Source: BY MATTHEW REAGAN of StarTelegram.com
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It takes a rare breed of athlete to endure hundreds of miles spent on a bike for hours on end, testing your limits for 48 consecutive hours, only stopping for food and water and maybe to catch a power nap. Some may call it daring. Some call it abnormal and others call it just plain absurd.
But don’t mention those words to a group the cycling world refers to as randonneurs.
It is what they love. Starting today, you can find nearly 300 of these racers testing their stamina on a 26.5-mile course beginning and ending at Glen Rose City Park in the Texas Time Trials.
The three-day event includes five races ranging from a 500-mile race to a 24-hour time trial to a one-lap sprint.
Riders from all over the country and the world, including ones from Germany, Austria and France, will go it alone or as a tandem and try and find a pace they can settle into. But the race isn’t just for veterans of endurance cycling.
“On the same course, at the same time, we also have many cyclists riding their first race ever,” race coordinator Dan Driscoll said.
The races kicks off at 6 p.m. today with the Tejas 500, which is a qualifier for June’s Race Across America, a 3,000-mile race from California to Maryland.
