Bob Banks

I remember one time many years ago Steve and I were discussing bathroom strategy (don't ask why) with another person whom I don't recall, and this other person mentioned that they are usually out of 'there' within a minute. To which Steve incredulously remarked, "How do you get any reading done?" He wasn't joking.

Anyone who's ever entered a bathroom in a Steve Edwards residence is bound to find an impressive stack of literature. Usually in the form of various cycling, climbing and running rags, sports equipment catalogues and the occasional scientific journal. No Playboys in this bathroom, cause we all know, you don't really 'read' those, and what else does one do on the can?

The Challenge:

• 50 magazine pages/newspaper articles read in the bathroom in 50 before Nov. 1st (bonus points if someone is waiting to get in the bathroom)

While this challenge may indeed seem odd to most, for anyone who's ever lived with Steve it will make perfect sense. I think it was his brother Brian who told the story of having breakfast at some diner in LA a few years back when Steve noticed an opening at the bathroom in the back of the restaurant. He excused himself from the table, snatched a newspaper off the counter and headed back to the facilities. In a crowded restaurant. Who else but Steve Edwards can pull that move off?
I'm one of those people who are "out of there within a minute”. For a variety of reasons, it's just not a place I want to spend my time, let alone catch up on the latest news in the cycling world. Therein lies the challenge and as I write this Challenge Report, it has proved to be an undertaking of monumental effort. I began strong, about a page a day, but was interrupted by a 20 day trip to Italy, where English language literature was difficult to come by, and now with only 9 days left, I’m not sure if I can make it. This may very well prove to be the hardest challenge I’ve ever undertaken, but I feel something coming on right now, so it looks like I should go get some reading done.

PS: As an aside, I will be doing a second Challenge in the 50 hours prior to Steve’s birthday, beginning at 10:00pm Friday Nov. 19th and finishing by midnight Nov. 21st.

1. 50 miles running
2. 50 miles single speed mountain biking
3. 500 pull-ups / 500 push-ups / 500 ab exercises
4. 50 boulder problems (10 V5 or harder)
5. 10 mile ocean paddle

This will be a difficult undertaking as well, although with far less chance of having my legs fall asleep.

Happy birthday Manny. And to make sure you know Bob was serious about the "aside" challenge, click here for a full report.

Todd Mei

The Steve Edwards Birthday Challenge: To be completed in a 24 hour period starting Saturday, November 20, 2010 at 12:00:01 AM (since 22/11 is a Monday):

5000 finger-tip push-ups/press-ups
50 two-finger, one-arm pull ups/chin-ups (each arm)
Drink 5 rye Manhattans
Lose 5 kilos (11 lbs) by start of 24 hour period: original weigh-in 70.8 kilos (156 lbs) at the start of my training (20/09/10)
5 seconds doing the Jean Claude van Damme splits
Raise £500 for RSPCA by the start of 24 hour period
By the start of the 24 hour period, I will have inspired 5 people to undertake birthday challenges of their own (on their own birthdays)

During the 24 hour period, I will watch Season 7 of the television programme “24” with the following conditions:

each time the word “now” is said, I have to do either 20 V-ups or 50 crunches (stomach stuff)
each time Jack disobeys orders, I have to drink a shot of bourbon
if Jack is tortured in an episode, I cannot drink water for the remainder of the episode

Lisa’s call to Steve’s friends came just at the right time for me as I was looking for new challenges to break my academic sleep. Training has been brutal, with the noted addition of a drinking rule which requires that for every drink had, an extra mile must be added to my normal run. I’m allowed to store miles “in the bank”, but credit only lasts for 24 hours. Most notable incident to date: having to run 12 miles (an addition of 7 miles) the first morning of a philosophy conference in Oxford. “Here’s to my frieeeeeeendssss!”

The Eater
Todd's BDay Challenge Wrap Up

First, thanks to all those who provided fund raising and moral support for my challenge. A special thanks to Patricia Baker, my wife, for putting up with 60 days of training and 60 days of a grumpy "Todd" on a strict diet. A hearty thanks to Lisa Romney for organizing all this and rallying Steve's friends for this magnificent collection of challenges.

