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On Tuesday, June 22, at 5:30 p.m., Winnipeggers at the Legislative buildings cheered the arrival of Arvid Loewen who cycled from Vancouver to Winnipeg, a total of 2,400 km, in less than six days. A still-limber Loewen clocked in at 5 days, 11 hours and 30 minutes. Records say it hasn't been done before. But the motivation wasn't to set a record; it was a one-man benefit marathon, dubbed "Spoke '99", to raise funds for MB Communications/Family Life Network, the radio agency of the Manitoba MB Conference that produces programs in seven languages aired all around the globe. Loewen hoped not only to raise funds, but also to stress his agreement with the agency's belief that life only makes sense with Jesus.
Loewen, a general manager at Palliser Furniture in Winnipeg, said he took up the challenge largely because of FLN's family focus, a focus which is important to him. He and wife Ruth, members of North Kildonan MB Church, have three children.
"There were times I felt I couldn't make it," Loewen, 42, confessed with moist eyes, "I had bitten off more than I could chew." The first few days Loewen kept up a steady pace of cycling through the mountains stopping every four hours for 10 or 15 minutes.
"He did Roger's Pass straight through, non-stop," said Dave Balzer, producer of the FLN's "Connecting Points" and co-host of "GodTalk".
For two days through the prairies, Loewen fought storm winds that knocked out power lines in some cities.
However, the crunch came at Moose Jaw on Tuesday morning. Loewen explains, "I set my alarm as usual for 3:15 a.m. The day before, I had already been scraping the bottom of the barrel [of my endurance] only to wake up to hear the forecast out of Winnipeg was for 60 km winds. I looked outside and realized I'd be facing a headwind for the remaining 700 km to get home. The temptation to quit was strong."
He forced himself to eat the prescribed 1000 calories of food and one-and-a-half litres of fluid before mounting his marathon cycle at 4 a.m.
"I have an odometer that reads out 1/10s of the kilometre. I actually watched it 1/10 at a time and mentally celebrated—Hey, you did one more! Before I knew it, I'd covered 50 km in the worst possible conditions."
Loewen drew on his faith in God and claims that the prayers of others helped him endure.
So far, Loewen's extreme challenge has brought in $32,000 in donations from across Canada, with more expected.
A four-person support team tailed Loewen in a motorhome. It consisted of Ruth; Dave Balzer; Delbert Enns, associate director of FLN; and Miroslav Peyter, a Ukrainian producer training at MBC (see MBH, June 25), who saw Western Canada for the first time.
"[Ruth] did amazingly well," Loewen said, "She was the only one with experience. She didn't really get much more sleep than I did [two to three hours a night]."
Loewen's teenagers expressed amazement of what their father had achieved and said they were proud of him. Manitoba's Minister of Justice, Vic Toews, joined the welcoming party.
After one day of rest at home, Loewen returned to work.
Golden West Broadcasting and Palliser Furniture sponsored Loewen's venture as they have done in other ultra-marathon races as far afield as France, Alaska, and the Mojave Desert.
Responding to a question about how he felt after riding over 130 hours on a bicycle, Loewen replied, "The first night at home I had throbbing in my knees. But today [Thursday] I can't find a sore muscle in my body."
Dorothy Siebert, Family Life Network
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