateway to inner city mountain biking

JoeMiller — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 18:13:40 +0000

Problem: Most mountain bike trails are located away from residential areas, making them difficult for carless kids to get to.

Solution: Build mountain bike trails closer to where kids live so they can ride to the trailhead.

Granted, that would seem to fall into the “No ‘duh” category. But because mountain bike trails take up some territory, making urban trails happen isn’t as easy as it sounds. Postage stamp-size urban parks tend to have their turf eaten up pretty quickly with playgrounds, basketball courts and a ball field or two. Often, though, there are scraps of unused parklands that can be put to recreational use. That’s why the International Mountain Bicycling Association started its Gateway Trails program, a program that last week added it’s first Triangle entry, at Durham’s Solite Park.

By big-boy mountain biking standards, the Solite system is small. There’s about a half mile of trail as well as a “pump track” — a series of bumps and berms designed to be ridden on sheer momentum and body movement (hence, the pumping), alleviating the need to pedal. Pump tracks are seen as a good introduction to mountain biking for kids who sometimes don’t have the attention span or stamina for a three-hour ride on a 20-mile trail. What’s particularly genius about the Solite Park network is the park’s location — along the northern section of the American Tobacco Trail. This nearly 7-mile stretch of paved greenway links downtown Durham with NC 55, and ties in several neighborhoods and Hillside High School along the way. Kids, several of whom were at last Thursday’s grand opening, can easily and safely bike to the trail. Adults, too.

The trail came together quickly. It was announced earlier in the year, and was funded with a $7,000 grant from REI and $5,000 from Trips for Kids, an international non-profit with a Triangle branch whose goal is to get at-risk kids on bikes. The Triangle Off Road Cyclists shepherded the project; Durham Parks and Rec. played perhaps the biggest role by turning a blind eye to bureaucracy and letting the system proceed post haste. A good public/private/non-profit/corporate partnership: Bravo to all.

For a better sense of what a pump track is about, check out the video.

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Toolkit pries open the discussion on childhood obesity

JoeMiller — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 13:33:38 +0000

For the last 20 years or so, childhood obesity has been, almost literally, the 800-pound gorilla in the room. The room in question, unfortunately, has been the pediatrician’s examining room.

Despite the fact childhood obesity has reached almost epidemic proportions in the past quarter century — the percentage of obese kids in the U.S. grew from 6.5 percent in 1980 to 17 percent in 2006, one in three kids born here in 2000 stood a risk of becoming diabetic, the statistics go on — it’s been an issue rarely discussed at the annual well-child exam. According to a 2008 survey of its membership, the American Academy of Pediatrics found that only 52 percent of pediatricians measured patients for their Body Mass Index, an imperfect but general indicator of obesity. Even then, if their BMI indicated they were overweight or obese, 59 percent of pediatricians said they were reluctant to discuss the matter.

Why?

Some health care observers — and pediatricians themselves — say it’s because obesity is a sensitive topic. Parents can be in denial, they may take the diagnosis as a personal affront to their parenting, it may be a cultural issue — all areas that most pediatricians haven’t been trained to deal with.

Chapel Hill pediatrician Edie Bernosky believes the problem is more basic: Until recently, pediatricians haven’t had a good course of action to recommend to parents of overweight and obese kids.

“As part of a general practice, the goal is to talk about growth, development, nutrition,” says Bernosky, with Village Pediatrics. It’s only been through a plethora of clinical studies on childhood obesity over the past few years that solid recommendations have emerged to give parents. In 2007, the American Academy of Pediatrics took these findings and created a “physicians toolkit” to help its members address the issue. On Thursday, a similar toolkit created by the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association and Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina and tested for six months in five states, was made available nationally.

The BCBS Good Health Club Physician Toolkit was developed in conjunction with the American Diabetes Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics. The toolkit includes information specifically for physicians as well as handouts to give to parents on topics ranging from appropriate BMI ranges to health tips by age group to a weekly journal kids can keep.

“It’s important to be able to give something parents can take home from the office,” says Dr. Bernosky.

It’s important to keep in simple, too, she says. To that end, the toolkit emphasizes the 5-2-1-0 approach to healthy kid living. That is:

5 fruits and vegetables a day
2 hours — and no more — of screen time a day
1 hour of vigorous physical activity
0 sweetened beverages

Dr. Bernosky says she can’t emphasize enough the importance of handouts.

