158 miles

I can officially say goodbye to the northern Andes and Ecuador. I really enjoyed much of the time that I spent in Ecuador, although today certainly was not as special as the previous three days. In fact, the part of southern Ecuador that I bike through today felt more like an extension of Peru then a part of Ecuador. To be honest, today was a pretty boring and lack luster day. At its worst, it was quite miserable and even sad. I’m not very excited to be leaving Ecuador. Progress is great course, but I know that Peru likely presents the largest challenge that I have faced yet. Since I started this journey, I’ve been talking about the winds of Peru and Patagonia. Of course, Patagonia is really a much smaller region than I am giving it name to. I’ve been referring to essentially everything south of Peru as Patagonia, which is not geographically incorrect. It’s just easier to think of it that way in my mind. Regardless, I am now into the flat plaines of Peru and for the next 3000 miles I will work my way along the Pacific Coast before crossing back over the Andes into Argentina where I will have a final 1500 mile push to Ushuaia. Unfortunately, for me, the winds are once again not favorable. It was always a bit of a sick joke that I would have a headwind for the entire trip. I turned it into a joke because when I really think about having a headwind for the entire trip, it makes me want to cry, but it’s a lot easier to just make fun of it and turn it into a joke. I haven’t had a single day with consistent tailwind. The only day where I had more than five hours of tailwind was in Calgary where I had six hours of headwind and then six hours of tailwind. Beyond that, it’s either been a headwind or no wind every single day. I had a nice break from the wind for the most part in Central America, as expected, but as soon as I got back into South America, I was hit with the headwind. I’ve had headwind every single day for the past week, but today was definitely the worst wind I’ve had since Texas. For the next 3000 miles, I will have headwind for every single mile. Unless there is a major storm that develops off the coast, the wind will not drop below 8 miles an hour for the next 3000 miles. The wind will whip up the coast resulting in a direct or cross direct headwind 24 hours of the day. There’s nothing I can do about it. I can complain all I want, but that’s just wasted mental energy. I’m trying to stay positive, but to be honest it’s really really hard to stay positive right now. When I was in the Andes I was only averaging about 150 miles a day but I was so happy just to be there in the beauty of it all. I didn’t expect to go fast in the Andes. I expected magnificent views and incredible climbs and that’s what I got. I knew that in all likelihood if have a headwind in Peru, but I’ve been trying not to think about it for the past 9000 miles. There was always a small chance that the wind would be blowing the other direction. Once I get a little bit past Santiago, I will turn east into Argentina. At this time, the winds will become much more variable. Perhaps I will have a tailwind for the last 1500 miles, but I could also have a headwind for the last 1500 miles. In all likelihood, it will be a sidewind coming from the west and I will not get a tailwind at all. regardless, it is now impossible that the winds will even out on this trip. I have cycled 9000 miles thus far and I have had a headwind for over 4000 miles. I will have a headwind for the next 3000 miles which leaves only 1500 left. At the very best only 10% of this trip will be done with a tailwind. At the worst, I will finish this trip having experienced less than 500 miles of tailwind. It’s very likely that I will finish this trip with less than 500 miles of tailwind. it seems like a pretty sick joke that I am looking at another 30 days of biking in the headwind. If there were no wind at all, I would be hoping to finish in 20 days, looking for that sub 70 day finish. With 3000 miles of headwind waiting me this is essentially impossible. I wouldn’t need to average well over 200 miles a day. Today I had a 15 to 20 mile an hour headwind and barely managed to make it 150 miles. Expecting 200 a day is super unrealistic. It hurts my soul to think that I will struggle to hit 150 miles every single day. the headwind is expected to an extent, but it’s stronger than it usually is at the moment. The next couple of days in particular are going to be incredibly rough with a consistent 20 mile an hour direct headwind. I am hoping that once I get to Lima the wind will slack off to only about 10 mile an hour headwind which is significantly more manageable. When the wind starts to get above 12 to 15 miles an hour, I begin to flounder. My speed drop significantly and my mind begins to break down. At 20 miles an hour I was struggling to hit 10 miles an hour. It felt like Texas all over again, but somehow even worse. There is no respite here. There are no trees, there are no bends in the road, it is only me and the dead on block headwind. Today was spent going south south West. The wind was dialed into my direction to the degree. Tomorrow I will turn south south east and the wind will turn with me to the degree. Having the wind offset even by 10 to 15° does make a difference. It’s frustrating because it feels like a laser pointed on me. I don’t believe in karma, but a part of me wanted to believe that when I got to South America, I have to have a tailwind because I got so unfortunate in having a headwind in North America. Not the world we live in unfortunately. There’s no escaping this headwind. What should be a 20 day bike most likely turn into almost 30 days left on the road. The wind slows me down by 5 miles an hour on average. That takes my average speed from about 18 miles an hour down to 13. 50% increase in the time it will take travel, the headwind also has massive effects on my morale. I will try not to let it affect my head, but I’m simply not strong enough to block it out. I think there are people out there who are strong enough to block it out, but I have shown that I am not one of those people unfortunately. It would be a lot easier if I could block it out. If I were strong enough to ignore it, then I would be making life much easier for myself. I wish I had that strength.

