Bravo!

I woke up before dawn yesterday (another bravo, but not the subject of this post) in order to take John to the start of his first brevet. "Brevet" is French for "diploma," and John definitely deserves one. Brevets are long bike rides that come in several flavors: 200 km, 300 km, 400 km, 600 km, and 1200 km. Riders are called "randonneurs," French for "rambler." This one was 200 km, or 126 miles, which works out to be about 120 more miles than I ride to get to school each day. They started in Malibu, headed up the coast to Carpinteria on PCH, and then came back again. At about 6:30 pm, John arrived back at the start point tired, hungry, 6 pounds lighter (eek! that's 2.72 L of lost fluids!) and happy. Well, happy to see pizza, at least. I'm really proud of him and I told him that lots in the brief time before he passed out last night. He's got me excited about riding more and covering more distance, and I'm unnaturally interested in this 1230 km ride that happens every four years called the Paris-Brest-Paris. Riders ride from -- well, duh -- Paris to Brest in the northwest of France and back again. My mostly-rejuvenated randonneur pulled no punches when he pointed out that we had to stop every few miles on our wine country ride. I'm sticking to my story that it was the incredibly yummy trail mix we were carrying that day. So a huge BRAVO to John and a promise that I'll be up to doing the next one with him. In the words of Yoda: “Do or do not... there is no try."