“Handouts help to raise the topic and open discussion. If you can send the parent home with more in-depth information it helps reinforce what was said in the office. It’s an important part of pediatrics.”

You don’t have to go to the pediatrician to benefit from the BCBS Good Health Club Physician Toolkit. All the handouts available through the program are also available at the Good Health Club Web site, which you can access by clicking here.

Photo: We’ll never know if Dr. Drake Ramoray would find a physician’s toolkit helpful since he was … canceled.

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Climbing the walls of our backyard playground

JoeMiller — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 00:33:39 +0000

A couple weeks ago I mentioned a report from the Center on Everyday Lives of Families at UCLA that found, among other things, that middle class American families have spacious backyards that they rarely use. This got me reminiscing about those halcyon days of my youth on South Boston Court when we did everything from play the World Series and Super Bowl (which hadn’t been invented yet) to tight rope and play endless games of hide-n-seek without leaving the block. And that got me to thinking about our own backyard today and how underutilized it is. Which spurred us to do some updating over the past couple of weeks.

The pool was a pre-existing condition.

OK, to be fair, that pool you see was already there. We lucked into a house with a small backyard pool that we have made good use of. The kids use it to whip themselves into an early bedtime, my wife swims laps in it, and I use it for 15 minutes a day to tread water. Actually, it’s more than just treading water: it’s 15 minutes a day of weightless physical meditation that does as much for my mind as it does for my body.

What’s new in the past two weeks is the climbing wall, which isn’t so much a climbing wall as it is a kind of rock climber’s monkey bars. Ever since we moved in, the kids and I have been looking for ways in incorporate a climbing structure into the house. They saw the two-story chimney as a natural; I saw it as a series of lawsuits stemming from my long history of not being able to drill and install firm anchors into mortar. Instead, we settled on the underside of our second floor deck, where a series of 2 x 8 supports and end beams seemed to offer a multitude of low-climbing (and thus, low-falling) options.

The easy part was finding the climbing holds. If you’ve been to a climbing gym, you know that climbing holds come in all kinds of shapes (some whimsical) and sizes (some requiring the finger strength of a Vulcan Nerve Pinch). At our neighborhood REI, I scored a set of 5 Metolius Drips Holds for $34.95. It’s a good starter set because, as prefabricated climbing holds go, these are big and easy. As our under-deck climbing gym blossoms, perhaps we’ll add a Vulcan Nerve Pinch or two.

The not-so-easy part was the installation. We were planning to anchor our holds into the 2 x 8s, but the hex bolts that came with the holds were only two inches long, long enough to anchor through a 3/4-inch sheet of plywood, the typical surface of a home climbing gym, but not long enough for our 2-inch-thick (1 1/2-inch in reality; a quirk of the lumber industry). We concocted a variety of schemes that involved building out a thin plywood fascia around the lower deck, schemes that all would have been laborious and all in violation of numerous local homeowner covenants. Then a friend said we just buy longer bolts.

So now we have the beginnings of our under-deck climbing gym. As funds allow, we’ll add holds (including some of those itty crimpers) which will allow us to work our upper bodies, especially our fingers, our hands, our forearms. The best thing: Most of these climbing workouts will be impromptu. Come back from a trip to the store — drop the groceries and climb for 10 minutes (5 if there’s ice cream). Head out to water the flowers, work in a 15-minute routine. Need to blow off some steam? Twenty minutes under the deck oughta do it.

It’s the best kind of workout: one you don’t even know what you’re doing.

* * *

So far, our backyard playground is coming together cheap. To date, it includes a pool (included in the cost of the house) and climbing wall ($34.95 for the holds, another $9.95 for anchor bolts and nuts). As we contemplate our next move, we want to hear yours. Tell us how you’re turning your under utilized backyard into your personal rec zone.

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Vote to refresh physical activity at school

JoeMiller — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 11:03:57 +0000

Imagine being able to improve the health of North Carolina school kids to the tune of $250,000, and all you have to do is log on to your computer every day this month. Details in a moment; first, some quick introductions.

Be Active North Carolina. Be Active NC is a non-profit aimed at getting more North Carolinians off the couch and: a) into the gym, b) onto the trail, c) out on the playground, d) all of the above. Among its various programs is Just Push Play, the goal of which is to go into our schools and revive the notion that a kid who is receptive to learning is a kid who gets at least 60 minutes of physical activity a day.

