Sibling rivalry, or how many miles to Christmas?

Black Friday

During Thanksgiving festivities, my brother revealed that he is participating in something called the Jenny Challenge. (No, it has nothing to do with Jenny Craig.) The goal is to run 100 miles between Thanksgiving and Christmas (Jenny challenged her uncles and siblings to do this one year). Somehow it's a fundraising function, but he didn't get to those details. A laudable goal, but 25 miles a week seems a bit brutal to me. So I wished him luck without taking up the challenge.

But in the thinking time I had on my bike ride today when I wasn't dodging slushy patches on the road, I realized that setting some sort of goal to counter the fudge factor of December would not be a bad thing. So I am embarking on the Jenny Gamble. My goal is to ride 1,000 miles between Thanksgiving and Christmas. It's a gamble because that target is not an enormous challenge (for me) except for the gamble of December weather. Last year I rode 954 miles during that period, but there were some icy days when I could not ride. I will make it a little less easy by stipulating that trainer time and indoor time trials do not count; these should be "real" miles.

So I have 29 days to cover 1,000 miles. Just 34.5 miles a day. I got in 73 today, so I'm off to a good start. If I get desperate near the end, there's always the solstice ride (ride from sunset to sunrise through the longest night of the year), but I hope it doesn't come to that! I'll keep a total on my Facebook wall so you can hold me accountable. Join me?