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Ok, about 20 years ago, I was an aspiring bike racer – training with the US National Team in Carlsbad, California – racing Category 1/2 on the Road and Track all over So. Cal while managing a bicycle shop in Escondido, California called North County Bicycles (now long gone…). 

It was an amazing experience – riding 500 miles a week.  Lifting weights every other day, massage daily, riding like a mad-man and loving every minute of it.  Unfortunately I had a nasty crash, blew out a knee along the way and although I continued to race, lost that caliber of racing forever.

While I was working at the shop, and racing I was introduced to this stuff called Kool ‘N Fit.  I always thought of it as this massage stuff that smelled like Eucalyptus, but it made me feel incredible.  I used it regularly but eventually I left the shop and couldn’t find it at my LBS, and moved on.

Recently I had found out the manufacturer is actually in San Diego, and I met the owner’s of the company.  What a fantastic couple!  They seem to have a true passion for their products as well as still going to races – whether a marathon or a criterium nearly every weekend. 

Turns out they wanted to have a few web-design things done, and I had the wonderful opportunity to do the work for them.  Of course I got some Kool’nFit and man – it was like old times!  You can literally feel the muscles warming up, feeling flush and loose…and my knee that’s been reconstructed twice feels better than ever. 

As I searched the internet I read many times that people had a hard time finding Kool’nFit, but you can get it online from Kool ‘N Fit themselves  HERE .  They also have a whole site full of testimonials you can check out at http://www.KoolnFitBlog.com. 

Do yourself a favor and go check it out!

That’s the sound I hear…crunch, crunch, crunch. I’m in Big Bear, California. My home to be in the next few months hopefully. It’s a crisp 38 degrees outside and I’m mid-way through a 7.5 mile run.

There are so many things that go into this run. They seem to all come to me at once. A year and a half ago I started losing weight. When I plateaued a year later, I had lost over 100 lbs. My wife has lost 75. We’re the same people with a new lease on life. So here we are…at 7000′ altitude, a week before Christmas, running in the snow. Yes – the snow. One of the many reasons I can’t wait to make Big Bear my permanent home instead of vacaction destination. I love the snow and I love that crunch, crunch, crunch sound our feet make as we run the Alpine Pedal Path along the North Shore of Big Bear Lake.

The weight loss is one of many things…the next is the running itself. An athlete most of my life, I’ve never considered myself a runner. But I’ve run 20-25 miles a week for the past 75 weeks. I’d be lying now if I told you I wasn’t a runner. I enjoy it now. It doesn’t hurt anymore. I find comfort in my runs. I think better while I run and certainly better after.

Ok, back to Big Bear! It’s the small town I love – the community. It’s the skiing, hiking, mtn. biking, backpacking, kayaking, running, horseback riding, snowshoeing…jeeesh the list goes on and on.

I don’t understand it…evertime I tell someone I’m moving to Big Bear, it’s always the same reaction. First they get the dumbstruck look, and then they all say it. “Why Big Bear?”. I recite the list above and I guess because none of those things are part of their lives – th lieir expression doesn’t change. And I just smile. I can’t wait to make it my home.

It’s been a goal for years. Slowly working towards it. Getting the ducks in a row, and now the house is on the market. Of course it’s an ugly time to try to sell a house in Southern California, but I don’t even care. I don’t have to make a dime on it. If I can just break even, I’ll be the wealthiest man alive! I’ll be living in my vacation spot of choice, on the Pacific Crest Trail in the mountains of California, a mile above the ocean, where the air is still clean and I can hear that crunch, crunch, crunch!

So some of that weight loss I wrote about in my last post came from an extensive amount of exercise. Over the past 20 years I’ve raced bicycles, played semi-pro paintball, done triathlons, raced inline skates for RollerBlade around the country, swam, ran and rode all kinds of things. But this past year, after losing the bulk of my weight, I started doing more triathlons.

I completed 6 or 7 triathlons this season – mostly sprint distance and a few international distance. These races typically start with a swim of up to 1000 meters, followed immediately by a bicycle ride of up to 25 miles, followed by a run of up to 10k (6.2 miles). Some have different formats or distances, but that’s the typicaly scenario.

I also competed in several swimming events including a 5k open water swim…that’s a 3.1 mile Ocean swim for you metrically challenged folks. )

Well after having done the triathlons, bicycle racing, swimming…everything else I was of course looking for the ‘next thing’ – the evolution of my sports.