I think this is the most continuous and intensive training I’ve done for one thing in my life. In 60 days of training, I completed:

Pull-ups
3054 regular pull-ups
16 one-arm pull-ups (each arm)
229 two-finger one-arm pull-ups (each arm)
95 two-finger one-arm pull-ups with 2.5 lbs added weight (each arm)
119 two-finger one-arm pull-ups with 5.5 lbs added weight (each arm)

Push-ups
532 regular push-ups
17,328 finger-tip push-ups

Core
13,600 crunches
3480 half-crunches
4287 V-ups
1686 hanging knee bends
2070 hanging half-knee bends

Cardio
505 miles of running
255 minutes of break dancing
390 minutes of calisthenics
127 miles of walking

Miscellaneous
1 rest day
80 units of alcohol

The dieting part of the challenge dictated the amount of cardio since the last 5 lbs to lose were quite difficult to shed. Repetitive stress on my fingers and elbows also caused numbness in my left hand in the last 30 days or so of training.
But the actual challenge went down extremely well, and my strategy on the day of was to complete half of the push-ups in the first six hours. This proved effective, but 13 hours later and even though I had only 700 push-ups left, my left elbow was afire with pain. Huge calloused blisters on both thumbs meant constant leakage onto the floor. Most monotonous of all was the kneeling “rest” position between push-up sets. Blisters formed on the tops of my feet from this, and my hamstrings became quite sore.

The day after, well, I can’t grab things because my thumbs won’t bend too well. My left side is numb (mostly my pinkie and pinkie toe). But at least I can now eat!

This is the first time I’ve completed a challenge in full, so Steve’s birthday proved an apt occasion and motivation. Happy Birthday, paly!

Birthday Challenge Summary

Start time: 5pm GMT (Cocktail Hour), Friday, Nov 19, 2010
Finish time: 4:59pm GMT, Saturday, Nov 20, 2010
Weigh-in: 144.8 lbs.
RSPCA funds raised: £565
Number of People Inspired to do Challenges of Their Own: 5 (Patricia Baker, Josh Lavik, Michael Kim, Jamie Buckland, and George Darby)
5000 finger-tip push-ups completed (within 19 hours, Saturday 11am)
50 two-finger, one-arm pull-ups (each arm) completed (within 16 hours, Saturday 8am)
6250 crunches completed (“now” said 125 times)
7 shots of bourbon (Jack Bauer disobeyed orders 7 times)
1 episode without water (Jack tortured once)
5 Rye Manhattans shaken and drank
5 kilos (11 lbs) lost in body weight by the start of the 24 hour period
5 seconds of the van Damme splits held
If you want my training schedule, I kept a record and be happy to pass it on to anyone else foolish enough to make finger-tip push-ups a part of their challenge.

To the feasts of the Good, the Good unbidden go . . .

The Executair

Dad and Mom

Congratulations, Stephen James, our #1 son! You have hit the big FIVE-OH! Since you are unable to do your planned extravaganza FIVE-OH challenge at this time, we all decided to help you out by doing something challenging FOR you! Hopefully this will demonstrate just how much we admire and love you. This got us to thinking about when you first got interested in Birthday Challenges. It all started in your preschool years on San Bernardino Road, when Grandma Ruth introduced our family to the JACK LALANNE show. Every morning she would call out, "JACK LALANNE TIME!"

LaLu was your name for Grandma Ruth when you were little & when she called out "Jack LaLanne Time!", you'd come toddling in to do your rendition of his exercise routine with LaLu & LaLanne. It was an absolute riot to watch you! (Could you possibly have come up with the name LaLu from Grandma talking about LaLanne?) Jack planted the BIRTHDAY CHALLENGE seed in your little noggin that started your own Birthday Challenges around Junior High age. The problem with your birthday is that the weather can raise havoc with great ideas on November 22nd, but you bravely tried not to let weather interfere, much to our chagrin at times.

