Mike C: How did you both first get involved with randonneuring?
Mike H: I was with the SFU triathlon club and Dave Johnson showed me a flyer about randonneuring. I was appalled. 200 km was a short ride? I'd never done more than 70 or 80 km up until then. But I was also intrigued and thought, "I gotta try this!". I went out by myself the week before the 200, did a ride up the Dewdney Trunk to Rolley Lake, came back on the Lougheed. It was raining through Maple Ridge. But I did 120 km, felt fine, did the 200, and it snowballed from there.
Anna: Since the age of about 14 I had been doing longer distance riding. I was doing triathlons, and met Mike in the summer of 1986. He suggested randonneuring to the SFU triathlon club in the spring of 1987, and I was part of that group. This was my first 200. Of that group, other than Mike, I was one of the few who continued to do longer distances.

Mike C: How long have you been members of the BC Randonneurs?
Mike H: I started in 1986 and Anna in 1987. A lot of folk started then, and it's been really cool to be a part of that.
Anna: Yeah, then we stopped in 1996, and joined again in 2014.

Mike C: How has randonneuring impacted your lives?
Anna: One of the biggest impacts on my life has been the people I have met. I have made a lot of great friends through randonneuring. It has also been a great way to get out and get some exercise. It gives me a sense of accomplishment when I finish a ride. I have also learned a lot about myself through the sport. (both good and not so good).
Mike H: It really shaped and reinforced my identity as a long-distance cyclist. It's what I do. Doing it with people who understand the challenges, the highs and lows, being part of that kind of community, is also a big part of it.

Mike C: What's a standout memory you both have of riding a brevet together?
Mike H: A lot of it is a blur. Back in the 90's we did some really fast rides together. There was one 600 when we set out to break 24 hours, but we took a wrong turn, did 30 km too far, then both of us were falling asleep so we crashed at the Acme post office for a power nap.
Anna: There are several stand-out memories: One is riding a tandem together in a Flèche, we did it with 2 other tandems. We borrowed a tandem for the event, and mid-way through the ride the sync chain came off. We put it back on. It came off again. 50 km later it had stretched so much that it wouldn't stay on, and I was on the back and the only pedeler. Mike kept putting the gear higher, trying to make me go harder, but it was a futile and frustrating thing for me. I wanted a lower gear. We stopped in a small town store and tried to fix it, to no avail. It got dark, and we started out from the store. Mike couldn't hold the bike on the road, so I stopped pedaling. When the bike stopped, I got off, said "I QUIT!" and started walking back to the store, from there I called a cab to take us back to the border. "What happened to my bike?" cried the owner on getting it back. "You forgot to maintain it!". Was my response.
Mike H: Manfred was apologetic for years after! But no worries, it's a great story that we keep on telling.

Mike C: Outside of randonneuring, what else do you like to do?
Anna: I like any outdoor endurance sport. Skiing (cross country primarily, but also downhill and back country), hiking, kayaking, and the like. I also curl in winter on a team with my son. I also am learning to speak a couple of languages.
Mike H: I guess I'm famous for explorer tiling. The entire world is covered by a grid of 1-square-mile tiles and I'm collecting as many as I can. I'll do side trips during a brevet to grab a tile, or I'll design a permanent route to snake through a bunch of tiles. I was also doing gravel permanents for a while; I created several gravel permanents as part of my Journey of the Sorcerer series.

Mike C: What's something you can't live without on a ride or you have to have in your gear bag?
Mike H: There's no one thing in particular, but I carry some items that are indispensible simply because I didn't have them the first time I needed them. A spare tire. A chain tool. A first aid kit. An assortment of zap straps. Some small bolts and nuts that tend to come loose and get lost. An emergency blanket. I can tell you that if you need to sleep at the side of the road some night, it might still be cold, but it's a lot better with a blanket than without.
Anna: Other than the standard items like a pump and patch kit, I cannot do without my flip flops. They are like a foam Birkenstock, and I attach them to my seat bag using the straps on the seat bag. I bring them because on hot days especially, my feet swell, then hurt. Taking my cleats off at controls and putting on the slippers allows my feet to feel normal again.

Mike C: Where's your favorite place to stop and eat on a brevet and what do you like to order?
Anna: My favorite place to stop is Birchwood Dairy because they have great ice cream. I like to have a pub style burger after a ride, without pickles or mayo and stuff. Just the lettuce, tomato, and the burger. And real cheese (fake cheese is gross). Though I wouldn't say no to mushrooms or caramelized onions, or avocados, or bacon.
Mike H: My go-to tends to be the Chevron Town Pantry convenience stores. They have what I need, there's usually a tap for water, and I know where everything is. Most times I'll just get an ice cream sandwich and a bottle of Gatorade, but I'll also grab a hot dog on longer rides. Sometimes I'll crave a spicy chicken samosa.