Let me shift gears a bit and come back to this. About a year ago – or more, I started planning a move for my family. We’re moving to Big Bear, California. It’s a small mountain town of around 5,000 people (at the most), East of San Bernardio/Los Angeles, California. It’s gorgeous up there at almost 7,000 feet. We spend nearly all our vacation time there hiking the Pacific Crest Trail, mountain biking, skiing, snowboarding and kayaking and boating on Big Bear Lake. Nic and I work at home full-time and we can do our work anywhere…so why not Big Bear? Oh yes, I almost forgt to tell you… I can buy a house for around 200,000 dollars less than where I live now! Anyway, with the mountain aspects coming into play I thought Adventure Racing was the natural progression for me…

Ok, back to the ‘evolution of my sports’. Along the way I heard about Adventure Racing. It’s a triathlon “plus” if you will. Like a triathon the distances and disciplines vary, but essentially here’s what they’re about. You will Run/Trek/Hike, Swim/Paddle, Bike/Mountain Bike, Climb/Rappel, as well as normally do some other tasks requiring teamwork or using your brain – like a mental type puzzle or riddle – oh yeh, and you do all this while navigating using a compass, topographic map and coordinates – no GPS. You can do them solo, but typically you’re on a team of 2-4 people. They’re a team event with everyone having to stay within 100 yards of one another at all times. They last anywhere from 6 hours to 6 days…yes nearly a week!

Well I got my first taste this summer with an Urban Adventure Race in San Diego. My buddy Josh and I finished 2nd place overall. This was essentially just a bike race with some fun events thrown in the middle. At approximately 5 mile intervals we had to walk on stilts, ride a big wheel through an obstacle course, jump on a giant hippity-hop, do a bean-bag toss, and do a wheel barrow race with a teammate in the wheelbarrow. It was fun and got me thinking about a ‘real’ adventure race doing the things I like and excel at – Mtn. Biking, trail running, kayaking…

I got my first chance last month in the Lake Hodges Adventure Race. It was billed as a 12-hour

race. Here’s what the race entailed: First we kayaked 1.5 miles across the lake and back to retrieve a small foam ball (again – the checkpoints are not given – just the coordinates and you have to navigate using a map/compass to find them). Upon returning you carry the small foam ball on a golf tee around a short course without it falling off. Seems easy enough unless you just kayaked for 1/2 hour and your arms are shaking and you’re out of breath. My two teammates Louis and Cory and I all did fine and soon we were off to cover around 20 miles of terrain on our Mtn. Bikes. We used the coordinates of checkpoints and a map to follow trails to the 6 checkpoints we needed. The checkpoints took us to the top of the tallest hill in the area – no small feat on the bikes and negotiating the course with the other 75 competitors. Cory got a flat on the way back, but that only set us back about 3-4 minutes.

At this point we were instructed to build a small waterfall out of pvc tubing – 20 pieces max that had been provided. There was a funnel at one end and a bucket at the other. Our goal – fill the bucket with 3 dixie cups with water from the lake 50 yards away. So for 10 minutes we ran to the lake, and back with our 6 oz. of water – pouring them in the funnel, having it run down our version of the waterfall we constructed and into the bucket. When the bucket overflowed we got our next set of 3 checkpoints to navigate. They were on the water…

Back in the ‘yaks for another 5 miles of kayaking. By the end of this leg of the race my arms were ready to fall off! But we made good time and passed several teams on the water. This leg was nearly 2 hours on the water…

Along the way you have to remember to eat and drink or you’ll simply run out of gas in a 12 hour race of non-stop exertion. We all did well at this with an alarm we set to chime every hour to remind us to eat drink.

When we got out of the boats we got our next 5 checkpoints to navigate. They had to be done on foot. Trail running/hiking only. According to the map it would be around 6-8 miles of ground to cover. And off we went. We found the first two checkpoints right away. The next two proved to be challenging as they were each at the very top of two large peaks of at least 1000 feet of climbing each…ouch! Eventually we found them and hit the last checkpoint on the way back to the Start/Finish line.

What a great feeling it was to be jogging down that last bit of trail and see the finish. I was seriously pooped out. It took us 7 hours to complete the entire course and we finished 1st place for the “Masters” group – which means our teams averag age was over 40. ) We finished 2nd for 3-4 person teams and 6th overall. Not bad at all.

This truly was an adventure, and I can’t wait for my next AR!

Ok, it’s not really a ‘landmark day’ but it’s a change. For the past two years this Blog has been about eBay and Internet Marketing – hence it’s old name… eBay Jay. But I’ve found I really wanted to write and share more and so I’ve decided to make it my ‘catch all’ Blog. You may learn more than you wanted to know about me, but you’re taking your chances reading my Blog anyway.

So – Bubba Jay it is from here on out.

Ok, let’s get started with the details…lol. Guess who these folks are?

Wow, that’s right – it’s

Nicole and I… 180lbs ago. Yup – I lost 105lbs and Nic lost 75lbs over the course of the last year and a half. Actually we lost it all in a year, but have maintained that weight for another 6

months now. Here’s an after shot from a few months ago.

I actually wrote a short ’story’ about our weight loss and entered it into a contest that Weight Watchers had… for most Inspirational Story. And we won first place in our region, out of a few thousand in the US. A local news channel from NBC came out to interview us and were were on the news.

It was kind of fun. Here’s a link to the NBC website and you can check out the short 1 minute video.

http://video.nbcsandiego.com/player/?id=160971

Ok, enough fat talk. I’ll be back soon with more. Or as my Weight Watchers meeting leader Melanie says “we’ll see less of you next time”.