The Governor’s Race

Jeff Simons

Monday, Oct. 18, 1999 | 9:41 a.m.

Santa Fe, N.M. -- George W. Bush may be the leader for the Republican presidential nomination, but he's running miles behind New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson.

More than 100 miles behind.

Johnson, 46, plans to compete in the 1999 Ironman Triathalon World Championship in Hawaii on Saturday -- a grueling event that combines a 2.4-mile ocean swim, 112-mile bike ride and 26.2-mile run.

Johnson's rigorous training program -- a combination of swimming, biking, jogging, rollerblading, hiking, rock climbing and weightlifting -- adds up to the equivalent of 130 running miles a week.

It's a strict regimen that begins every day at 4:30 a.m. -- demanding far more than Bush's 15- to 20-mile a week workout.

Johnson's training has paid off.

In 1997 he finished his second Ironman in the top third of a field of 1,500 competitors from 50 countries. His overall time was 10 hours, 54 minutes and 30 seconds.

So what makes Johnson push himself so hard?

"Back in 1987 I did an analysis of my own life," he said. "And that analysis was, 'What really made my life work? What were the good times in my life and what were the bad times?'

"And I came out of that realizing that when I was fit, that represented the best times in my life. When I was as fit as I could possibly be, everything worked."

That year Johnson swore off drinking; he hasn't had a drop of alcohol in 12 years.

When he's not traveling, Johnson is out the door of the governor's mansion before sunrise, riding his bike up to the Santa Fe ski area -- a 45-mile roundtrip loop often followed by a five-mile run. While he cranks, the governor's security detail follows him in a car, lighting the way.

Even when he's traveling, his regimen doesn't let up. While in Washington, D.C., earlier this month, Johnson swam two miles and jogged five miles one morning before a daylong round of speeches.

Since he became governor in 1994 Johnson has used a point system to measure his training regimen. He sets a baseline of 80 points a week.

"One point is a running mile, one point is a quarter-mile swim, one point is three miles of biking," Johnson said.

"Everything has points, including rollerblading and weightlifting. I've worn a heart monitor for a long time so I can equate heart activity to 10 minutes of aerobic weight lifting -- so 10 minutes of weightlifting can be a point. I go downhill skiing or cross-country skiing and I give myself points for the day. Hiking, rock climbing, mountain biking -- you name it -- and I assign points."

After being invited to compete in this year's Ironman, Johnson stepped up his training.

For the past two months he's averaged 130 points a week running, biking and swimming. Using Johnson's formula, it's a schedule equivalent to 130 miles a week running, 390 miles a week biking or 32 miles a week swimming.

He estimates that's about half of what professionals like Luc Van Lierde, the world record-holder in the Ironman, log each week to prepare for the competition. Van Lierde's record is eight hours, four minutes and eight seconds, set in 1996.

Johnson, 6-foot-tall and 167 pounds, has been an athlete since he was a teenager. In high school he ran track and played basketball, baseball and football. In college he skiied for the University of New Mexico.

And for the past 20 years he has competed in a variety of triathalons ranging from the "sprint distance" -- 3.1-mile run, 12.4-mile bike ride, 500-meter swim -- up to the 140.6-mile Ironman.

Since 1993 Johnson has run one marathon a year, consistently finishing the 26.2-mile races in a time that would qualify him for the prestigious Boston Marathon.

He's rigid about his training schedule, but Johnson doesn't adhere to a strict diet. He does avoid sugar and doesn't touch cookies, ice cream or soft drinks.

Over the years Johnson has climbed Alaska's Mount McKinley, hang-glided off New Mexico's Sandia Mountain, backflipped off the ski jump at the Winter Olympics training facility in Provo, Utah, and run 25 miles in army boots and military fatigues with a 35-pound pack through White Sands Missile Range to commemorate World War II's Bataan Death March.

He's also ridden his bike four times across the state for more than 2,000 miles in his annual "Trek for Trash." Johnson's effort to bring awareness to fitness and litter cleanup draws thousands of cyclists each year who ride at least part of the trek.

When Johnson finishes his second term in 2003, he plans to tackle Mount Everest.

Johnson also is committed to getting kids thinking about the merits of exercise. His college-age daughter rock climbs, his teenage son runs cross-country and they both ski.

"What we're striving for as adults is, how do you get your kids into this lifelong fitness thing?" Johnson said.

"How do you get them to want to be fit every single day of their lives? Because it isn't about high school athletics or college athletics. It's about about being fit for life."