re = /^([^\s]+ ).*( .*)/m
str = 'tunnel4 connection to router 1 status
gig1/0/1 blah status
g2/0/1 foo bandwidth'
subst = '$1router1$2'
result = str.gsub(re, subst)
# Print the result of the substitution
puts result
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for Ruby, please visit: http://ruby-doc.org/core-2.2.0/Regexp.html