Pepsi REFRESH Project. Pepsi is giving away up to $1.3 million a month in grants — in amounts of $5,000 to $250,000 — to “people, businesses, and non-profits with ideas that will have a positive impact” in the areas of health, arts & culture, food & shelter, “the planet,” neighborhoods and education. Every month beginning in February, Pepsi has accepted 1,000 ideas from individuals, businesses and non-profits. The following month, the ideas are put to a public vote on the Pepsi Refresh Web site. Winners for that month are announced at month’s end. In April, for instance, the Kanzius Cancer Research Foundation received $250,000 to develop an alternative cancer treatment with no side effects, while boosters of the Ben-Gil Elementary School in Illinois received $250,000 to rebuild their school, which was partially swallowed by an abandoned mine one weekend in March 2009.

As you know, there’s a childhood obesity epidemic in this country that is particularly profound in North Carolina: the state ranks 14th nationwide in the number of obese and overweight kids, with more than a third of our 18-and-under crowd falling into those categories, according to the Trust for America’s Health. Be Active NC is trying to lower our dubious nationwide profile with its Just Push Play program; this month, Be Active is in the running for one of the $250,000 Pepsi Refresh grants to expand the Just Push Play program.

Currently, Just Push Play is in eight schools in the state: Rutherfordton Elementary (Rutherford County), Thomasville Elementary (Davidson County), Underwood Elementary (Wake County), Lowe’s Grove Middle School (Durham County), Glenn Elementary School (Durham County), Brentwood Elementary (Cumberland County), Contentnea-Savannah School (Lenoir County) and Chatham Middle School (Chatham County).

How, specifically, the program works varies by school. Each school received $10,000 to buy playground equipment, to improve their gyms, to buy heart-rate monitors and pedometers — basically, whatever they need to reintroduce the notion of physical activity to our kids. In addition —

Sorry, but I need time for a quick vent. Every time I write that line — “reintroduce the notion of physical activity to our kids” — I nearly pop a blood vessel. Back in the day, the teachers let us out once in the morning for recess, then turned us over once in the afternoon to a PE teacher to whom “PE” meant “Painful Education.” But we always returned to the classroom with tired bodies and alert minds. It’s just common sense: Let a kid burn off all that extra energy of that comes with being a kid and he/she is much more likely to remember when the Spanish American war was or how — Heaven help me — to diagram a sentence. Quick primal scream: AAHHHHHHHHH! There. Better. Back to our regularly scheduled post …

— Be Active NC works with the schools to change a culture that encourages dodging sweat instead of dodging dodge balls.

If Be Active NC’s Just Push Play proposal gets enough votes and scores $250,000 through Pepsi Refresh, Jodi Hubble, Be Active’s Director of Development and Communications, says they’ll be able to extend Just Push Play to 20 schools statewide. That’s 20 schools where the notion of more activity = happier, smarter kids has a better chance of becoming reality.

But Be Active’s proposal, which it put together with the help of the ‘nPlay Foundation, nplayfoundation.org/ needs your help. Currently, it ranks just 119th out of the ideas submitted for June. The good news is that it’s only June 5 — there are 26 voting days remaining. In the spirit of Al Capone politics, Pepsi Refresh allows you to vote, if not early, then at least often — once a day, in fact. All you have to do is go here, press the “Vote for this idea” button. You’ll have to register (or you can connect through your Facebook page). Then go to your digital calendar of choice, instruct it to remind you to vote everyday for the rest of the month, and for the next 25 days, take 25 seconds to vote for fit, happy kids.

And don’t treat it like a primary or a runoff election: North Carolina’s sedentary students need your votes.

Photo: Imagine what Bart Simpson could do if Principal Skinner would only give him recess.

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Beer for butter, unprotected support and other insights from the Burn 24

JoeMiller — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 14:59:42 +0000

I haven’t counted how many racers from the Triangle were in this past weekend’s Burn 24 Hour Challenge mountain bike race at Dark Mountain near Wilkesboro, but I couldn’t walk from our pit to the start/finish without running into someone from hereabouts. These are a few of the stories I picked up along the way.

Chapel Hill’s Steve Rogers may be the most sought-after teammate in the Triangle. He’s a solid rider, his race resume including TORC’s local 6-hour endurance series, it’s cross-country race series, assorted 24-hour races, the Pisgah Mountain Bike Adventure Race and the Shenandoah 100, to name a few. But the real reason to have Steve on your team: Risotto with shrimp in a light garlic sauce.

"I slave all day over a hot a stove and you complain because we're out of parm!?" Steve Rogers, left, behind hot stove, Kip Porterfield, lounging.

