How does one start writing-up an epical bicycling adventure that starts in the suburbs of Paris and traverses to the coastal town of Brest and back in 90 hours? It is difficult enough to remember exactly what happened right before, during and after those 90 hours, the whole ride seemed a blur. Here's what left a lasting impression.

I stood in line at the start for about two hours to ensure I was in the first "90 hour" velo group to be let loose at 10:00 pm on Monday, August 18. I felt fresh and excited, and I had just about peaked in my training for the year, in spite of the slight training detour with my cycling accident in June. It slowly became dark, but it was not too cold out. The street around the Gymnase was packed with spectators, cheering us on as the announcers (French and American) gave their last minute instructions and provided commentary. It was exhilarating to start pedaling around the first roundabout and proceed down the street. We had a police escort for about the first 15 km. I had ridden the first 40 or so km of the route the proceeding Saturday, so it seemed somewhat familiar. My mind jumped back four years to the first time I did PBP, and the sensation of the departure was fresh in my mind.

All through the night, the country roads were packed with cyclists. Red taillights could be seen far into the distance, and the immediate area was illuminated by a myriad of headlight models. Even at that late hour, there were people sitting in chairs on the side of the road in each small village cheering us on. I briefly stopped in a village that had a bike shrine and marveled at the enthusiasm of the French people in their support of PBP. At one point we were entertained by one of the SAG vehicles playing upbeat Dixie music. The first stop was a "Revitallement" at Mortagne au Perche - not an official Controle on the way out, but none the less, most of us stopped there briefly. I arrived there around 2:30 am Tues. morning. I had met up with Ron, Don and Ken a little while before, and we drank tiny cups of espresso. The next stretch to Villaines la Juhel gave us our first sunrise, and I felt rejuvenated and eager when it got light enough to see the actual countryside we had been riding through. We passed by many dairies along the way. Somewhere along that stretch I met up with Ivo Miessen, a guy from the Netherlands whom I had met the previous PBP. I recognized him in his Esperano jersey. This year, he was apparently riding with the Danes. I arrived at this first official Controle at around 8:00 am, and after checking in, drank more coffee, ate a croissant and a ham omelette, and retrieved my RUSA drop bag to obtain more Gatorade and nuts. I saw TandemRogerSandra there, and Sandra was as cheerful as usual. How does she do it?

The route to the next Controle at Fougeres showed us more of the French country side with miles and miles of fields, villages and quaint, old towns, such as Mayenne (home of mayonnaise?). In Gorron, the townspeople had set up their own Revitallement station, and I enjoyed a cold cup of Pepsi and some cake and orange slices. Along the route, I struck up a conversation in my broken French with an older Frenchman, and found out this was his 6th (and last, he added) PBP. He was able to tell me he had been to San Francisco, and that I rode strong - in fact, he was trying to get me to push him up the hills! "Posse, posse!," he shouted. I arrived in Fougeres at around noon, and drank a cold iced tea and ate some of the nuts I'd been carrying, then headed out to the next Controle, Tintenniac. The middle of the day was warm and humid, and I was getting tired and hungry. I arrived in Tintenniac at round 5:00 pm, checked in, and went up to the cafeteria and bought some mystery meat with mystery starch. It wasn't exactly the best Controle for food, but at least they had something. Surprisingly, my stomach was holding out well, and I could eat most anything in sight at the cafeterias. I ended up only drinking one bottle full of Sustained Energy during the whole ride.