Mike C: You both took a hiatus from randonneuring, what did you do and what brought you back?
Anna: We stopped because we had children. Two, a boy and a girl, 1995 and 1997. So life got very busy. We came back as time allowed. I wanted to do PBP at some point, as it had been on my bucket list for many years. I also missed the riding.
Mike H: Yeah, kids, a house, and just too busy with life. If I have a regret it's not trying harder to get out for a brevet now and then. We did do the occasional populaire. Anna and Eric did the Canada Day Populaire on the tandem when he was 12 or so; their picture is still on the CanPop web page. What brought me back was just the feeling that I used to do this and I wanted to do it again. So I bought a carbon fibre road bike, and I did the 2014 Flatlander. Of course I still had the mentality I was going to do it fast. I think I've finally gotten over that the past few years, but in 2014 it was still go, go, go. Craig Premack caught me at Popkum and we spent an hour or so blasting through Sumas Prairie at 40 kph until he dropped me at Arnold. Funny thing, though, I think all my fastest 200s since then have been with Craig.

Mike C: How did you find it balancing raising a family and doing brevets?
Mike H: We didn't balance it; we didn't do brevets!
Anna: The brevets had to wait. I commuted to work while raising a family, but that was the extent of my riding.

Mike C: How many brevets have your children done?
Anna: Both kids have done the Populaires, but only my daughter has done a brevet. She has done one 200 km brevet, and several 200 km permanents.
Mike H: Kiersten did the 2014 Flatlander. She was 17 and renamed Sumas Mountain Road as "Stupid Mountain Road" because it was so steep.

Mike C: Who are some people or someone in particular you both find inspiring?
Mike H: It's actually other folk in the club that are most inspiring.
Anna: I find Deirdre Arscott inspiring. She has done brevets for about 30 years, without stopping (except for the Covid years). Her determination and persistence is impressive. She is also the women's record holder for the most number of times completing PBP by a woman. I also give kudos to Eric Ferguson, because he just keeps going and going, no matter what the odds.
Mike H: And I'd add Peter Stary to the list: maintaining an SR streak for 38 consecutive years is mind-boggling.

Mike C: Have you both done PBP and if so, did you ride together and how was your PBP experience(s)?
Anna: Our riding styles are quite different, so it would be difficult to stay together with all the masses of people at PBP. I am a faster descender and do better at night as I don't do well in heat and when it cools off at night I go faster. Mike is a faster climber and does better in heat than I do, and not as well at night. We would be slower riding together than riding separately as the fast descender would have to wait for the slow descender down hills, and the fast climber would have to wait for the slow climber going up hills. PBP is hilly. There are also a lot of people (last year almost 7000 starters) so one is never truly alone. We both attempted PBP in 2019. Mike finished, and I didn't as I made a lot of mistakes. I finished in 2023, and Mike and my daughter were my support crew.
Mike H: My PBP in 2019 was pretty awesome. Paul and I made it to Brest in one go, then 300 km a day to get back in two days. But I had issues with my Garmin, my saddle broke, my seat bag broke, it was so hot, and I had stomach problems. Stopped to see a doctor at the Fougaues control. I spoke only English, he French, but I did get the message to eat carbs, not fat. He said, "Sugar! Sugar! Sugar!" So that is my doctor's prescription now.

Mike C: How do you stay motivated during particularly difficult rides?
Mike H: It actually doesn't seem that hard! When things get difficult you're usually well into the ride, and by then you have the mindset that riding is all you do. So stopping doesn't really enter one's mind, I find.
Anna: With difficulty. Staying motivated can be hard. You have to get home somehow, might as well ride. Just keep the pedals turning, and keep your eye on the prize.

Mike C: As both active riders and volunteers, what makes a good control in your opinions?
Anna: A good control is one with smiling volunteers, available food, water, and toilets. In the past we would get our cards signed at an establishment. Asking the person behind the counter to sign. Some people felt obviously uncomfortable with this, and I felt uncomfortable with it too. So when Covid changed the policy to what are called ˜information controls' (answer the question on the control card) I thought this was a positive change.
Mike H: In my mind, the best controls are the staffed ones way out in the boonies where there's a canopy, a place to sit, hot food (soup, burgers, stir-fry's), and you don't want to leave in a hurry.

