Bike, Fitness and Travel
We hope that you find this site useful for your quest to a balanced life with a goal of lifetime fitness. Bicycling has offered an adventure and break from the normal routine and created some of the best vacation memories. By cycling at local events and around the world, it has forced us to get out of our comfort zone and given us some rewarding benefits. We have also made some of our best friends from bike rides around the world. Even if you are getting on a bike for the first time since a child or have been cycling year after year, we wanted a platform to share inspiration stories and offer encouragement on your bicycle journey.
“A bicycle ride around the world begins with a single pedal stroke.” ~ Scott Stoll
Our 3 Reasons
Why We Veni Vidi Vélo
(we came, we saw, we bicycled):
1.) A reason to joy ride and offer a balance of work and life
“Ride as much or as little, or as long or as short as you feel. But ride.” ~ Eddy Merckx
“Nothing compares to the simple pleasure of riding a bike.” ~ John F. Kennedy
At whatever fitness level, you can enjoy the health benefits that a two wheeled fun adventure can bring. Even if you have not been on a bike in years or want to start integrating it more frequently into your fitness routine, we wanted a site to help you get started or take your fitness or cycling passion to the next level with encouragement and support.
2.) A way to make new friends with a fitness like mindset
“Gliding down the bike path on a Saturday morning, you whip by somebody peddling in the opposite direction and give each other a nod. For a moment it’s like “Hey, we’re both doing the same thing. Let’s be friends for a second.” ― Neil Pasricha, The Book of Awesome
Cycling can be individual or group and the best way to meet others is through an activity. Just like a golfing outing with friends, cycling can be a very social activity. Clubs are a great way to meet life long fitness buddies. Attending local bike rides or even destination events are a great way to explore the world and meet other like minded cyclists. Friends can also be your workout partners and help achieve your weight loss goals.
3.) You see the world in a different way
“It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them.” ― Ernest Hemingway, By-Line: Selected Articles and Dispatches of Four Decades
The actual splendor of bicycling is all the wonderful places it can take you. There is basically nothing in the world like rolling through fields of sun flowers, riding along the ocean’s edge, or taking in the scenery of a vista on after a mountain climb.
Meet Mary and Michael
Our Story:
We are Americans that lived in France and have a passion for cycling (when we are not working normal day jobs). Our enthusiasm for doing sports around the world started in 2006 when Mary qualified for and participated in the ITU amateur triathlon world championships in Switzerland, and then traveled through two additional counties while doing another local triathlon and over 200 miles of cycling through European countrysides. This experience confirmed our love of doing sports while travelling, and by doing sports on vacation it served as an ideal means of seeing and experiencing the countries. By competing in races and doing sport abroad, it created a common interest and broke down the communication barrier to meeting the local people. By the end of 2006, Michael decided to brush up on his French, and had enrolled in French classes at the local Alliance Française in Seattle, Washington and by the end of 2007 we were living our dream in Paris, France after Michael found a job there.
With only 6 suit cases and our 2 road bikes, we started our life in Paris. Mary, with only 5 weeks of French study before moving to Paris, quickly enrolled in French classes and local sport clubs (a swim club, a running club and a triathlon team). Every weekend, to escape the city, we would ride our bikes in the surrounding countryside, sometimes just cycling from the city and making a long loop (65 miles or 100km) or sometimes we would hop a train to explore new areas farther away.
Exploring France With Just a Bike & Backpack
By 2008, we started doing weekend cycling trips with just a backpack and a bike. We would take the train from Paris and then ride from bed & breakfast to bed & breakfast. Then in 2009, with a Garmin 405 watch, we would program out the whole entire route and follow the GPS guided arrows on the watch. This made cycling more enjoyable with less wrong turns or having to deal with paper maps.
In 2010, we bought a house in the countryside outside Paris to be closer to cycling. This was no easy feat buying a house without a car, but we had bikes. Mary would ride each day to the train station in Paris and take the train outside of the city and complete a 30 mile cycling loop, stopping at all the local real estate agents (in France there is no multiple listing service or buyer’s agents). After 3 months of searching by bike for a house and 5 months of waiting for the final move (it is typical in France to wait that long), we finally found one and made the move from Paris to the countryside!
By April 2011, we were riding our bike right out our door on beautiful country roads! By May, Mary already joined a new triathlon club and was learning all the top places to ride in France and beyond. Finally we decided to share our dream and help make “local” European cycling accessible for all by creating this site. Veni, Vidi, Vélo ! We came, We Saw, We Cycled!
Back in the USA …
Although we had to move back to the United States in 2012, we did not stop our quest of exploring new places and continuing our cycling dream of making cycling accessible to the everyday athlete. Now when we are not working, we enjoy exploring the back roads and share our stories to inspire and motivate others to use their see the world by bike. Having a common cycling interest with others, breaks down communication barriers and helps grow relationships that last a lifetime. We consider ourselves the luckiest people to find the sport of cycling as a means to travel new places.
Mary
A distance swimmer gone triathlete! After years of competing in the age-group, university, and masters swimming scenes in the US, Mary has since competed at a national level in France in triathlon, including a 10th overall finish in the team duathlon national championships in 2009. In swimming she placed 3rd overall in the 800 meters freestyle at short course French masters nationals. In running, Mary has qualified for French nationals in the half marathon. She is also certified as a BNSSA (beach lifeguard) and first aid response in France.
When Mary is not training, she is working full time and always enjoys sharing and motivating others to explore the world by bike.
Michael
Track cyclist going for the sprint points! Since competing at a national level on the velodrome as a junior in the United States, Michael has always had a passion for cycling. Balancing work and sports has been a challenge but Michael will always rise to the occasion to race for some sprint points on a team ride.
When Michael is not on his vélo, he is a civil engineer and senior project manager specializing in complex international bridge design projects. On team rides, Michael is known as the ‘TGV,’ (train à Grande Vitesse) the high speed train in France, due to his speed and determination to help take the cycling groups skills to the next level.