I had planned to make it to Carhaix the first day, but my speed and efficiency at the Controles was not as I hoped. It looked like I was going to have to stop in Ludeac and get some sleep there. This 80 km stretch seemed endless, until I met an English rider, Bill, and we rode together and talked about our kids. He apparently had several football-playing sons, and my son also played soccer. The sun started going down, and it got dark by around 9:30 pm. I made it to the Controle at around 10:30 pm, ate a nice dinner with roasted chicken and accoutrements in the cafeteria, retrieved my drop bag, changed into new clothes, unfurled my space blanket and layed down in the grass to sleep for a few hours. I set my alarm for about 4:00 am and dozed off. The wind rustled the space blanket through the night, and it started getting really cold. One could really see the stars out in the night sky. It was still dark when the alarm went off, and I quickly got up, drank an Ensure from my drop bag, and got back on the bike. Along that stretch after the sun had come up, I saw Craig, Ken H. and some other Bikeaholics coming back in a pack riding Audax style (i.e., ride together the whole way). I also saw Todd and a bit later, Paul G. on his Bike Friday that almost didn't make it to the airport. I would have liked to ride with Paul, but he was going just a little too fast for me.

I rode PBP for the first time in 1999, and afterwards SWORE that I would never put myself through such misery and abuse again. Shortly afterwards, I turned 40, my eyesight went whacko resulting in BIFOCALS!!, my metabolism changed, I quickly put on 10 extra (unwanted and unneeded) pounds, and I plunged deeply into my first mid-life crisis.

So, I immersed myself in my stressful job, as well as took on a new role as "soccer mom/coach" for Arik, who just started AYSO "K-league", while keeping up a lower baseline of cycling weekdays during my lunch break and on non-soccer weekend days. I managed to complete enough double centuries to still get my Triple Crown patches, but it was really tough. I felt like I was getting too old for long distance cycling, and it would soon be all over for me. After focusing so long on reaching the goal of finishing PBP in 1999, I was without a goal and drifting in a big, rough sea.

In 2001, I decided to try a brevet series again, so I managed to complete the Davis Bike Club 200 and 300 km rides, conveniently got out of the 400 km brevet due to a symphony concert set, and did only about 500 km of the 600 km brevet, due to the fact that I followed a group of cyclists that took a wrong turn, and ended up going several miles before figuring out I was off course. In Sept. of 2001 I put in an order for an Otis Guy frame with a Softride beam, which I got in March of 2002, and I set up for randonneuring. I signed up for the Davis brevets in 2002, and completed the 200 km and 300 km rides, missed the 400 km again due to a symphony concert, and for the 600 km brevet, I purposefully made arrangements to have someone drive my car to Oroville so I could end there early Sunday morning and drive home just in time to make Arik's soccer game. At some point I started thinking about the possibility of doing PBP again, and decided to at least try to "qualify" in 2003. I was on the edge with my level of fitness, but I figured that I could qualify for PBP with persistence and determination. Obviously I had forgotten everything about the pain and misery I endured in 1999. The important thing was - I had a goal again, and I could temporarily forget my mid-life crisis and immerse myself into training and getting my bike optimized for PBP 2003.

The San Francisco Randonneurs 200 and 300 km brevets were scheduled in February, and I signed up for these to hopefully jump start my training. Riding in Marin and Sonoma counties was great, however the terrain was no piece of cake, and the headwinds on the northern California coast were unforgiving. The rides were mostly unsupported. (It was on those rides that I met visiting nurse, Liz, and Matt from South Carolina and connected up with them again at PBP.) In January of 2003 I had started a new job, so my general outlook was greatly improved, plus I discovered a dedicated group of cyclists at my new company that had an awesome lunchtime loop in the hills of San Mateo and Hillsborough. Although I hadn't lost any weight, I felt like my fitness was returning. I completed the Davis 200 and 300 km brevets in March, slowly and surely, without pomp and circumstance (been there, done that). The 400 km brevet came on Easter weekend, and I planned to finish in time to make it back to San Carlos for the Easter church service. Most of the ride was on mostly familiar territory, however, I had not done the stretch from Cloverdale to Hopland, and it was very hilly and hot. I was not in a good mood when I got to the turn around point, and my mood deteriorated on the way back. By the time I got to Pope Valley, I knew I'd finish but it would be early Sunday morning. My Lumotec lamp gave out at Moskovite store, and although I had a spare bulb, I couldn't figure out how to get the headlamp put back together in the dark and thought I had broken it. Luckily I had two backup lighting systems and was able to make it to the finish at around 2:30 am. I slept in the car for a couple hours before heading back. When I woke up, my knees and hands screamed out in pain, and my worse fear became a reality - my hands and arms were numb and in extreme pain. I was worried that further riding would end my viola playing. At that point, I convinced myself I was definitely through with long distance cycling and was going to figure out another way to ride out my mid-life crisis.

