Jason Lewis has just finished his human powered circumnavigation journey of 14 years! I have been following Jason since his Pacific crossing in pedal boat Moksha from California to Hawaii in 1997 with Stevie Smith and have also supported his effort periodically. Jason is an inspiration and a hero. However, I am also a supporter of Colin Angus who completed his human powered circumnavigation earlier this year.
There is an ongoing debate between the Jason Lewis and the Colin Angus camps. Colin became the first person to circumnavigate the earth by human power earlier this year, but he didn’t follow some of the rules that Jason Lewis (and Erden Eruc who is currently rowing across the Pacific ocean) says is part of a true circumnavigation. According to Jason and Erden, a true circumnavigation must pass through two antipodal points and Colin’s route, although greater than the circumference of the earth at it’s widest part of 22,858.7 miles, did not.
I’ll let you decide. Here is Colin’s justification of his circumnavigation:
I’m not making any judgements, as they are both hero’s to me. But, I’d like to know what you think. Send your thoughts to the comments link on this blog post, or email me at greg@justgreg.com or return reply to this email.
You HAVE to check this video out. We set up a water proof lipstick camera to the bow of WiTHiN facing back, one in the cockpit of WiTHiN to catch the action from Within WiTHiN, and our HD video footage shot from the dock.
Over all – a pretty successful day.
WiTHiN handled at speed much like what I remembered from my kayak hull top deck weight simulation test. She motored right along nicely at speed and tipped quite dramatically when I threw that over sized rudder all the way to one side which was pretty fun – no concerns or surprises at all. You can see in the video how responsive she is to rudder movements. Again – she is a blast to ride! The steering has been changed from that long plastic push/pull rod to a cable loop and it is WAY easier to steer now that it used to be.
We clamped 80 pounds of ballast to the floor to offset the additional weight of the full top deck and as a result, WiTHiN sits much lower in the water now. This meant that we needed to heighten the drive leg bay walls and Ben did an awesome job of converting my old flexible rubber and neoprene bladder to a nice solid wood frame which worked very well. We still have a couple of inches of water floating on top of the drive leg plug, but as long as I was not upside down, this water wasn’t an issue. During the capsize, though, that water splashed around the cockpit, so something is going to have to be done about that. Probably a deeper plug will need to be made.
The capsize test went as per predicted. WiTHiN is not stable upside down and it took quite an effort by Ben and Cyrille to flip her upside down with me strapped into my seat. Instead of cleats on the bow and stern for tow ropes, we drilled holes through the hard points in the tips of the bow and the stern and then inserted stainless steel tubes which were bonded and glassed into place. These through holes will be far stronger than cleats when we get to sea trials and require motor boats to tow WiTHiN into and out of rough areas. We constructed handles that fit into these through holes which were really handy for carrying WiTHiN from the trailer into the water, and for Cyrille and Ben to grab a good hold and flip WiTHiN around.
We bolted a 4 point racing seat harness onto the seat rails, so even upside down, I was held firmly into my seat. After the first capsize, all of the dust that had collected inside WiTHiN instantly got dispersed into the air and I could barely see through the dust cloud inside the cockpit. I started to gag on the dust and we had to open the canopy for a while to allow it to drift out. Quite a bit of water was flying around inside WiTHiN during the capsizes which was mostly from that 2″ of water sitting on top of the drive leg plug. Some water was coming in through the hatch and we need to do a better job of sealing that hatch up. The front window did not leak at all.
For safety gear, I had a diving knife fastened to the inside wall of the cockpit which if necessary, I could stab through the PETG plastic window to escape. I also have an emergency oxygen supply bottle called Spare Air.
The capsizes were a blast!! Totally fun. I didn’t want the ride to stop and I am really looking forward to getting WiTHiN into some rougher ocean conditions to experience and learn about that. I am concerned about how to manage the next aspect of testing – rough ocean testing. I don’t know how to safely test WiTHiN in those kind of conditions. I imagine getting a zodiak to tow me out into rough water would be the way to go, but I just don’t know enough yet about the dangers of doing that. If WiTHiN was solid enough (no more leaks), then I could pedal her out into open ocean, but I would be concerned about strong currents either taking me out to sea, to pushing me down the coast into shore. There is a reason it took Roz Savage and Erden Eruc a month and a half to find the perfect conditions to leave the California coast for Hawaii in their row boats. Rough seas + wind + currents + shores don’t mix.
The other issue that I am still looking for an answer to is stability for standing. Periodically, I will need to stand up through the top hatch, climb out onto the top deck, and climb up from the water level. Currently, WiTHiN is not stable enough to allow me to do that without tipping her over too much and risk flooding the cockpit. I need some way to temporarily add stability for these maneuvers.