What we decided to do to for your big FIVE-OH birthday is to complete a Jack and Elaine LaLanne's FOREVER YOUNG routine for 50 days (to the best of our ability). Wow, he exercises like a whirlwind!

We are so proud to have you for our son. You are our inspiration and we love you!! Dad and Mom

Brian, Ashna, and Mael

We celebrated the 50th birthday of the Stainless Maestro with our own little birthday challenge, suiting the magic number to various efforts that would challenge each of us.

A birthday challenge for a 7 month old baby you ask? Why not? Never mind that little Maël is already a zinger. ZINGGGGG!

We figure he has been doing birthday challenges from about 6 months before he was born, and this is a modest assessment. For at least 5 months of Ashna’s pregnancy, her tummy looked like Harry Houdini trying to push his way out of the inside of a medicine ball. Yep, he is the boss.

But nothing doing, he is just a psyched little Matador ready for any sort of challenge. For Le Stephanois 50th, he even dug up this peculiar muscle vest somewhere:
Now compared to the Zinger, Ashna and I have been lacking the time to take proper care of our bodies, so this was the perfect opportunity to start a program to be finished on November 22nd, the birthday of El Grande Hombre.

Obviously, one of the first challenges for a baby is: standing! How challenging would that be? After all, as Maël told me the other day, “You know, it’s not birthday “pretty hard,” but BIRTHDAY CHALLENGE!”

His first effort at standing lasted for 1…2…seconds, then a forward faceplant into the bed.
Distressing….

Guess we found ourselves a pretty good challenge for Maël. Could these burly but untrained muscles really stand for a full 50 seconds by November 22nd?

The training begins…

In other challenges, could Ashna edit and publish her novel in the next 50 days? She set to work.
And how can one write well without a scintillating body to fire the pen? 50 days of morning yoga…

and evening Freeform dance odyssey began…

(pic censored by Govt. of West Bengal)

Ahem…could Brian write 50 lines of poetry by the Big Man’s birthday, the muse had been quiet recently…
Attempting to awaken the muse, Surge began a vigorous physical regimen, aiming for 50 pushups and 50 pullups in one go by November 22nd:


Those muscles don’t work that way anymore!


Good God Jim! This man needs a hypo!


And the yoga continues apace…
Wait! What’s this? Maël doing yoga?!
I guess he could not help being a cobra, as he is growing fangs.
All in all, it should be an interesting 50 days. We will all be a lot fitter by November 22nd, and I can feel that is making Manny Varjak smile somewhere.

Ha! 3 more lines of “poetry.” Do Haiku count?

Challenge be our food
And our neverending mood
Course you do dude!

Kristen Edwards

Tributing my awe-inspiring Big Bro, The Dude, His Dudeness, or uh, Duder, or El Duderino Steverino...

As you are The Big Catalyzer, and not rolling on Shabbos, my writing partner Amanda (she’s got a nice marmot) and I are entering a world of pain by creating 50 different creative writing exercise for 50 days orbiting around our children’s fantasy series - Starlighter XII and book one, Aries Scorched. Day one we'll strike out at 5:05 a.m. in honor of The Dude's arrival time on planet Earth!
The Dude Abides, I take comfort in that. It's good knowin' you're out there.
I love you, man (even though you’re gonna have to face the fact you're a dang catalyzer).

Or as the Dude's Mama says - LYFE, Kristen

Leeanne Edwards

I’ve always admired and revered you as an athlete, my teacher & my playful bro. As we’ve grown-up so has my respect for you; your quest for knowledge and focus in the realm of nutrition and exercise are extraordinary. To honor all the ways in which you’ve inspired me over your 50 years, I have devised a Sonoma County Nature-cise program; “Punk’s Trailside ‘o 50 Bootcamp”.

Hiking & running a +4 mile trail with a 600’ elevation change, in less than one hour I perform 50 different exercises ranging from intervals, plyometrics, isometrics to core strength exercises using man-made and nature’s apparatus available on the trail. (Examples include “jumping jacks & wacky jacks”, “hitching post stretches & pole maneuvers”, “park bench and log pole step ups”, “hop-scotch & quick steps”, “lateral & diagonal running & jumping over water bars”, “power jumps & squats” etc).

