charity race!

So Mayhew has a funny story where a guy came into his shop and claims to have WON the ms - 150. Its a charity ride, and nobody wins. Its weird that this guy won it.
So what about a charity race? Well if you consider the fact that most bike races on the road dont even make enough money to pay the promoter, more or less give money to a charity, it becomes hard to do.(Was it Mr. Hebe who took money out of his pocket FOR A CHARITY after not breaking even on his costs at the race?)

A race promoter needs a lot of people to make this work. How do you get a lot of people on bikes? You make it safe, weatherproof, and competitive. How about an indoor exercise bike race? Hellish? Yes. There are two divisions, spin bikes and airdynes. I have done the airdyne race twice, and swore I would never do it again. The airdynes are lower cadence more power, and big mongo guys do it with their arms. Of course Docsnydes was there killing it for like the fifth straight year and won again. No thanks.

Our team for the spin bikes consisted of Me, Hodos, (spin instructors at the Downtown Athletic Club and 10 regular class attendees. The race was six hours, and we each did 30 minute straight blocks, rather than the 15 minute blocks that other teams did.

Despite Dr. Stubna's claim that I only wipe sweat off of exercise bikes, I would like to point out that with the help of my excellent teaching, our team with a mean age of 47 beat the local collegiate cycling team! Yes, it was the local cycling team, with matching kits and the whole deal!

The team's average cadence was somewhere around 155 - 160, I would guess. It was hard to get accurate cadence counts with our legs spinning so fast. The top end was somewhere around 190 - 210 for a half an hour straight! It was like riding a bike without a chain.

Like any charity event, there was TONS of swag. Every time I walked past the GNC booth, I took at least two sample powerbars. Yeah baby.

The tops of my feet were bruised, chaffed and swollen the next day. When it came down to either sitting around, getting a taxi, or riding with the dudes, I took the easy route and did a 5 hour 90 mile day. Who wants to sit around a 55 degree house or sit in a taxi all day?