It wasn’t the lottery or the Publisher’s Clearing House Sweepstakes, but the big prize definitely changed the lives of Oxnard neighbors Stuart Cugnoni and Vince Jones.
Cugnoni won an all-expenses paid trip for two to the 99th Tour de France from Trek Travel. And he and Jones won’t be just watching the most famous cycling race in the world. They will be riding portions of the stages that the professional riders will be doing through the Pyrenees Mountains, July 16-20.
The value of the prize is nearly $7,500 per person.
Cugnoni, 45, and Jones, 62, started out as recreational cyclists, doing two to four rides a week along the relatively flat coastal terrain of Ventura County. The thought of grinding up thigh-aching, lung-busting mountain passes and then barreling down on the other side at break-neck speeds along the French-Spanish border raised some serious concerns for the pair.
Jones, who retired after a long career at Procter & Gamble Paper Products in Oxnard, was thrilled his neighbor invited him on the trip, but he soon realized they were in over their heads.
“This is the third week of the tour and it’s all in the Pyrenees,” Jones pointed out to Cugnoni. “I said, ‘We do not have enough game to even think about doing these climbs. We’ve got to do something between now and then (December, 2011) to improve, because we won’t be able to do the rides … not even close.’ ”
Cugnoni understood the magnitude of the challenge.
“I’m in shock, thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, how am I going to achieve this?’ ” he said. ‘ “How am I going to ride in the Pyrenees Mountains. I’m going to need some help.’ I had a bike but it was a 22-pound bike. I needed something lighter.”
Jeff Byers, owner of Trek Bikes in Ventura, set them up on a pair of 16-pound carbon-fiber bikes.
“Jeff said, ‘You need to get a thoroughbred,’” recalled Cugnoni of his conversation with Byers. “He donated bikes to us, computers, clothing, $11,000 worth of equipment; he’s been phenomenal. We went on shop rides with him.”
But they knew they needed more intense training.
“I had no idea how to train,” admitted Cugnoni, the owner of Set Them Straight, an orthodontic laboratory in Oxnard.
But he knew how to do research and ask questions.
“He likes to get into magazines and literature and find out the history of the sport he’s involved in,” said Cliff Ghersen, Cugnoni’s brother-in-law and a long-time teacher at Montecitio Union School. “He likes to dig into things. He subscribed to Velo News and entered the contest.”
Ghersen and his neighbor, film maker Brandon Aroyan, are doing a documentary film on Stuart and Vince’s adventure.
Cugnoni phoned Carmichael Training Systems in Santa Ynez. The company worked with seven-time Tour de France champion Lance Armstrong and many other elite cyclists. He also contacted Wesley Wilson, a personal trainer at the Fueled Gym in Santa Barbara.
“He and Vince are pulling out all of the stops,” said Ghersen.
“I asked, ‘Can you help us out here?’” said Cugnoni of the phone calls. He said his father always urged him to ask questions if he didn’t know something.
He had lots of questions for Kirk Nordgren, a coach at Carmichael Training Systems.
“(Stuart) knew they needed help,” Nordgren said.
Nordgren understood they didn’t have much time to get them ready for the ride.
“The first thing we did was a lactate threshold test and a bike fit,” he explained. “We measured physiological benchmarks that tell us when their body is shifting fuel utilization from fat sources to more carbohydrate sources. At that physiological point of the body, we know if we build training ranges around that point we can see maximal improvement in the shortest amount of time. Based on that data and the time they had before the trip, we put together a training plan for them. Each of them was slightly different.”
Under Carmichael’s guidance, they learned how to ride with more efficiency. They did rides over the rolling hills of the Santa Ynez Valley and made the big climb and descent on Figueroa Mountain.
“Doing mountains, they needed to be as fit as possible. They have to have sustainable power as much as possible. The main goal was to increase their sustainable riding power,” Nordgren said.
Cugnoni is admittedly nervous about the climbs.
“People think that the hardest bit is getting up, which it is,” he said. “But the scariest bit is coming down, and the speed you can generate. We had emails from people who had tires blow out. I’m a responsible parent; I don’t want to hurt myself. The whole thing for me — ‘touch wood’ — is be safe, enjoy it and come back in one piece and tell people about it.”
Nordgren was impressed in Cugnoni’s improvement. In seven weeks, he made a 40 percent increase in his threshold power.
“He made phenomenal leaps and bounds from where he was; he lost a lot of weight. It’s been quite a transformation.”
“It’s so nice to have a 36-inch waste and go down to a 33,” Cugnoni said, proudly. “It feels really nice for the wife to say, ‘Hey, you’re looking really good.’”
Jones also is reaping the benefits of the training. After years of being hampered with physical problems, he might be in the best shape of his life.
“I always like staying fit and being fit to do the things I like to do,” he said. “I’m the old guy keeping up with the kid.”
The pair ride five days a week and log 150-160 miles.
Cugnoni said their dedication has rubbed off on others in the neighborhood.
“It’s created a wave in the community,” he said. “People on our street are working out. My wife (Danica) goes to Zumba classes, my kids are doing more; we got a puppy dog and I’m walking around at the park three times a day, and doing (the workouts). It’s been a huge thing for everyone. It’s a wave of positiveness.”
Jones said the trip to the Tour de France will be his first visit to Europe. He’s followed the tour on television.
Cugnoni said he watched the race for the first time last year with his son.
“My 7-year-old son watched it and said, ‘Dad, I can’t believe you’re going to be riding it this year. That’s really cool.’”
Cugnoni said the experience has changed his life.
“Being a guy who wasn’t heavily involved in (cycling), now I am really excited and I’m thinking this is a way of life that’s going to keep continuing for me,” he said. “I’ve put a lot of effort into it and I’m going to come back from France and not sit on the couch.”