Standing up with the test strap-on keel
During this capsize test, we experimented with a ballast keel. I welded up a rig that strapped onto WiTHiN and suspended 50 pounds of ballast 3.5 feet below WiTHiN’s floor. This was enough extra ballast to allow me to stand up, climb-in, etc, but I don’t like it as a solution. Mostly because 90% of the time, I will be safe and snug in my seat in WiTHiN and won’t require the additional ballast from the keel – In a sense, I would be hauling around this extra weight and drag for no reason most of the time.
My dad Rudi enjoys a spin in WiTHiN
A retractable outrigger is too flimsy for the ocean and I would be afraid that a giant wave would just rip it off. Moving parts like that out on the ocean aren’t very safe. I’ve thought about folding outrigger arms that are stored inside the cockpit, but there isn’t really very much room in there! Also some of you have suggested inflatable bags, but again, there isn’t much room inside WiTHiN to store those, and I’m not crazy about all the fuss of getting them inflated and installed every time I need to stand up.
Please send your ideas to the comments section of this blog post, or to me directly by replying to this email.
I am planning on running a full-deck capsize test this Saturday at the lake.
While I have been away eating and drinking to my hearts content in Italy, Ben has been hard at work in the SquirrelWorks shop finishing the installation of WiTHiN’s full top deck window and hatch. (We named the shop SquirrelWorks after our mascot black squirrel that hangs out near the windows on the south side of the shop.)
I decided that I did not like the side-entry hatch and we moved the hatch to the top. WiTHiN is NOT stable enough to stand up in without it tipping over, so I need to think about some other way to add stability for entry/exit.
The new top entry hatch
The old side entry hatch – don’t like.
One idea is a swing-arm outrigger. The single arm outrigger would be a long strut that rotates on a bearing mounted on the top of the deck. When it is stowed and not in use, the float becomes an extension of the stern of WiTHiN. To use the outrigger, a handle could be used from inside WiTHiN to rotate the arm into a 90 degree position.
The swing-rigger concept:
When I first drew this up I liked it, but now I don’t. Too many things can go wrong with that outrigger arm and the mechanism required to activate it. If this outrigger is the only method of providing the stability that I require to stand up, climb out, get in and get out, and it failed, I would be in trouble.
Instead, we are going to experiment with a ballast keel. 25 pounds or so about 4 feet below the hull might provide enough counter balance to allow me to stand up through the open hatch. It may also allow me to climb in from water level. This is something that I will experiment with on Saturday.
The additional ballast added to counter the weight of the top deck is 70 pounds secured to WiTHiN’s floor. I welded a threaded rod to the seat rails that secures a stack of standard weight lifting plates.
The hatch is secured with 4 window latches that pull the hatch tight against a neoprene seal. I decided not to put hinges on it yet and instead to hold it down with 4 latches and have it tethered to the boat. When not on, this option will allow me to dangle the hatch door inside the cockpit or strap it to the roof. If the top hatch works, then I can always add two hinges later.
We are trying to source a 4 point safety harness right now. This harness with me bolted to the seat rails in the front, and the rear bulkhead in the rear. When I am in, and strapped down to my seat, we should be able to flip WiTHiN upside down and I should be safe and secure in my recumbent seat. This will keep me safe during a capsize and will also keep the weight on the bottom of the hull to assist in right-siding.
Some other changes we made are new steering lines that route through the deck. I have two lines on the perimeter inside decking that I can hold onto to move the rudder. The line is a loop so i can control the rudder with one hand or both – way better than the plastic push-pull arm that I was using for the 24 hour record attempt.
On Monday, Helen and I returned from a bike trip through the Tuscany region of Italy with Backroads. It was a wonderful trip! Despite cycling mammoth hills every day (2000 ft up, 2000 ft down, all day long), I managed to gain 10 pounds. Imagine that – eating Pizza and drinking Chianti Reserva day after day with reckless abandon and you will gain a few pounds. Oh well – it’s back to a serious training program for this cowboy.
Helen and I are doing the Las Vegas marathon on December 2nd, so I really need to get my running form back. I designed a new training program that will hopefully convert me from my sluggish present self to a lean and mean marathon machine. My goal is 3:15. My training program is here if you care to look it over.
I am also biking an hour everyday to maintain a cycling base plus 3 days of weights (2 days of legs and 1 day of upper body). My goal is to really pursue the Greenland Ice Cap crossing in the spring. Tons of stuff needs to happen first, but I am going to assume that everything will work out as I have planned (ha, ha, ha – good one!), and I want to make sure that I am really super ready for the biking volume that I will need to have as a base. If I can break the 8 day crossing record, it may end up being a solo RAMM-type of effort -RAMM is Race Across America where solo competitors cycle up to 20 hours per day for 8 to 10 days in a row racing their way across the US.