I am most certain that I raise eyebrows of onlookers (human and critter!), but I do so knowing that you would be smiling from afar.

☺ Love you forever and ever Punk! Landirs

Joanna Aceves and Jeremiah Strange

Joanna: In honor of your 50 awesome years I am running /hiking 50 awesome miles in 10 days! Doesn't sound to bad you say? Well I'm doing it minus a gallbladder! Take that super fit and healthy athletes. Really though, you are inspiring and a role model for all. I wish you the very best and the happiest birthday.
Jeremiah: In honor of you being old but still cool, I'm doing 50 scooter crashes because injuries are fun! Happy Birthday Edwards!

Bruce Anderson and Alisa Rosseter

Moving from LA to France with three dogs before Steve’s birthday might be considered a challenge for some be we did even more! We ran 5 miles, we hiked 50 minutes, the 5 of us (Dashell, Stella and Nellie included) walked around the village for 50 minutes on Sunday shopping at the open market, we did 50 pushups, Alisa ate 5 really good cookies, Bruce had 5 espressos in one day and on Saturday we each climbed 5 routes. All completed with rain, jetlag, fatigue and no bikes. Happy Birthday, Steve! Come visit!

Aaron Baker

For my BDC2010 in honor of Steve, I thought of pulling a ferry boat across the Golden Gate Bridge with my teeth. But since I suck at swimming when there aren't waves to body surf, and since I hate being in cold water, I decided against it. Sorry Steve. Instead, I opted for the following punishments: ride 500 vertical meters of 20% grade in 50 minutes; 50 pushups in one go; 50 squats (no weight but after the ride) in 5 minutes; 50 pull-ups in 500 seconds, and 50 ab-rollers in 500 seconds.

I decided to start with the hardest part, the ride. I recently moved to Marin, and in my explorations of my neighborhood, found a terrific (to me) ridge that separates my city of San Rafael from the city of Larkspur. The ridge has a few roads going over it, each absurdly steep. Total elevation gain is only 400 feet or so, but it's really hard and I've been doing a weekly ride taking in a
selection of the climbs as training. After sussing things out, I found that one of the more difficult climbs has a sustained steep section of about 65 meters at 20% or so. It is really, really hard. I did the math and concluded that I could ride this hill 8 times to get the necessary vertical gain.


Of course I got sick the week before, but I rested and tried to take care of myself leading up to the Challenge on Halloween. Scary! I wasn't entirely at my best, but I was good enough. The climb actually starts with a 100 vertical feet ramp that goes from 10% to 20%, I didn't count this part of the climb but my body certainly noticed it. After the first lap, I became really concerned about finishing. Have I said that this is a really, really hard climb? It's funny, people talk about 20% climbs, but really I find that most people have no idea what 20% actually looks like, let alone feels like. Most people add between 5-7% to their estimates of steepness. In truth, 8% is an unusually steep climb. Most are around 6%. 20% is truly rare. And Hard.


On the second lap, I started to hate Steve and particularly Lisa, for cooking up this idea. And though Steve is a truly great friend and an inspiration, I began to hope that he doesn't have a 60th birthday. Sorry Steve. On the third lap, I grew convinced that 8 was too many. There is no taking it easy on a 20% slope. You can't hide, you can't rest. If you try to slow down, you start to fall
over. My times for each lap ranged between 2:40 and 3:00. So I stayed consistent. But each lap was a little piece of hell.

The fourth lap was something of a mindset change, because it meant I was halfway there. Though I suffered more on each lap, I could begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel. From start to finish, each lap took about 6 minutes (three up and three down and back to the start). I took a wrong turn after the first lap, and lolly-gagged on the next two on the way down, losing time. After the third lap, I realized I needed to actually get down as fast as possible if I was going to make the 50 minute cut.