When I woke up, I was disappointed to find that my epoxy had not hardened at all. It was just as liquidious as when I went to bed. I double checked the packaging to make sure I hadn’t messed something up, but I had followed everything to the t. Either I’d been sold defect, epoxy, or the stuff just didn’t work in the first place. This presents quite a problem for me for two reasons. One, my seatpost is still cracked and is no more stable now than it was last night and secondly, the inside of my post is filled with epoxy that has the consistency of toothpaste. There’s no way for me to scrape it out of the seat. Gravity will slowly pull it down and it will want to escape inside my frame. I have attempted to duct tape the opening at the bottom of the post, but when I layered the tape on the post it would then not fit into the frame. The only way I could get it to fit was by using one piece of tape to cover the entrance to the post. If the epoxy finds its way around this piece of tape, it will drip down into the frame and find its way into my bottom bracket. If the epoxy gets into my bottom bracket, and then begins to harden, my bike will be ruined. It could also get all over my shift cables, or it could get in between the seat post and the frame locking it in forever. It seems inevitable that the epoxy will begin to leak around this tape. I don’t really know what to do. I can take out the seat and take off the tape and let the epoxy drip out all night, but I’m afraid that not all the epoxy will come out or that epoxy will leak out before then. The post has been nothing but trouble for me. It’s already cost me about eight hours of riding time. There are so many little things that keep hemorrhaging time on this trip. It’s unbelievable, and it’s starting to change me a little bit. I talk about this inability or my emotions not affecting me as much anymore, but on my bad days, this stuff still gets under my skin a lot and affects my morale and in turn really beats down my physical ability as well. Mentally, I’m stronger than I was, but I’m definitely not unbreakable. Things are getting really hard now. I’m kind of in this weird stretch of my trip. I’m getting somewhat close to the end, but in reality I have almost a month left on the road. I’m really not that close at all. The hardest miles undoubtedly lie ahead of me, especially with this damn headwind.

It was raining a little bit when I left the hotel. I initially didn’t mind that much. I was actually happy that it was raining because Ecuador really needs the rain. Within a couple miles however, the rain became quite a problem for me. As noted before, when things get wet, everything chafes a lot easier. Pretty soon my inner thighs were on fire as my wet kit rubbed up against them. I’m all out of electrical tape, but I have plenty of duct tape that I’ve been using on my post. I tried to put some on my thighs, but the duct tape sucks. It’s not that strong and it crumpled up really quickly. Luckily, the rain didn’t last for too long and I was able to dry out after a couple of hours and the pain subsided a bit.