“When we first had kids,” Steve explained while slaving over a pot of pasta between laps for the Sofa Kings (34th out of 50, Male Team category), “the deal was, whoever got home first cooked dinner.” For the ensuing 18 years, Steve managed to get home first, and in the process became a pretty good cook. Still, you can’t always please the masses.
“We’re out of parmesan,” Steve announced shortly before dinner.

Teammate Kip Porterfield sighed. “Why do we even bring you?”

* * *
James Haskins is an animal on his single speed, but his true talent may lie in bartering. Steve Rogers’ aforementioned risotto was in jeopardy when he discovered he was short on butter. Off went teammate Haskins to score a stick in the tent city of roughly 1,000 (400 riders and at least twice that many support crew) that had sprung up on the infield for the weekend race.

When he wasn't searching for butter, James Haskins was sprucing up his all-white single speed.

“I found one at the second tent I went to,” said Haskins, who seemed more proud of that feat than of the laps he turned. What did he give up in return for the butter?
The ultimate currency among mountain bikers: A beer.

* * *

Late Saturday night (or was it early Sunday morning?) I awoke from a stupor to find the Triangle’s Wise Man of Wrenching sitting in the camp chair opposite. I’d heard a report that Team Cycle Surgeon had a team in the Coed category, and that the team was captained by the surgeon himself, Cary’s Matt Lodder. Still, it seemed like a dream that I now had direct access to one of the sharpest cycling minds of our time.
“I’m thinking about upgrading my road bike,” I said.
“How so?” Matt asked.
“A carbon fork, for one.”

John Holloway, left, and my knee listen as Matt Lodder dispenses his wisdom.

Matt thought for a moment, running my 1998 LeMond Buenos Aires through his databank. “Is the headset threaded or headless? And do you know if it’s one inch or an inch and one-eighth? Is your current fork steel or aluminum? Because if it’s aluminum, you may not notice much difference with a carbon upgrade.” On it went, until finally he issued his verdict: “By the time you get done upgrading your bike, it might be cheaper to just get a new one.”
We talked a while longer, then as quickly as he had appeared he was gone. Or had he really been there in the first place? Had I’d been dreaming? Had I conjured this Sermon on the (Bike) Mount?
Best not to take chances, I reasoned. The search for a new road bike begins this week.

* * *

Tent for people who fear laying down.

Chris White thought he was ahead of the game when he registered to ride the Burn last October. Then he got his pit crew pregnant. Chris, a member of the local IMBA mountain bike patrol, was planning on his wife being his support. But life happens, as the saying sorta goes, and Chris not only lost his support, he found what a lot of us already know: parenthood can put a crimp in training. In the last month, for example, he’d ridden a total of … not at all. Yet, he managed to turn 9 laps and finish 26th out of 31 riders in the Men’s Solo division.

* * *

Best team name: “Are You Faster Than a Fifth Grader?” manned by four 10-year-olds: Tyler Spears, Jarred Blevins and John Hamby of Wilkes County, and Nathan St. Clair of Gastonia. They logged 10 laps in the Male Team category, and by all appearances may have had the best time of anyone.

* * *

Flaming Marshmellow Pierce Holloway oatmeals up for his last lap in the wee hours.

Had the Triangle-based Flaming Marshmallows been named “Are You Faster Than a Ninth Grader, the answer for 15 of the 21 teams competing against them in the Coed Team category would have been “no.” The FMs — consisting of Luke Vrouwenvelder, Pierce Holloway and Ben Rice, all of the Triangle, and Sophie Clyburn of the Bethlehem, N.C., racing Clyburn family — logged 31 laps to come in 6th in their otherwise adult category. Nice job, little dudes & dudette.

* * *

The family that bikes together … Officially, their team name was Whitfield Family/Johnson Lexus. But ask anyone in the Triangle biking community and their name should have been Team Nicest People Ever. Congrats to the racing — and very nice — Whitfield family: Dad John, Mom Jill and daughters Elizabeth and Emily, who collectively turned 23 laps to place 16th in the Coed Team division. Now, about those 23 laps, Dad. The rules state that members of the minority sex on a coed team must ride at least two laps — did Team Nicest People Ever adhere to the rulebook?
“I think I’m good,” John said Sunday morning.