However, a couple days after the ride, I felt better, although my hands and arms were still numb, and I went in search for a solution to this problem. I found the Specialized gloves with the ulnar padding, bought a new Nitto handlebar with a more ergo design, and signed up for the 600 km brevet with the SLO club, as the Davis 600 km ride conflicted with the Santa Cruz County Symphony performance of Carmina Burana, which I couldn't miss! The SLO 600 km brevet sounded like an easy, scenic, ride, but turned out to be extremely challenging, with 7 hours of 15+ mph headwinds on the coast and in the Salinas Valley, as well as long, seemingly endless hills. The first day ended at 11:00 pm in San Juan Bautista after ascending and descending the San Juan Grade in the dark and cold. The second day followed HWY 25 through deserted inland valleys, but the SLO support was terrific, and I was greatly revitalized after two hot dogs and a Lipton ice tea at the junction between 198 and Peach Tree Road. I finished the ride Sunday at 4:30 pm (and was not the last one to finish that brevet). But my rear was extremely tender, and at that time, I convinced myself I was definitely through with long distance cycling and was going to figure out another way to ride out my mid-life crisis.

However... I met Stoker Sandra of TandemRogerSandra. She was smiling at the end of the brevet, and I was really wondering what her secret was for staying in such a great disposition, and on a tandem none the less. She highly recommended the Performance gel shorts, so first thing Monday after work, I drove to the Performance shop and bought two pairs of these miracle shorts, that for some reason were more than half the price of the Pearl Isumi shorts I'd been riding with for the last 8 or so years. I tried them out on two 100+ mile rides and found them to be effective.

I balanced on the fence for the next several weeks as to whether or not to send in my PBP application, then finally decided to just go for it. I bought the RUSA and ACP PBP jerseys, made my travel arrangements, renewed my passport, and planned out the next 7 weeks of intense training.

I discovered right away that my helmet had gotten cracked in my luggage, and I needed to figure out a time to find a replacement. So early Thursday morning, I rode in to St. Quentin and bought a new helmet at Go Sport, as well as did some food shopping at the expansive Carrefour. When I got back to the Campanile to retrieve my bike (from the then sparsely populated bike storage room), I ran into Todd and John, who were also contemplating going to Paris. Don showed up on the scene about that time, and we all agreed to go into town on the train together. I quickly rode back to my hotel to drop off my stuff, and met them back at the hotel to walk to the train station. We figured out how to get tickets, and in no time we were on our way to Grand Paris.

We got off at the Tour Eiffel train stop, and lo and behold, the famous, giant structure of the Eiffel Tower was right there in front of us! The last time I'd seen the Eiffel Tower in Paris was in 1981 when I was a student in Germany and was traveling during my school holidays. We contemplated walking up the stairs to see the aerial view of Paris, but then concluded we didn't have the time for such extravagances, and pressed onwards to the Champs de l'Esee and the Arche de Triomphe. Todd was determined to visit a bike shop in Paris, and said he knew of two on the Avenue de Armee, opposite the Arche. We walked down the street and saw that one of the bike shops was closed for the next couple weeks for vacation. We continued walking and eventually found the second shop, on the right side of the street. All of us were looking for different things. I thought I might find a seat post bolt, as I had the insane gut feeling I'd need a new one. Luckily I never needed one. Our next destination was a long way in the opposite direction, so we opted to take the Metro to the Louevre station.

To be continued...