While we’re on the subject, a lot of people were surprisingly interested in my electrical tape job on my thigh and while I was in Panama. That electrical tape stayed in place for almost a week before it began to peel. A couple of days ago in Colombia I ripped off the last pieces. The skin underneath filled back in a tender whitish pink and is still quite tender. It is significantly less painful now than it was. It’s still painful with every pedal stroke, but I can mostly block it out. I hope it continues to get better, but another full day of rain would put me right back where I started. Luckily, I am riding into the driest place in the world, and it’s unlikely that I will see rain for the next 3000 miles.

The first 20 miles were relatively flat and I managed to make good time on the smooth asphalt with very light winds. I got to the town of Arenillas and my nice asphalt disappeared and I left the flats behind. This was another one of Ecuador’s concrete slab roads. The potholes came back and I begin bouncing at the lip of each slab set 20 feet apart. I could hear my rear wheel straining. I knew it was going to be a long day. I just crossed my fingers and hoped that nothing would implode. Plantations gave back way to cattle fields. The low clouds and thick haze gave everything a gloomy look, but this landscape didn’t need any help looking gloomy. There were a decent number of trees and shrubs, but everything was dead. There was no greenery anywhere. It looked like someone cropped dusted the entire forest with round up. I don’t know if it’s a seasonal thing, the effect of the drought, or something to do with the damaging livestock practices here, but this was the most unhealthy pseudo forest I’ve ever seen. I knew that I would slowly enter the desert throughout the day, but this clearly was not meant to be a desert yet. It was turning into one quite rapidly though. I was only at about 400 feet of elevation but I ascended up a 3,000 foot climb. For 2 miles near the top of this climb the hill became so steep that there were no cows and there had never been in attempt to log this forest. All of the suddenly greenery sprang back into everything. I was transported into a vibrant jungle. I heard monkeys again, hundreds of birds flew all around me, I saw a cool little mammal scamper across the road in front of me. I have no idea what it was. It was jet black and looked like cross between a capybara, a monkey, and a mouse. I saw a snake or two and wildflowers hung down from the vines ahead. Tall trees were cloaked in greens and their boughs hung heavy with air plants. Perhaps this was not a true jungle, it would probably be considered a cloud forest, but the forest was clearly very healthy and very wet. At the top of the climb, the pastures returned and the landscape went back to the bleak desertification. Everything truly looked absolutely dead. It’s hard to emphasize how rapid and severe the change between the cloud forest and barren pasture was. It was like a light switch. The problem with the pasture is that it’s contributing to desertification. Not only is the cloud forest/rainforest an incredibly important hot spot for biodiversity, the forest has dramatic effects on the climate. The trees hold onto the water and slowly release it over time through the process of transpiration. The trees also provide shade so the soil doesn’t dry out quickly. The shade also keeps the temperature down and promotes a moist system where other plants can flourish and also trap the rain water. In a healthy forest, the rain is trapped and slowly released. When you cut down all the trees, the water runs straight down the hill and straight into the rivers. With no trees to block the sun, the soil dries out immediately. With no flora to stabilize the soil, the soil starts to erode and soon everything is a rocky mess and every time it rains, the problem gets worse. It’s so hot here that as soon as it rains, everything evaporates away without the aid of the trees. When the farmers went in and cut down the entire rainforest, they created a monolithic pasture that has undergone the process of desertification. Now that Ecuador is in a horrible drought, the pasturelands are no longer sustainable for even the most hardy of cattle so the land is barren. We have essentially destroyed this large swath of southern Ecuador and left it for dead. One of the most remarkable things about mother nature is her ability to rebound from destruction. However, desertification is incredibly hard to bounce back from. Even if man decided to stop tampering with the land now it would take hundreds of years for the forest to return to its previous glory. And in some spots the forest may be forever lost unless we actively help it recover. We stripped away all the soil that took thousands of years to build up. Biking through this landscape was so sad for me. I felt quite depressed to be honest. It really hurts me to see how much we messed up the world. I absolutely love the jungle, and it was striking how beautiful and diverse the tiny little patch of jungle that does remain is. I’m sure that within a few years this jungle will also be cleared and all the animals I saw today will be dead.