* * *

For most, an epic such as the Burn 24 is a goal. For Brian Martin it was a training ride. “He’s training for the Leadville 100,” support crew/wife Sarah said while standing with hubby after he’d turned a lap. What prompted that insanity? I wondered. “What made you decide to do that?” I asked. Brian shrugged and grinned. “The movie.” http://www.raceacrossthesky.com

* * *

Awaiting a teammate, sometime in the middle of the night.

The one person I wanted to talk to but didn’t get a chance: Lee Walker. That’s because Lee was busy pedaling 27 laps to win the Men’s Solo Division. That’s 27 laps on the hilly 7.4-mile course in 24 hours. His fastest lap: 41 minutes, 53 seconds, on lap 2. His average speed: 10.025 miles per hour — averaged, btw, over the entire 24 hours, assuming Lee never stopped. (I know he stopped once; his pit was across from ours.) Nice job, Lee.

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24 hours of guts

JoeMiller — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 15:21:25 +0000

The kids were doing the math, and the numbers weren’t coming up in Ben’s favor.

It was Sunday morning, around 9:30, and the fact that these 15-year-olds were able to do math at all was impressive. For most of the past 24 hours they’d been racing their mountain bikes at the appropriately named Dark Mountain near Wilkesboro, site of the 10th Annual Burn 24 Hour Challenge, a mountain bike race that began at noon Saturday and ran, straight through, until noon Sunday. During the past 12 1/2 hours, one of the 15-year-olds had thrown up twice during her middle-of-the-night shift-in-the saddle. One had severe stomach cramps early on after finishing a 7.4-mile lap on the hilly foothills course. One kept falling asleep in a camp chair and had to be awoken, for the third time, less than 10 minutes before his last lap. Yet at 9:30, working on maybe three hours sleep per person, their brains were working away.

“Let’s see,” said Pierce, “Luke’s out right now. “If he does a 38 or 39 [minute lap] he should be back around 10:25.”

“Or 10:15,” Sophie suggested. Luke’s laps were getting progressively faster, a contradiction for a 24-hour race, and the joke was that if they raced long enough he’d be registering times only achievable in a time warp.

“So he gets in around 10:25,” Pierce continued, Sophie, you’d get back about 11:10, then it’s my lap and I should be back by … “

I glanced at Ben, who sat spent in a canvas camp chair, his eyes closed. He’d just finished his seventh lap, which he and everyone else assumed had been his last. He’d pushed it hard, given it everything he’d had, crossed the finish in a sprint, then made a bee-line for the camp chair. He’d been absent from the discussion, but he’d been monitoring it closely. Before Pierce finished his sentence a small moan emanated from Ben.

“… by 11:50, 11:55,” Pierce continued. “That would let us get one more lap in.”

According to the rules of 24-hour racing, you may begin your last lap up until 23:59:59, a last lap that, having already raced for 23:59:59, most people would gladly pass on. But these were four 15-year-old kids, and there was a chance that if they put in that one last lap they could move up in the standings, from sixth to fifth. This lap — this lap that, according to the rotation, fell to Ben — could mean something.

Fifth place wouldn’t mean a podium finish. But these four kids, the Flaming Marshmellows, couldn’t care less. They weren’t competing against other junior racers, they were in the adult co-ed category, competing against 20 other teams, some with impressive sponsorships — Topeak, Cycles de Oro, Sycamore Cycles. These four kids were sponsored by their dads (and in Ben’s case, me, his stepdad). They were out to prove what had become obvious over the past 21 1/2 hours: That they could race with anyone.

I empathized with Ben’s groan. Six years earlier, at the last 24 Hours of Snowshoe, my five-person coed team was likewise running the numbers. Three members of the team had announced they were done earlier that morning, leaving Branson and I to split the remaining laps. I finished what I assumed was my last lap at 10:33 a.m. only to be met by a surprisingly fresh Branson, who took off like a jackrabbit. “Don’t hurry!” I yelled as he disappeared up the trail. But he did, turning his second fastest lap and returning at 11:54, six minutes before the cutoff.

