Brain Endurance Training & Paper Maps

"Brain Endurance Training (BET), a combined cognitive and exercise approach, has been shown to significantly improve cognitive and physical performance in older adults."

Brain Endurance Training Combats Age-Related Decline in Focus, Neuroscience News, 10/11/24.

That grabbed my attention. 

Another day finding my way on the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route with paper maps.
And I thought I was just out for a ride.
(image by Paul Brasby)

As I understand from a rudimentary reading of some published reports, BET is an approach to exercise both the brain and the rest of the body in a structured, complementary training program. This can be achieved with separate mental and physical workouts, but also with cognitively fatiguing tasks during demanding physical workouts. Although developed for elite athletes, it recently has been shown to apply more broadly, including to those in the MediCare race category.

One report summarized BET as follows:

"BET's core principle revolves around using cognitive stress as a catalyst for a broad spectrum of physiological adaptions, extending beyond mere task efficiency to encompass increased mental resilience, enhanced decision-making capabilities under fatigue, and overall physical endurance."

"Brain endurance training is not merely about getting better at specific cognitive tasks. Instead, it's about expanding an athlete's cognitive and physical capabilities, enabling them to perform at higher levels, with less perceived effort, and make better decisions under fatigue. The misconception that improvement in task performance is equivalent to athletic enhancement misses the core objective of BET:  to forge athletes who can outlast and outperform their competitors by cultivating a more resilient and capable neural engine." Understanding BET:  It's Not About Task Mastery, It's About Capacity Expansion, Soma Technologies, March 21, 2024.

Wow.

What gravel cyclist/bikepacker does not want to increase mental resilience, decision-making capabilities under fatigue, and physical endurance?

I read one example of BET training as solving mathematical problems during an endurance bicycle ride at 80-85 percent effort. That sounds to me like most any gravel race of 100-200 miles or more, especially when navigating by cue sheets. Or most any day bikepacking remote roads and trails, when navigating by paper maps.

From riding the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route, navigating only with paper maps and an odometer, I know that both physical and mental resilience improved significantly over the course of seven challenging weeks. Here's what I wrote shortly afterward:

"Working through a difficult first two weeks, I eventually found my rhythm and rode stronger, longer, higher, and faster as the weeks passed, even as the roads and conditions deteriorated significantly in New Mexico. At the end I believed I could have continued to ride even stronger for many, many more weeks." The Great Divide - Believe, BlackHillsBackBone.blogspot.com, April 5, 2022.

This merits more research.

In the meantime, I'll keep riding with those paper maps.

Merry Christmas 2024!

Merry Christmas! 

Peace and good will to all.

Addendum. I love that Linus lets go of his security blanket when the angel of the Lord says "Fear Not!"

The Meaning Of Christmas, by Linus.

A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965).

Coming Home!

On the last day of November two years ago, my Dad died. So, this is already our third Christmas without him. Seems like yesterday. Seems like a lifetime ago.

When I saw this picture and short story on social media, I thought of Dad. We always had a special connection with baseball.

God bless all of you missing loved ones. May you find peace and hope in this season.

"I recently read about a man who collects pictures of hitters who had hit walk-off home runs. He said that the reason he did this is because this is how he views us entering heaven.

Look at the faces of his teammates waiting to welcome him home. Look at their excitement. They can't wait to celebrate with him.

Look at the fans. Arms raised, big smiles, maybe even hugs for a perfect stranger.

Perhaps this is your first holiday season without someone important who is now waiting for you in heaven. Maybe it's just another one with that big hole in your heart and an empty seat at the table. Either way, I hope you can find some encouragement in this picture, what it represents to the man who collected it, and find joy this year."

Shared via Greg Payne.

2024 Black Hills Bounty (Day 7) - Going Home

Well, I'm going home, back to the place where I belong

And where your love has always been enough for me.

I'm not running from, no, I think you got me all wrong.

I don't regret this life I chose for me.

But these places and these faces are getting old,

So, I'm going home.

Home, Chris Daughtry (2007).

Emerging from Lost Canyon onto Old Baldy Road (USFS Low Standard Road 633.1).
(image by Luke Derstein)

Day 7 of the 2024 Black Hills Bounty.

Rapid City, South Dakota is my home and the Black Hills are my backyard. Riding into the Hills for a day, a week, or longer isn't leaving home for me.

But it is for the rest of the crew on the Bounty. They all traveled hundreds of miles from their regular lives with families and friends in Nebraska and Kansas, just to ride together for a week in the Black Hills. 

So, on Day 7, they're going home.

Descending out of Lost Canyon on an abandoned road. 
(image by Paul Brasby)

Camping at the bottom of a narrow canyon makes for a memorable evening, but also a cold morning. So, we break camp quickly and layer up for the relatively short, (mostly) downhill ride into Spearfish. We're rolling down Lost Canyon long before the first direct sunlight reaches our site.

As customary, the final day of the Bounty is, at most, a half-day so the crew can start their drive home. But this is still the Black Hills Bounty, which means a mix of challenging near-roads, USFS Low Standard, Secondary, and Primary Roads, and maybe even some pavement. And at least one steep pitch. Well, just because.

Tracking another unnumbered road along Beaver Creek.
(image by Paul Brasby)

In no time, the crew drops out of Lost Canyon and onto Old Baldy Road (USFS Low Standard Road 633.1) and then Schoolhouse Gulch Road (USFS Secondary Road 222). The reprieve on that moderately developed road is very short, however, as we immediately turn onto another unmarked, unnumbered, barely two-track winding up a valley alongside Beaver Creek.

Just as the crew settles into a rhythm on that rough near-road, we turn ninety degrees to face a climb directly up to a distant ridge line. Looking up that steep, loose, rough two track is a bit daunting, especially on a loaded bikepacking bike. But all it really takes is a little focus and a little patience. And a willful ignorance of speed.

Bounty riders prepare for a 90 degree turn onto a steep pitch directly up to a ridge line.
(image by Paul Brasby)

Smooth ridge line cruising on USFS Low Standard Road 130.
(image by Paul Brasby)

Cresting that pitch, we t-bone into a curiously well built and maintained USFS Low Standard Road 130, which rides much more like a solid Secondary Road. Many roads and trails branch off this road as it follows along a nice ridge line. Now, we're cruising.

But we're not done yet. We eventually turn off USFS Low Standard Road 130 onto another one of those unnumbered, unmarked two track near-roads for a rollicking two mile descent that's just rough enough to keep your attention. Too soon, we drop onto Higgins Gulch Road (USFS Secondary Road 214) for the final, champagne gravel road into Spearfish. 

Loading up Paul's toy hauler at Rushmore Bikes in Spearfish.
(image by Luke Derstein)

All loaded up for the drive home.

The sun never did warm up those canyons and gulches we descended that morning. We were cold when finally stopping at Rushmore Bikes in Spearfish. Hard to believe that we started this trip a week ago in the blazing oven of Buffalo Gap National Grasslands.

After a quick change into warmer traveling clothes, we load up bikes and gear in Paul's toy hauler and hit the open road. 

They're going home.

Addendum. Here's a link to the Black Hills Bounty Page, which describes and links all blog post for every post for every year of this ride (2021-present). Black Hills Bounty Page.

Home, Daughtry (2007).