My feeling of sadness for the loss of nature is totally justifiable, but I was struck a little bit by the fact that the desertification of the jungle had a more significant impact on my mind, then the two dead people that I’ve seen over the past couple of days. Is it normal or fair for me to be more upset at the death of a tree than at the death of a man? I couldn’t really answer my own question. I felt a little inhuman in a way. Perhaps my feelings stem from a selfish aspect. As much as I value the intrinsic nature of the jungles, biodiversity, and environmental rights (the idea that animals and the environment should be entitled basic rights, has as humans are. Granted different rights, but still rights), there’s certainly a selfish aspect of wanting to be able to enjoy its beauty and see future generations enjoy its beauty as well. I guess I also feel like I have a small hand to play in the desertification of the jungle. Everybody in the world does more or less. The drought we are in is certainly exasperated by climate change. One can’t argue with this. It’s just a cold hard fact that climate change is making climate extremes worse. There are plenty of papers on this subject, showing evidence that the drought in Ecuador is made worse by climate change. There are very few people in the world who can claim that they are carbon neutral or carbon negative. I’m certainly not one of those people, so in a way I have contributed to the drought here in Ecuador. I’ve also eaten some red meat here in Ecuador. I am propping up the system that is cutting down these trees. Still, it doesn’t feel right to be more disturbed by the loss of the forest than the loss of the human life. I don’t know what this says about me. But if I had had the same reaction before I started this trip? I think I would’ve been just as sad about the forest being dead, but I know for a fact that seeing a mangled corpse before the beginning of this trip would’ve hit me a lot harder than it did in Quito and Colombia. These incidents essentially didn’t impact me at all. It’s easy to try to block out that image. In Quito alone there are 8 million people. I obviously didn’t know that man and my life goes on unaffected by his passing, but that’s still a human life that I saw disappear before my eyes. Any loss of life is sad, so why didn’t I didn’t feel sad? Perhaps it’s better that I didn’t feel sad. Certainly from a cycling standpoint it’s better not to think about that. It’s still always on my mind—the risk that I take every time I bike. Just because I’m out of Mexico doesn’t mean that I’m immune to the same feelings I had there or am any less at risk of getting hit by a car. In fact, the roads I’m on right now probably aren’t much safer than Mexico, I’ve just become desensitized. I just find it remarkable how much differently my brain processed the dead person in Mexico versus the dead people I’ve seen in Colombia and Ecuador. It’s like I’m a truly different person, but that was only 20 days ago. It feels like several months have passed, since I was in Queretaro, Mexico, but in reality that was day 34 of my trip. That was only two weeks ago. That honestly feels like it can’t be right. I’m going to have to go double check the dates because there’s no way I was in Mexico two weeks ago. Now that I think about it, it feels like several months.

I actually had a lot of climbing today. I had over 10,000 feet in only 150 miles. I wasn’t totally expecting all the climbing. To be totally honest, I didn’t put as much research into this section of the route or subsequent sections. I gave myself incredibly low odds of making it to South America. I spent most of my time planning for North America. I figured that if by some small chance I made it down to Peru I would just figure things out. I guess that’s what I’m going to do. I just gotta figure things out. To be fair, there certainly is less variability in my climate from here on out. From here until Santiago it’ll pretty much just be a desert. I think there will be a fair amount of climbing along the coast, but nothing huge until I get past Santiago. It feels like the next section of the trip is really unknown. I have a view of what the Peruvian coast looks like in my mind, but the coast goes on for Over 3,000 miles. There must be more variation in it than I think. I did spend a decent amount of time on Google Earth looking at the coast, but every section looked identical so in my mind, it’s just a rocky hilly landscape all the way to Santiago. I think that’s actually a pretty accurate representation, but I can’t say for certain. Time will tell, hopefully.