On the sixth lap, my photography team showed up (Michelle and the kids). Nothing like kids screaming "go daddy go" as you labor at 4 miles an hour. But the distraction helped me take my mind off the climbing a bit, and got me through lap 7. On lap 8 I was really cooked. You can see from the pictures how much effort I had to put into the pedals, almost bending over double on each stroke. I looked like shit. But I got up all the laps, and didn't even puke. Michelle asked me to puke because she thought it would be a good picture. I thanked her for the suggestion but demurred.

Ultimately, I missed the time, 50 minutes past as I descended after lap 7. I came in at about 54 minutes. In total, I climbed over 3,000 feet. 524 meters on the climb. Unfortunately, my garmin showed that the average grade for those 524 meters was just a hair over 18%. I guess that a couple of street intersections (which were still steep) brought the average down. Total climb
time was about 21:30, or under 1500 seconds, so I rode a bit better than a foot/second. This was really hard.

Next up was 50 push-ups. Not as much of a mental game as the ride, but for pure physical challenge, more difficult. I typically do about 30 push-ups a week. Never more than 15 at a go. I wasn't sure I'd be able to do this. As you can see from the photos, I was maxed. At 47 I just came completely unraveled. It was like a complete system shutdown. I found myself lying on the ground, covered in sweat, with Michelle yelling at me for being a quitter. I knocked out the final three after catching my breath for a few moments, but have to acknowledge that this part of the challenge was a bit too hard.

The squats were a welcome contrast. I wasn't sure how the legs would respond after the climbing, but they actually seemed pretty loose and good. I adjusted the challenge mid effort from 50 in 5 minutes to 50 in 2:30. Not a real problem. But Michelle didn't think she'd gotten a good enough photo, so made me keep going. Pretty soon I reached a point where the body said stop, so though I finished, I think it was closer than it felt. I should have tried for 100 in 5 minutes. That would have put me in the grave.

Halloween interfered with the completion of the challenge, something about and trick-or-treating made it difficult to reason with the little ones about the value of pull-ups and ab-rollers. I'm not sure what this means for Steve's anti-child-obesity mission. Next time I'll make the little ones do the challenge while I yell at them with a bull horn. I should have thought of that
sooner.

The next day I set about pull-ups and ab-rollers, but it put me in the grave. I'm sick again and really weak. I tried to finish my challenge, but could hardly do any pull-ups at all, let alone 50 in 500 seconds. Here's a photo of my weak attempts. Made it through 35. Couldn't have done 50 in 50 minutes today. I abandoned the ab-rollers. On the bright side, clearly I pushed it yesterday. Now I need to get healthy again. Looking forward to some local organic veggies for dinner tonight.

Happy Birthday Steve!

Dawn Baker

In honor of Steve's 50th birthday and his love of birthday challenges, I have am doing formal meditation for 50 consecutive days. As part of my recent quest to regain physical and mental wellness through better stress management, I have discovered many techniques for formal and informal meditation. However, incorporating these into a daily routine even without a heavy workload has proven to be quite a task. I started my challenge on 10/26/10 and plan to finish on 11/14/10. Here's to Steve's inspiration to help us all be better people! Happy birthday!

Trent Baker

One of my long-term goals was to send 40 5.13's by the time I turned 40. I achieved that goal a little bit early. My new challenge, in honor of Steve's 50th birthday, is to redpoint 50 5.13's by the time Steve turns 51! Thanks Steve for the inspiration and I hope you can join me out climbing over the next year. – Trent

Elijah Ball

I am doing a challenge -and they don't call it Birthday Pretty-Hard - but I can't tell you what it is. I don't want to jinx it. Call me after your birthday. I'll tell you how it went.

Maggie Banks

In Steve's honor, I made 50 phone calls from Incline, NV, to IL to support DAN SEALS (D) for Congress with MoveOn! Thanks to my kick-ass donkey pants, I am sure these calls will make a difference! Several volunteers signed on, and several others promised to GET OUT THE VOTE! I hope Steve has a WONDERFUL birthday! Maggie

Ben Banks

For Steve's 50th Birthday I am set for a 24 hour Challenge:

1. 50 boulder problems in Little Cottonwood Canyon. Half of the problems will be V4, the other half V5 or greater. Grades will be confirmed according to the "Black Bible" Utah Bouldering Guide. Problems may be repeated once and count toward total. Skin will be an issue.

