Rapha Festive 500 Challenge 2015!
December 24-31.
Since 2010, the London based company Rapha, sportswear company for accessories and cyclist clothing (very cool, very expensive shirts...), has proposed a challenge to any and all cyclists - to ride 500km in the week and a day between Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve.Yes, this is an awesome challenge for any cyclist, but for those in the Northern Hemisphere, wow, it is amazing to see so many people going for it!! I have a huge advantage living in Thailand, it was 30-35 degrees here (80's and 90's F) the whole week of Christmas, actually even too hot to ride on one of the days (38C on Christmas Eve!).
Last year about 8,000 of the 48,000 who entered were successful, and this year I see that over 70,000 people joined! It looks like about 13,000 finished, so any awards available are going to be pretty hotly contested... I had only read about the challenge a few weeks before it was to begin, but I had a cool idea to try out - I knew the weather would give me the chance to do it too, so I started planning.
There are a few very nice prizes for people who do the 500km in creative ways, or use their rides to tell a great story, the top prize being a handmade bike! The article from last year's winner is a good example to use for how far people take this contest, very impressive, cool, and fun!, so I just enjoyed the riding like everyone else.
My plan was to finish the 500km in 3 days, as I was going to be working at a camp from Dec 27-30. It is a personal tradition of mine to do some type of extra-curricular activity with kids in the last week of each year (since 2009), last year my good friend asked me to do a volunteer English Camp with him (awesome time in a small town in the lovely Esaan province of Nakon Panom) and this year the timing would even work out nicely with this Rapha Festive Challenge.
I have lived in Thailand now for a bit more than 6 years. I am a teacher and I studied planning to teach Science, but in Thailand have taught mostly English and sometimes Math... until this year! I;m now at a university position in the Faculty of Environmental Science and Natural Resources, my fourth position since moving here. I taught in Bangkok for a year, town of Korat for a year, smaller town of Chumpuang in Korat for almost 4 years, and now I live in Mahasarakam.
The thought came to me to just revisit my old schools, all in a row. I would spend one day enjoying Christmas festivities at the third school (the place closest to my heart), and then three days of camp near the second school in between. Looking at the map, it all lined up to almost exactly 500km! I was set! I went into work early on Thursday, left early, but had to take Friday (Christmas) off. Haha, yes, its not a holiday here...
In Thailand I don't have much crazy weather of which I can boast about, no enduring of extreme temperature or hardship of that sort... my usual hardships deal with traffic, both mechanical and living traffic (livestock can cause quite a few surprises and occasionally some backups :) ). So, a huge kudos in order to all my friends who finished their 500km in near-zero degree weather!
My rides for the Festive 500 looked like this:
-Ride to each of my 4 previous schools using only local and back roads.
-Try to race with any kids on bicycles along the way.
-Do my best to document the beauty of the Thailand's rural highways.
Of course the camp was awesome, another highlight was the surprise hill I climbed (took a wrong turn, ended up changing the whole ride, but I can't see how I could have done any better! Lovely!), but the best part of the trip was spending Christmas with my favorite group of kids. Yes I am a teacher, and yes I just clearly and deliberately used the word favorite :). The graduating class of 2022 (currently about to graduate 6th grade), at Anuban Chumpuang Wittaya, is the most fun grade that I have yet had the privilege to teach.
Here are some photos - School 4, School 3, Camp near school 2, and finally Bangkok for School 1.
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| My old classroom, taught in this room from 2011-2013 |
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| One of the most awesome kids, Mr Oak, enjoying a Hello Kitty Doll raffle win! Merry Christmas!! |
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| Grade 5 |
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| I have never taught these students, but they all knew me. Fun times at ACW School... |
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| One of my favorite 1-km stretches in Thailand, the Tree Tunnel 12km West of Chumpuang! |
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| Stopping for a break near Nong Bun Mak, Nakon Ratchasima |
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| The trees looked and SMELLED amazing!! Had this view all to myself, almost an entire hour without a truck, a motorbike, a bicycle... just birds, trees, and the squeaks of grinding gears. |
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| Surprise climb through an amazing Forest, not a National Park, but it was a Protected Area... The road was very nice in parts, and some parts had no road at all. |
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| English Camp at Golden Gold Resort, Pak Chong, Nakon Ratchasima |
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| My awesome Yellow Team! |
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| Leaving Pak Chong... |
School #4 to School #3: 142km
https://www.strava.com/activities/455491693
Dec 26
School #3 to School #2: 253km (my 2nd longest ride to date)
https://www.strava.com/activities/456616162
Dec 27
Riding around location #2 during camp, 3 days: 79km
https://www.strava.com/activities/457690477
https://www.strava.com/activities/457181218
https://www.strava.com/activities/458357543
Dec 30
School #2 to School #1: 24km
https://www.strava.com/activities/458623326
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Totals to 504km, 6 rides for a time of just under 21 hours.
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