The morning clouds gave away to intense afternoon sun. The sunscreen that I picked up in Colombia doesn’t seem to be working as well as the stuff that I had in the US. It doesn’t really rub in then it washes right off as soon as I sweat. I try to reapply every couple of hours, but it’s pretty useless. At this point, I’ve built up such an intense tan that I can’t really bur. Still, I’d rather not get skin cancer. On this trip I am certainly increasing my chances of skin cancer down the road. There’s not much for me to do about it to be honest.

It was hot. Really hot. I think I had 12 ice creams today. I kind of forgot that today was day 50, but I guess all that ice cream was way of celebrating.

I eventually dropped out of the mountains. I did not enjoy my time in these mountains. Everything had been clear cut, and every single mountain from the base to the peak was a deserted mess. There was no life anywhere. I saw a couple cattle, but they all look deathly sick. The dogs were meager and skinny. They couldn’t even muster a bark at me. It’s very difficult to tell how much of this dire landscape can be attributed to the drought. Even during the rainy season this would be a pretty glum landscape, but right now it’s downright depressive. As I left the mountains, I started entering true desert. I could tell this was actually supposed to be desert for the first time. Cacti began to spring up and the soil started turning a little sandier. There were no more trees, but these tall shrubs that look to be some sort of cousin of the mesquite stood in groups. The cattle fields disappeared and all that could thrive here were occasional chickens in the town and goats. There were a fair number of goats and they loved to run along the road. The little ones are quite cute. They are probably just as destructive as cows, but they don’t look quite as bad for the environment. Farmers typically just let them go on the loose. These guys were walking all over the road doing whatever they wanted to. They were also cleaning up a lot of trash, so perhaps they weren’t all that bad. A lot of the landscape I was traveling through was reminiscent of Africa. Like the savannah. I prefer the real trees and forest over the outright desert, but it’s kind of cool to see this landscape as well. The wind was making it really hard to enjoy. I was getting absolutely blasted. The wind was locked onto me to the degree as it whistled on at about 20 miles an hour. I was just getting munched up on the short climbs and descents. At around four, I made it to the border. This was a tiny little crossing. I thought it would be more significant, but I think the main border crossing is a little bit further east closer to Loja. Instead of having an actual customs building, it was just a cargo container that had been converted into a little office. There is only one customs lady working, and there was no line. I went up to her with a big smile and give her my passport. I was feeling pretty defeated and tired, but I was also excited to get into a new country. This is the last crossing that I could even remotely have trouble with (I think). Chile and Argentina are both very friendly to the United States and the governments have significantly more money so the border should be more well funded. The lady at the window was very nice, but she explained to me that they didn’t have power. Of course, the rolling outages had hit the border right when I was to cross. She couldn’t process my documents. I was so tired and hungry and thirsty that I just sat down on the steps for a couple of minutes and tried to cool off. I wasn’t that angry, I was just a little sad. There was nothing on the Ecuadorian side of the border. I didn’t have cell service, and there was nowhere to resupply. I would just have to sit under the sun waiting for the lights to come back on. After about 10 minutes of moping, I stood back up and politely begin to talk to the lady. She was really nice and very understanding. I could tell she wanted to let me through, but she really couldn’t. Everything is done on the computer. She would be risking her job if she let me through. The Ecuador-Peru border is a pretty important one to have secure because of all the cartels and cocaine flowing towards the States. Her job is serious one. I made sure to flash my passport so she could see that I was American. Behind me was a tent that had been set up for some of the border patrol agents to use while searching vehicles. On the side of the tent, there was a large American flag with the phrase “with the help of the American government, this border is secure.” I knew she could see that sign just as well as I could. Eventually, she asked to see my passport. I continued talking to her and tried to emphasize how important time was for me since I was riding for a record. She flipped through my passport and saw my entrance stamp into Ecuador. She asked me how many days have you been here and I replied 3 1/2, she looked up at me “¿tres días?” she said. I knew that I had her. She really wanted to help me get across the border and so after talking to her for some more time about my trip and how far I was going every day she agreed to let me through. She scanned my passport with her phone and got all my information collected by hand. She said she would go through and manually enter all my information into the system when electricity came back on. I was tempted to give her some money just for help, but I was already through and I didn’t want to risk looking like I was bribing her. I only want to bribe the corrupt officials. She was a nice lady just trying to do her job. I thanked her many times over and headed across the bridge with my passport stamped. The Peruvian official was quite surprised to see me since he hadn’t been expecting anyone to come across due to the power outage. He gave my stamp about 20 seconds.

