The past few months of my life has been a whirlwind of new experiences. I traveled across the globe to my motherland with my two best friends, flew across the country to visit Washington D.C. and its famous landmarks, and took a big leap forward in my design career by getting an exciting new job. But throughout all this, there was still one part of me that remained in a limbo…and that was the athlete in me that was always chasing “the next challenge”.
Not too long after completing last year’s LIVESTRONG Challenge, I set a new goal of finishing a marathon...and for a moment I was completely immersed in the sport of running. But then came the injuries -- first the shin splints then the achilles tendonitis – and for the next 8 months I constantly battled new flare-ups while I made no progress toward my marathon goal. Finally, it became clear to me that this just wasn’t a realistic goal for me – at least not at the movement – and I was left feeling defeated with no concrete goal and no motivation to train.
All this changed though when I got the opportunity to visit my uncle while I was traveling in Japan last month. He’s been battling liver cancer on & off for last few years, and recently it has returned with a vengeance…sending him back to the hospital and endless chemotherapy. When I arrived at the hospital, I was shocked to see how weak he looked…and he spoke to me as though this latest battle with cancer was one challenge he couldn't see himself overcoming. So I reminded him of how I always though of him as the toughest man in the world while I was growing up…and also told him about Lance Armstrong; how one cyclist overcame a death sentence and won the toughest athletic event in the world. It was then that the thought of participating in LIVESTRONG Challenge again came to my mind.
I had received an email from LAF about the event little while ago, but at the time I had no desire to participate it in it again. After seeing my uncle in the hospital bed though, I realized I should start being active again…and I knew there was no better way to motivate myself than to ride in this fund-raising event for the organization committed to fighting cancer. After all, no matter how much injuries I’ve sustained from the impact of running, I could still ride my bike.
Now I wish I could say that I registered for the event as soon as I got back from the hospital…but in reality I hesitated to do so for the fear of being so ill-prepared for it. Back then I was barely riding 30 miles at a time, and when I found out that the Portland course would include sadistic 7,000+ feet of climbing – including 6,000 feet elevation gain in 15 miles – I thought to myself “no way”. The event was only couple months away, and getting ready for such extremely difficult century in relatively short time (I had 6 months to train for last year’s event) seemed almost impossible.
But then came a breakthrough in my riding. For last couple weeks, I’ve been able to steadily increase my riding distance – putting in 40, 45, and 55-miler on weekends – and now I feel like the Challenge is slightly more attainable goal. That’s why as of today I’m officially registered to participate in the 100-mile ride of the 2007 LIVESTRONG Challenge Portland, taking place on September 30th from the Nike World Headquarter. It’ll be the toughest physical challenge I’ll encounter yet, but I’ll tackle it head-on knowing that at this very moment my uncle is fighting to overcome a far greater challenge.
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