I looked at Ben and wanted to tell him that, yes, he was dead tired, and yes, he had already ridden more than 50 miles of grueling singletrack in the last 23 1/2 hours, and yes, he’d done it on maybe three hours sleep. I wanted to tell him that no, he certainly didn’t have to go out on that last lap, that everyone would understand (and they would — his three teammates had all announced they wouldn’t go back out). But I also wanted to tell him what that last lap at Snowshoe had done for me. After talking with Branson and my teammates for five minutes and watching the clock count down to 11:59, after coming up with a million reasons against riding that last lap and not one for it, after being perfectly willing to accept, nay, embrace, my wimpiness, for whatever reason I clipped in and headed out. Immediately, I knew it was one of the best decisions I’d ever made. As I left the transition area, the announcer bellowed, “Team TIO is going out for one last lap with just a minute to go — and they’re in the Just For Fun category!” The 8-mile course, which was a quagmire due to torrential rains at the start, was now in near perfect shape. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky, I cleared sections I had to walk before, and for the first time in the race I passed other riders. It was, perhaps, the best ride I’ve ever had, and I returned to a hero’s welcome. Most importantly, though, is the lingering effect of that last lap. Whenever I’m in what appears to be an impossible situation, I think back to that sunlit lap that almost wasn’t.

I wanted to share my experience with Ben, but when it comes down to it you need to make the big decisions on your own. You need the clarity to look within; Chicken Soup anecdotes are only a distraction. You need to know you reached the decision on your own.

“I’ll ride,” Ben said, and he slowly detached from the camp chair and began preparing for his second last lap. When he crossed the finish after turning one his faster laps, I knew that look on his tired but ecstatic face. I knew that last lap would stay with him for the rest of his life.

Photo: A quick handlebar nap before heading out on the second final lap.

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Challenge yourself — to put a deserving kid on a new bike

JoeMiller — Fri, 28 May 2010 01:04:41 +0000

Picture this: You’re preparing for the MS 150, or Cycle North Carolina, or the Blue Ridge Brutal. It’s a Tuesday afternoon, about 4:30. You’re supposed to do a 6 p.m. training ride, a 30-miler at an 18-20 mph pace. It’s been a long day at work; You’re beat and what sounds like a much better plan is going out with some coworkers for a beer. Or two. Missing one little training ride won’t hurt, the little dude on your shoulder holding the pitchfork rationalizes. If only you had some added incentive to drag your lazy butt to the ride …

How about helping a kid get a bike?

It’s true: This afternoon’s 30-mile training ride could mean the difference between a local kid getting his or her first bike — or not.

Here’s the deal: Trips for Kids is one of three teams competing in the $100,000 Clif Bar 2 Mile Challenge. Each team automatically qualifies for $25,000 under the challenge; that last $25,000 will be given the team that rides the most miles between now and Oct. 31. Which is where you come in. Go to the Clif Bar 2 Mile Challenge — heretofore referred to as the CB2MC — Web site, click on “Red Team” and register. (It’s quick, easy, no salesman will call.) Then, every time you ride, log on and log your miles. If the Red Team winds up with the most miles, Trips for Kids gets $50,000.

How much of a difference could those 30 miles after work make?

“Every $325 buys a new bike/new opportunity for another kid to join us on a ride,” says Andrea Hundermark, who heads up Trips for Kids — Triangle. In addition to hooking up kids with rides of their own, Trips for Kids takes kids on rides, often to places they wouldn’t otherwise get to explore.

“We hold a lot of one-day mountain biking excursions for the kids in my school district,” says Hundermark, who lives in Durham. “Without fail, each ride ends with some fantastic stories from these kids — they couldn’t believe that mountain biking was actually something that was done in the woods, they didn’t know that so many trees actually existed, especially in their own back yard of Durham.”

Miles logged under CB2MC will go to the national Trips for Kids program, which has more than 60 chapters nationwide, including ones in Charlotte and Boone. Hundermark says the money awarded must be used to buy new bikes. The “2 Mile Challenge” name comes from one of the contest’s goals: To wean people from their automobiles and on to bikes. (According to Clif, 40 percent of all urban travel in the U.S. occurs within two miles of the originating destination, and 90 percent of that is by car. Two miles is a perfectly reasonable distance to bike, hence the 2 Mile Challenge, although longer rides — including that 30-miler you’re contemplating blowing off in favor of a pale ale — count as well.)

Now, the good news early in the CB2MC is that the Red Team (a k a Trips for Kids) is currently in first place. But the Gold Team (the Alliance for Biking and Walking) is a close second and the Blues (the Alliance for Climate Education) are not far behind. Plus, it’s very early in the race. Think of this as Day 3 of the Tour de France: We may be wearing the maillot jaune today, but anything can happen between now and Paris. Or Oct. 31.

So, what will it be after work, a beer? Or a new bike for a deserving, underprivileged kid?

Guilt trip courtesy my parents.

Photo courtesy Trips For Kids — Triangle/Danielle Riley

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