My daily hour of base cycling is now on the mountain bike which is probably what I will end up using to cross the Ice Cap. My goal is to cycle to the gym 5 days per week regardless of what kind of nastiness winter wants to throw at me. This should get me used to various wintry surfaces, and dressing appropriately. It snowed again today – but this year I am actually really looking forward to the snow and cold. Learning about winter biking, camping and survival is kind of exciting.
John, Ben and I are back from NextFest and it was a blast! WAY more work than any of us expected though, but well worth it.
The highlight for me was being interviewed by Dave Navarro(Jane’s Addiction, Red Hot Chili Peppers and TV hit series Rockstar: Supernova) for Indie103.1 fm, a popular Los Angeles radio station. Those who know me, know how much I love my music, so to get a chance to sit and chat live on the air with a rock and roll super star was pretty freaking cool! Dave is really into human power and is an avid runner.
I was amazed at the general public’s reaction to Critical Power and the 24 hour distance record – even in the shadow of some pretty impressive displays like solar cars, jet packs and robots. We had a sign on CP that read “World Record 650 miles – 24 hours by human power” which always stopped people in their tracks and generated tons of questions. They just could not fathom 650 miles on a bicycle – many had never even driven their cars 650 miles in a day. I didn’t stop talking for 4 days! I think this kind of publicity is very good for human power in general. Perhaps it will get more people thinking about riding their bikes again. Or maybe they’ll just all want an electric drag bike like the Killacycle.
Our neighbor at the show was Bill Dube with the world record A123 Killacycle electric drag bike. We had dinner with him and his crew on Friday night where he talked about what could go wrong during a press burn-out demo he planned the following day. The next day Bill’s scary prediction came true and during the burn out, the Killacycle took-off and smashed into a parked car sending Bill to the hospital. Here is the video. Bill ended up with some minor injuries including some stitches on his head.
For the first few hours on Thursday and Friday, thousands of kids on school tours swarmed through NextFest. The simulator was wildly popular with line-ups that stretched across the Transportation Pavilion. The simulator held-up very well and worked flawlessly thanks to Ben’s awesome workmanship and design.
At NextFest, Google made a big announcement that they were sponsoring the new Lunar X prize where a team must successfully land a privately funded craft on the lunar surface and survive long enough to complete the mission goals of roaming about the lunar surface for at least 500 meters. The prize is $30 million clams.
Not to be outdone by Google, we made an announcement of our own called the Lunar AOG prize. FIVE BILLION dollars (yep – that’s BILLION) for the first human powered trip to the moon. John figured that if we deposited 7 dollars into an account, by the time someone succeeds at a human powered trip to the moon, that 7 bucks should be close to 5 billion.
Before starting on the main hatch, we figured that we should double check to make sure that I can actually get into the boat. I know I can get in from the water because we set up a test a month ago where I constructed a wood frame that simulated the hatch area and practised deep water entry with the kayak hull before the full top deck was installed.
It wasn’t as hard as it looks – really. I hoist myself headfirst through the hatch way into the boat lying on my stomach with my head toward the REAR (stern) of WiTHiN.
Then I flip around so that I am sitting on the seat with my legs still dangling outside. I can fold them up and tuck them inside. Done – easy.
Getting out is the reverse. There is not a whole lot of room in there! But that’s the way it has been designed. I lived for 24 hours in Critical Power streamliner which makes WiTHiN look like a palatial mansion. I should be able to live for a month in WiTHiN.
I think I will need to get out though to stretch and be able to service the boat – tasks like deploying a sea anchor, cleaning the bottom, sun tanning, etc. We’re probably going to have to come up with some way of deploying a temporary outrigger of some sort to allow me to stand up and climb up onto of the boat.
There has been a new project idea that has been fermenting in my brain for a while.
Since my mission in life is to conquer the world by human power, I figure that I better get on with some of the other kinds of earth aside from water and pavement.
I have always been very fascinated with human powered arctic travel, and have read about a dozen books on expeditions to the poles. I believe that our traditional human powered methods of travelling to the South Pole and possibly even the North Pole could be improved upon, and this challenge really intrigues me.
I think a good place to start is the Greenland ice cap. For details on some of my ideas regarding the crossing, the existing crossing record of 8 days and some ideas for a human powered snow mobile, please visit a new web site that I set up for the Pedal The Ice Cap expedition. Your input is always welcome.
Iditabike record – 563 km in 3 days 8 hours – average 7 kph
Cross country ski 24 hour record – around 355 km – average 14.7 kph
The heart of what my concept for a human powered snow mobile could be is the Ktrac treaded rear drive from Ktrac Cycle. I received my Ktrac today and I must say that I am VERY impressed.