2. 500 Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu armbars. These will be performed as a repetitive drill, not during sparring or against a resisting opponent. Finding a willing recipient will be an issue.

3. 5 beers. No issue at all.

Lynn Griese

Happy Birthday Steve! When I got the email from Lisa to do a Birthday Challenge in your honor I knew I would do one for you, even though I have never managed to do one for myself. Thanks for unknowingly giving me lots of motivation these last few weeks.

Here goes:

50 days of exercise

5 pull ups on the 50th day

5 lbs. to lose

5k Turkey Trot
The 50 days of exercise I’ve managed to do thus far, but I honestly don’t know if I’ll be able to accomplish any of the other things. I actually gained weight initially, grrrrr. I’m only at 3 very inelegant pull ups and I’ve never ran more than a mile outside in my life. Ben happily bought me running shoes for the occasion. Hey, it’s supposed to be a Birthday Challenge, right?

XOXO Lynn

Trevor Banks

10 jumping jacks

10 push ups

10 yoga poses

10 Jui Jitsu moves demonstrated

10 hugs for 10 different people

The Barber Family

Birthdays are special. Apparently, not every one feels you should just kick back and celebrate your arrival on the planet overdosing on gluttonous activities. Some family members think it is a good idea to challenge yourself on your birthday.

As a family, we committed to challenge ourselves to give 50 hours of community service.
Here is how we accomplished our family challenge of 50 hours of community service in 5 weeks:

I co-op 3 hours a week, plus drive for field trips
Bill coaches 7 year old soccer every week
As a family we volunteered at Wheeler Farm. We helped unload a semi-full of pumpkins, as well as conducting a survey for the Farm .
Collectively we all stuffed and addressed envelopes for Wasatch Community Garden, an organization that helps low income families learn how to grow healthy food.
William volunteered at a Food Pantry, putting cans into boxes and creating Halloween goody bags for children.
The kids loved helping and said they felt really good afterward. This challenge is one that will turn into a tradition!

Bill Barber

I challenged myself to bike for 50 miles mostly on trails. After much searching for a lengthy ride, my friend Alan and I found the Wasatch Crest Trail and thought it a good starting point. After starting at Brighton, we climbed 1800 feet to the top of Millcreek and dropped down into the canyon. From there we used the pipeline trail and eventually made our way down to the Jordan River. We used the parkway to finish out the remaining 10 miles on the parkway arriving tired in downtown Salt Lake.

Tara Barber

I challenged myself to eat zero refined sugar for 50 days. Living daily with a Romney, Edwards will understand the depth of that personal challenge. I was able to survive (even thrived) the 50 days, even avoiding the temptation of Halloween candy and goodies lurking around every retail corner for 30+ of those days.

Romney Barber

I was going to climb up my wall 50 times, but I never had time for that so I decided to do 50 hours of no sugar. It was hard to give up my candy of the day for the 2nd day, but I felt good afterwards. I really liked helping my family volunteering.

William Barber

I did 50 sit-ups. I started out only being able to do 10. My muscles were sore for a few days during my training. But after they recovered, I did 50 sit-ups all at once. I was really surprised I could do so many more.

Reed Bartlett

For my 44th birthday, I recently tried to ride my mountain bike 44 miles,climb 44 boulder problems and do 44 jumps of at least 44 cms. I failed miserably on the bike ride but managed to do the other stuff.
So, for Steve’s 50th I’m going to ride my mountain bike 50 miles, climb 50 boulderproblems and do 50 jumps of at least 50cm, spend 50 minutes playing outside with Levi and give my wife 50 minutes of back massages in a 50 hour period. I’m leaning towards Nov. 6th and 7th for the challenge, but it might come later."

For the full CHALLENGE REPORT click here!