The Ecuadorian side of the border didn’t have even the smallest hint of development, and the Peruvian side wasn’t that much better. There looked to be a sizable town on the Peruvian side of the border, but it was just a couple of buildings. All day I had been riding on this awful concrete slab road that was only getting worse as I got closer to the border. Upon crossing into Peru, I was now on Panamericana Norte 1, the main highway that runs up and down the coast of Peru. I was expecting this to be a well-maintained highway, but like I said, this crossing is clearly a very sleepy one that not many people make their way to. The road was awful. Probably the worst I’ve been on outside of a short stretch in southern Mexico. It was an aggregate, but the rocks in the aggregate were so big and the concrete surrounding them had been washed away. It was like riding on cobblestones. With every bump, I could hear my wheels straining. Every time I pedal now I can look back and see the entire rim bending around the spokes. It’s quite scary looking and when I get out of the saddle, I can hear it going “woosh woosh”. It sounds pretty cool actually, but it’s quite concerning when you figure out what the noise actually is. The spokes are so loose now. I’m afraid they’re going to start snapping at any minute. This of road had no bridges. Luckily, none of the washes had any of water in them, but the road kept dipping down and turning into gravel as it went through these dry creek beds. As the sun began to set it became harder and harder to see the loose gravel and hidden potholes. The wind was still whipping at about 18 miles an hour even after the sun went down so my progress seemed to be nonexistent. I only had 60 km from the border to Sullana, but, it took me over three hours to cover the distance. That means I was moving out about 11 miles an hour, which sounds about right. It was a pretty miserable ride. I was able to feel a little bit better after the sun went down. I kind of tricked myself into riding and not thinking about my progress, but it was still not a very pleasant ride. Once again, O had fallen short of my goal for the day by about 50 miles. It seems like for the past couple of weeks I have fallen short of my goal every single day. In the Andes, I didn’t set any goals for myself, I just let the miles be what they were and I was happy with my riding. But now that I’m on the flatlands, it’s much easier to pick out a place on the map with the goal of getting there that night. I guess I need to reframe my perspective. The wind presents a challenge just like the Andes did. Perhaps I just need to expect to go 150 miles every day instead of 200+ like I want to be going. It’s just difficult because the wind is detrimental to my morale, but the mountains actively positively attributed to my morale. As I rode into Sullana I got cell service for the first time in about five hours. The streets became lively and the pavement became nice. It was close to nine, so the wind finally started to die down. I stopped for some soda and ice cream and felt a little bit better. I worked my way downtown and found an ATM. I then got some street food and, after trying a couple of different places, found a hotel with vacancy. I sat down and told myself that something needs to change. There have been several points on this trip where I come to an inflection point and I know a new era of my journey is starting. Today is one of those. I am leaving the mountains and forest behind. The next section of my journey will probably be the hardest yet, and I just need to get used to that. The wind is gonna be here whether I like it or not. Just like the hills in the Andes, it’s inevitable. It’s not glorious, it’s not fun, I wish it weren’t like this, but there’s nothing I can do about it. Complaining and getting angry is just a waste of energy. I’ll go much faster if I can just deal with it. Anyways, if I crack down on my discipline and start riding much earlier in the morning and stopping earlier in the evening, I’ll spend less time in the wind. Lately I’ve been falling off my schedule of stopping at nightfall. I’ve been riding past dark and not starting until just a couple minutes before the sun comes up. If I flip it back to two or three in the morning, which are the quietest hours of the day in terms of wind, then I can make more progress before the afternoon winds begin to beat me back. It’s easy to feel like I’m fighting this battle alone. I haven’t seen a gringo my entire time in South America. I haven’t spoken to anyone in English in weeks since I saw a German bikepacker in Nicaragua. I feel like my experience is unique in a lot of ways. When I think about it, I know it’s not. Everyone else who has bikepacked the Pan-American before me has had to deal with similar winds in this part of the route—unless they road into the mountains on the eastern side of the state, which many do, but it’s significantly slower. While I may have gotten really unlucky with the winds in North America, it’s my understanding that for the next 3000 miles having headwind is pretty common. Strasser, Deichmann, and Leo, and all the other previous record holders probably had to deal with this wind just like I am. Instead of complaining about it, I can adapt and ride through stronger. It provides a perfect opportunity for me to actually increase my lead. Strasser only average 151 miles per day through South America. When I originally saw that number I was a little bit shocked. That seems really low. Now that I’m out here, it totally makes sense why his average was so low. The first week and a half, my average has been around 150 because of all the mountains. I thought it might jump up after I got to the mountains, but the wind seems to be just as big of a detractor as the Andes. 150 miles a day is actually quite an achievement in South America. That being said, I did a lot more miles than Strasser through the United States when I had a headwind and he didn’t. I know I can do that again. My body is stronger than it was in the United States and my mind is too—even if it’s more precarious. I’m really strong, but I am standing on the edge of a cliff. In theory it wouldn’t take much to bump me off the edge, but I’m going fight against anything that comes my way. In the meantime, I feel confident that I can tackle the wind and whatever else comes my way. I just have to want it really bad mentally. It’s all mental from here on out. It really is. I talk all the time about endurance being mental, but it’s never felt more mental than it is now. Strasser has a great quote in his documentary that I wrote down two years ago when I first watched the doc. I wrote this quote down because I knew I would return to it when I got to the headwinds in Patagonia. I foresaw the exact events I’m currently experiencing and I knew this quote would be helpful. Here we are. As much as it sucks, it makes me smile a little bit to think about me writing this quote down two years ago, envisioning this exact moment. The quote is:

