Where In The World Is Gabe Jennings?

In the March issue of Track & Field News Sieg Lindstrom wrote an intriguing piece entitled "Walkabout," in which he explored Olympian Gabe Jennings' decision to embark on a remarkable life-changing journey as he searches for the key to making another trip to the Games.

In a sidebar to that piece, Lindstrom explained why Brazil is the star miler's destination. Excerpts:

TRADING SPIKES FOR WHEELS

It’s unlikely you’ll find Gabe Jennings racing this year. Instead, he’s off on a bike ride to the far side of the equator as the kickoff to his Olympic buildup.

Jennings, who not only marches to a different drummer, but also plays the berimbau--an African stringed instrument that sets the rhythm for the dance-based Afro-Brazilian martial art of capoeira--and the aboriginal Australian didgeridoo, explains, “It’s going to serve two functions, by getting me in shape and solidifying my capoeira vision to loosen up these hips--the anatomical tight spring of Jennings’ trademark chop-chop stride.

“Running is so linear, so I was doing all these plyometrics to loosen my hips up, but then that becomes mundane, so I’m trying to develop a system where you can dance and serve the same function.

“Between dancing and rock-climbing, I’m trying to develop a revolutionary approach to strength training. Right now the one thing that’s keeping me from breaking through to the world-class level, I think, is my hips. If I can open the hips [at least for the last lap], the world-class level’s going to be right there.”

In Brazil Jennings will seek out a capoeira mestre to guide him. “This trip is the vision quest,” he says. “My dream is in place, but I’ve got to still go through some hurdles on my own--without anybody’s influence, with just my own vibration--grinding it out on this bike getting aerobically fitter than I’ve ever been. That’s not to say when I get back everything’s not going to be really structured; it’s got to be.”…

Jennings pedaled out of Tucson in early February, towing a small trailer behind a 30-year-old 10-speed…

Subsequently, father Jim Jennings has been keeping us apprised of details of the trip by e-mail as he patches them together from Gabe's on-the-road reports:

Report 1
(In which Gabe is robbed in Guadalajara, then pedals all night to keep warm in the high altitude near Mexico City)

Report 2
(In which Gabe runs into a truck in Oaxaca)

Report 3
(In which Gabe is robbed in both Nicaragua and Costa Rica, but remains in high spirits, meeting many new friends)

Report 4
(In which monkeys assault Gabe with coconuts as he runs through the Costa Rican jungle and Gabe later accedes to his parents' wishes that he skip violence-torn Colombia in favor of a plane hop to altitudinous
Peru)

Report 5
(In which Gabe climbs the Andes with underinflated tires and is beset by mosquitos in the rapidly disappearing rain forest on the other side.)

Report 6
The final update, in which Gabe reaches his capoeira destination of Salvador, Brazil, but is forced to return home by a dangerous case of hepatitis.

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