Mike C: What's the funniest or weirdest thing that's happened to you on a brevet?
Anna: The lady communicating with aliens. There were four of us, in Bellingham, there was an event of some sort going on. There were lots of people running around in costumes. Deirdre started a conversation with one older woman wearing an silver bowl on her head, with eyes on the end of springs taped to the bowl. What kind of character was she? She was a bug communicating with aliens. She was thrilled when we took her picture.
Mike H: Weirdest thing has to be the hallucinations. I had my first hallucination on my first 600. 30 hours in, no sleep, I was suddenly convinced that I was on the wrong bike. I couldn't figure out why I wasn't riding a blue Bianchi (which I have never owned). But the weirdest one was during the Too Dam Far 1000 in 2016. I'd had the idea of riding through, but bailed at Winthrop at 700 km and took a room. Sitting there wondering what to do next, I noticed my water bottles had writing all over them. Couldn't quite read it, and couldn't figure out why my daughter would write messages that I couldn't read.

Mike C: Who's the funniest person to ride with or someone who turns a ride into a real adventure?
Anna: There are lots of people who will say something to make you laugh. Laughing is a good way to make the miles go faster, especially at night when you're by yourself on the road. But two that stand out are Barb Lepsoe and Judy Morrison. And I love the Gary Baker/Rick den Braber/Jacques Belinski combination. While they are the best of friends, they never stop bickering and poking at each other. In the middle of the night, the entertainment keeps you awake.

Mike C: Where's the worst place you've slept on a brevet?
Mike H: We've usually managed to either ride through or plan ahead and properly book a room. But sometimes there are misses. The worse one is maybe on the Classic Cache Creek 600 one year. I planned to ride through but when I got back to Lytton it was dark, the wind was howling, and I thought, no way can I safely riding the canyon under those conditions. So I bailed. Found the First Nations Band office building, it was deserted, but there was shelter on the porch. It was cold, I pulled a very dirty carpet over me for some warmth. I unscrewed the porch light to get some darkness for sleep. But it could've been worse: it had Wi-Fi and no password needed.
Anna: Before PBP I only slept in a few ditches or on a park bench. I was generally nervous about sleeping in ditches, so I tried to avoid it if possible. In the US there are postbox places which are enclosed and open 24 hrs, so they often make reasonable places. During PBP I did a lot of sleeping in ditches. I had to get over my discomfort with the idea. I can't really say that there's a worst place.

Mike C: Do you have any good wildlife encounter stories?
Anna: Bears. I have had numerous encounters with bears. The route from Revelstoke to Mica Dam and back is the biggest one for bears. I have done it twice, and each time I've seen bears, 3 the last time. There is little traffic on the road, and on one occasion the fellow I was riding with and I crested a knoll to see a bear standing in the middle of the road. We stopped, and waited for it to leave, it walked down the road, and we stood there for 10 minutes before it left. There were no cars to chase it away. Later that day we went by one munching in the grass. Didn't see it till I looked down in the ditch and saw it. Outside of a brevet, on April the 8 th of this year, I was in New Brunswick on a back road half an hour before a total solar eclipse. It was starting to get a bit shadowy. About a of the sun was covered, by my estimation. I saw something large, almost filling the middle of the road. My first thought was a bear, but it was too big for a bear. Then I realized it was a moose. I waited for it to move. I yelled, it didn't move. Then I realized it wasn't going to move and took another route (the 2 sides of a triangle). As it got darker I was glad I'd gone that way. The moose had gone onto the road because there was more light on the road. The moose was scared. A scared moose in the dark would not be a good thing.

On another occasion, I was doing a 200 km permanent. It was July. In order to avoid the heat, and the traffic, and get as far in as I could before it got warm and busy, I left as soon as it was light enough to see. I was going down Adanac, in the vicinity of Nanaimo St. It was a gentle downhill, so I was probably going about 30 km/hr. Out from behind a car, as it was crossing the road, stepped a skunk. It didn't see me. Had it been a cat, I would have slammed on my brakes and come to a stop just in front of it. But it was not a cat. If I slammed on the brakes and stopped in front of it I would surely be sprayed. So I decided to avoid it by going behind it. But wait, that's the business end of the beast. Better go in front of it. So I steered myself in that direction. Bad choice. Just as I was about to pass in front if it, I was close enough to smell it, it realized I was there, and bolted. Forwards. At that point all I had were visions of hitting this thing, and going down. It was too late to do anything to avoid it. I hit it. Either that skunk had amazingly fast reflexes, or my wheel bumped it out of the way, as my wheel didn't leave the ground, and I was still upright. I turned around to look at the skunk, and it stood there, in the middle of the road, glaring at me. Time to leave, don't want it to decide to spray me when it came to its senses. But the deed had been done. A few blocks later, I noticed a rather foul smell. I stopped at a fountain in a park to wash my wheel. There, better. But it wasn't. I went to take a sip from my water bottle, to discover that was a bad idea. So I found a bathroom to wash my water bottle. Still the smell. By the time I got half way around, I was standing with my bike under the jets at a children's spray park. Well, at least now I was cooled off. It took several baths for the smell to get off me, and a month before my front wheel stopped smelling, and every once in a while I would pull a piece of skunk hair off the spokes. It left its mark.
Mike H: Other than the usual countless bear encounters, the best one was when eastbound out of Prince George on the Loopy Interior 1000, I spotted a young coyote in the bushes at the side of the road. Clearly protecting something, he rushed me trying to scare me off, but I just glared and snarled back. He did a face plant and ran off.