“It’s not about squeezing the last bit of strength out of your thigh, 95% of it is your mental performance, in your head. Your muscles only move when you intentionally activate them. You can’t dope that.”

After having biked 9000 miles to the Pan-American, I can tell you that he’s right. He’s 110% right. He hit the nail right on the head with that one. I’ve been saying it since the first week of this trip. I have the physical strength to get to Ushuaia in record-breaking time, it’s all mental. This journey requires a prerequisite baseline amount of physical fitness and capability, but once I’m out here, on the road, all by myself, it’s really all about my mind. It’s about how I tackle every single day. How I fight off these unfortunate circumstances. How I adapt when things go wrong. Just hearing that quote gets me fired up again. Gets me excited. I’ve got it. I want it. I want it so so bad. Thinking about that quote gets me excited because it’s a challenge. I haven’t mastered the physical challenge of the Pan-American, but I’m a lot closer to mastering that aspect of this ride. Mentally, I still have a lot of room for growth, I’ve got a lot of miles to figure it out. I’m so glad I wrote that quote down. It’s not the most elegant quote in the world, but it’s raw and true and so so applicable. I need to just keep reciting that quote in my head all day long. I need to write it out on my hand so every time I look down that’s all I see. I need that pen from Harry Potter. The one from book 5, where when he writes it etches into his arm. I need it tattooed across my forehead. Maybe I’m being a dramatic, but I’m in a pretty dramatic place and I feel like my emotions are so heightened in a strangely subdude, yet powerful dimension. I can’t explain it. They kind of bubble up sometimes and then disappear completely at other times. I think I’ll talk about it more tomorrow. For tonight I’ll end in that quote. As I go to sleep, I try to just think about that quote and get ready to tackle tomorrow.