I have spoken with Kyle from Ktrac a few times about this concept and he thinks that his patented Ktrac would be up for the challenge. Kyle says that when traction is required on sand or soft snow, the larger contact patch created his track is far greater than the contact patch created from a simple fat tire. For ice or packed snow, a studded ice tire might be better.
I was very surprised at how little rolling resistance this tread has. I was expecting it to be very sticky, but it rolls with very little effort down my drive way.
The plan is to mount it onto my mountain bike and run some tests on various snow conditions. And since this is Calgary, I would expect the snow to start falling anytime.
This whale breached right off the bow of my kayak!
I just returned from our 4 day kayaking/camping trip through the Broken Group Island chain off of the West coast of Vancouver island. We had fantastic weather and it was a really great time! We saw sea lions barking on the rocks, sat in the middle of a group of seals feeding, watched a whale breach, right off the bow of my kayak, and paddled along with dolphins. I also got the chance to experience a channel crossing with 3 to 4 foot waves and large swells from the open Pacific which was a good experience. Great, great trip. It was a highlight of my summer for sure.
We forgot (well, I forgot) the tent poles for one of our tents, so we used our axe to cut new ones from a drift wood log. It worked perfectly!
When we broke camp to move to a new island, I had to haul the new tent poles with me.
My daughter Krista chillin in the tent
Helen and Val getting ready for another day of paddling
Seals feeding
Seals feeding
From left to right: Gary, Val, Greg, Helen, Dustin, Cody, Bridget, Krista
While I was away at Ironman Canada and our kayaking trip, Ben was busy working away on WiTHiN. The top deck is now on, the front window is cut out, and the seat rails have been secured to the hull.
The plan is to do some capsize tests in a lake here in Calgary soon before the snow starts falling. I would like to do some pretty dramatic testing just to see how WiTHiN and myself will handle some extreme conditions. I envision using two docks placed close together with WiTHiN in the water between them. The idea is to be able to lift, drop, and flip us around using cables running to two hoists positioned on the docks. I’ll be secured inside. Kind of like going over Niagara Falls in a barrel.
To finish before the tests:
1. Seat restraint system in 2. Front Lexan window in 3. Steering cables working 4. Solid foam filled sections in Bow and Stern 5. Main hatch door working
I plan on adding the other hatches, port lights and vents after we get a better idea of where they should be positioned.
My finishing time was 10:54 and I came in 33rd out of 296 in my division. The last Ironman World Championships qualifying slot went to 10:38, so I was about 16 minutes too slow.
This was Ironman Canada’s 25th anniversary and to celebrate, they invited just over 2700 athletes to join in the fun this year – a record number. There is no doubt about it – Ironman Canada IS the best Ironman race in the world. What an amazing event. I actually enjoyed many parts of the race. The crowds watching are enthusiastic and everywhere you go. A truly great event.
The swim was great – I don’t think I touched another swimmer the whole 3800 meters in Okanagan Lake. My secret is to start way, way, way LEFT. Then when the start cannon blows I run still further LEFT until I am on the far outside and in my own private water space. This also cuts off some distance, as the beach curves out toward the turn around buoy. Not much though, but I’ll happily take whatever I can get. My swim time was an average 1:15.
My bike kind of sucked. I just ran out of steam. I had no issues holding my 200 to 210 watts during the first 3 hours, but after climbing Richter Pass I just sort of ran out of gas. I would be riding along at what I thought was 200 watts, when a quick look down at my SRM power meter would indicate 180 watts. I’d ramp up the power, then it would slowly fall again. My legs were sore and very fatigued. I think I am still not fully recovered from the 24 hour human powered boat record. Injuries from the 24 like my knee and hamstring were bothering me quite a bit near the end of the 180 km Ironman ride.
My run started out good, then got really good. After the first 45 minutes I was able to get into a comfortable sub 8 minute mile pace, but again, I just ran out of steam or the last hour and finished my marathon in just under 4 hours.
I’m not super disappointed, as my top 11% age group finish (33 rd out of 296 in the 45 to 49 age group) was my 3rd best Ironman finish, and my best Ironman Canada finish. My best performance was in Arizona 2006 when I placed 4th with a top 2% finish. Second best was Arizona in 2007 where I finished in the top 8%, but missed qualifying due to TWO flat tires!
I think I am going to take a year off of Ironman and focus on some of my other challenges – like making some progress on the Pedal The Ocean project, a second 24 hour human powered boat record attempt race, and the Greenland Ice Cap crossing record attempt .
I may return for Ironman Arizona in 2009 where I WILL qualify.
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