Mike C: Do you have any particularly fond memories from volunteering?
Mike H: You know what? I want to stress that volunteering as an event organizer, or an assistant, or a board member, or any of the other volunteer tasks is a big part of our club, and a really rewarding thing to do. Randonneuring is more than just riding, and we really need the folk who work behind the scenes or perform all the countless tasks that make our club so successful. If you don't do that as well as ride then you're missing out on a big part of our randonneuring community. As far as memories go, I gotta say probably the best thing is seeing all the happy riders finishing a populaire, many of them saying how much fun they had and how much they appreciate the chance to ride an organized 100 km or whatever the distance was.

Mike C: As a husband and wife team, do you have any recommendations to other couples getting into randonneuring together?
Anna: Nothing specific, just the usual approach to randonneuring: Enjoy the experience. Don't try to be in too much of a hurry.

Mike C: What activities other than cycling do you like to do for cross training?
Mike H: Not sure it counts as "cross training" but some of those tiles I'm trying to collect are only accessible by foot, by hiking, or by water, by kayaking. So I do that too.
Anna: Same. Lots of mountain biking and hiking.

Mike C: What's the toughest brevet you've ridden together?
Anna: The 1000's were always the toughest ones.
Mike H: I think the toughest brevet might have been the Island 400 in 1991 I think it was? Anna and Ron Sherman and I did it together, it was wet, and cold, and slow. We caught up to Carol and Stephen Hinde, and one other, can't remember who that was. Just before Duncan we rode over a trench cut into the roadway in the dark and had seven flats between the six of us. It was just before our finish and I was ready to cry.

Mike C: How was randonneuring changed since you first became involved?
Mike H: Oh, gosh. A lot of us have gotten older, that's one thing. More gravel, bigger tires. More traffic, more congestion, so times haven't gotten faster in spite of better bikes.
Anna: The 200's used to have lots of people, as there were no fondo's. And it's hotter now too, we never used to have to re-route or cancel because of a forest fire. And we're not only older, we're slower so we have to adjust our perspectives.
Mike H: We have Garmins now and maybe make fewer wrong turns?
Anna: But we're relying on senses that aren't so good! So maybe having GPS trackers take the guesswork out of where riders are, for the volunteers, and cell phones to communicate is a good thing.

Mike C: What have you both enjoyed the most about randonneuring?
Mike H: Definitely doing the rides with like-minded people. Camaraderie and community and lifelong friendships.
Anna: Two things: getting out there, and being healthier because of it, and the people I have met along the way.

Mike C: What's the worst thing that's happened to you on a brevet?
Anna: Heat exhaustion. Hyponatremia (low electrolytes) caused by heat. Nerve impingements in the foot, caused by swelling of the feet and pressure on the foot. Nerves, numbness in the hands. But mostly, saddle sores, so you can't sit on the seat. (among other physiological issues). Sleep deprivation.
Mike H: The 1990 Okanagan Cascades 1000: knee pains, broken hub, out of time, DNFd, called my dad to pick us up at Concrete, which he did, but complained the whole way home. Then the Two Dam Far 1000 in 2016, similar route, first 400 km no picnic, but then Columbia River Road just out of Omak was closed. Had to detour up Hwy 155, mountain pass, foggy, cold, deserted, and chip seal work underway. Then, crashed in tunnel at New Haven. Road rash, concussion, torn clothing, had to fix my bike, but continued. Phone was crushed by the one person passing through the tunnel while I was there. Lucky no one ran over me in the dark tunnel. No way to call home. Rode home 40 km after the finish, went to the bathroom to have my shower, and went into shock.

Mike C: Thank you Mike and Anna for taking time to answer some questions. As we wrap things up here, is there anything else you would like people to know?
Mike H & Anna: It has been a good journey, and it is a great sport.