WHEN MY cycling partner, Karen Poly, and I decided to undertake an eight-day, 474-mile journey down California's coast from San Francisco to Santa Clarita to benefit the World Parrot Trust, we went from "Are we really going to do this?" to "Did we really do that?" afterward.
 | | Will Campbell, Karen Poly and Sherry Kramer pause for a picture prior to crossing the Golden Gate Bridge and beginning their 474-mile Biking for The Birds ride. |
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The event was equally difficult for friends and co-workers to fathom, at least at first. The fact that it was a two-rider event with one person driving a support vehicle - not 2,000 riders in a well-orchestrated and organized exodus - confused people. They just could not quite grasp the grass-roots aspect of our endeavor.
They would ask, "So it's you and Karen and how many other riders?"
"Just us," I'd reply.
"Right," they'd respond, "but how many riders total?"
I'd hold up two fingers. "Me. And Karen."
"Really? Wow!"
That's been my reaction pretty much all along.
We get our bike legs
On September 27, 2003, on a damp and gray San Francisco morning, Karen said, "let's go," and away we went across the Golden Gate Bridge to start Biking For The Birds.
But to understand how we got to that moment of truth requires a bit of backstory. You see, though I'm a cycling enthusiast, the extent of my pedaling involved commuting by bike to work and occasional jaunts on the trails in the Southern California ranges. The farthest I'd ever ridden at one time was the 50-mile Baja Fun Ride from Rosarito to Ensenada.
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Before Biking for The Birds, the extent of my pedaling was back and forth to work, and some mountain-bike jaunts.
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But that all changed with the 21-mile L.A. Marathon Bike Tour in March of 2001. While I'd been riding in that event since its inception in 1995, it was the first time for Karen. In fact, it was her first time on a bike in more than 12 years. And she had a blast.
If she hadn't enjoyed herself so much, her biking days would have ended right then and there. But instead we followed the marathon ride up with other L.A. rides in April and May.
And then Karen dropped the bomb.
"I'm going to do an AIDS ride," she told me. "In September. From Montreal to Maine. 400 miles in five days."
Blown away, my response was something along the lines of "Really? Wow!"
Biking for birds
With fewer than three months to train and raise the required thousands of dollars in donations, soon we were doing rides of increasing distance practically every weekend. Three weeks before the ride, Karen not only exceeded her financial goal, but we culminated her training by riding 200 miles in two days.
Then off she went to Montreal, and though she severely injured her knee on the second day of the event, went on to finish with flying colors.
Fast-forward to the summer of 2002. Karen was back riding again and eager for us to do a just-for-fun "vacation ride" from San Francisco to Los Angeles. But schedules and conflicts and an inability to secure a support car driver conspired against us.
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We had no close calls with inconsiderate drivers, no wrong turns made, just a flat tire outside Santa Cruz.
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In March 2003 Karen and I were back riding in the L.A. Marathon Bike Tour and in April when we did the City of Angels bike ride, talk again turned to pedaling our way from the City by the Bay.
The talk turned serious in June when I unfolded my maps of the California coastal bike route and we charted a course. But this time, Karen didn't want to do the ride just for fun. She wanted to do it to raise money for something. But what?
Karen is a member of the Los Angeles Zoo's World Of Birds Show team and the devoted owner of a blue-and-gold macaw; I edit the zoo's Web site. Both Sherry and I are docents there. The answer had to be the World Parrot Trust, the renowned international conservation organization.
From June forward Karen and I did daily training rides and promoted the ride among friends and coworkers, until we arrive once again at that cold and damp morning on the Golden Gate Bridge in late September.
"Let's go," Karen said. And the rest is history.
Acres upon acres of brussel sprouts
Though it was our longest ride yet, and our first home-grown event for charity, Biking for The Birds was a bit anti-climatic. Then again, for long-distance bike riders, anti-climatic can be a good thing. There were no close calls with inconsiderate drivers, no wrong turns made, and other than a flat tire a few miles outside of Santa Cruz, no equipment breakdowns or mechanical malfunctions.
Nothing much happened but miles of pavement covered at a slow and steady pace. Eighty miles the first day. Seventy-seven the next. Sixty-eight after that. And so on down the line. But that's not to say that the ride was boring or unmemorable. Not by a long shot.
There were the acres upon acres upon acres of brussel sprouts north of Santa Cruz, which left me wondering who's eating all of them and what have I been missing?
There were vistas through Big Sur where the chills would chase themselves down my back upon coming around a curve in the road and seeing the rugged and majestic beauty of the California coast.
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Nothing could stop us, not even the weirdest desk clerk in the world.
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There were the sea otters we spotted south of Lucia, elephant seals in San Simeon, the California condors we marveled at somewhere between Guadalupe and Lompoc.
There were Allen and Mavis, a 60-something British couple riding fully loaded bikes who we passed on the way to Guadalupe on the fifth day. We found them again at the Lompoc Motel 6 and learned they had started their journey up in Vancouver, Canada, and were to be on the road more than seven weeks by the time they finished up in San Diego.
Suffice it to say their travels made our journey, done with the benefit of Sherry monitoring us in a support vehicle, seem luxurious by comparison and a bit insignificant. But it didn't stop us.
Nothing could stop us. Not even the weirdest desk clerk in the world at the Goleta Motel 6. And to spur us on were the dolphins south of Santa Barbara, the glorious hot tub at the Fillmore Best Western, and finally the finish line in Santa Clarita, which we crossed at noon on October 4.
Topping it all off was the money we raised to help the World Parrot Trust in its ongoing mission to protect parrot species in the wild and to ensure their welfare in captivity. More than $4,250.
Really? Wow!
Planning your own ride
At this point, Karen and I are in agreement that Biking For The Birds was a one-and-only ride. We have no plans to make it an annual thing. In fact, if you look closely at the t-shirts and bumper stickers we still offer through my Web site, they back me up: "The first (and only) Biking for The Birds Ride."
Sales proceeds from the t-shirts and bumper stickers go to The World Parrot Trust. Or, you can make a post-ride donation directly to the WPT at any time by visiting their site.
Better yet, why not plan your own charity bike ride for endangered parrots? Who knows? You may scare up more than two riders and make even more money than we did.
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You don't have to be a Lance Armstrong to do a grand-scale ride, just dedicated and determined.
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You don't have to be a Lance Armstrong to do a grand-scale ride. Prior to preparing for ours, I had never cycled more than 50 miles at one time, and Karen hadn't been on a bike in 12 years. Less than six months later we did 200 miles in two days, and a couple of weeks after that Karen rode 400 miles in five days in the Montreal-to-Maine AIDS Ride.
What you do have to be is dedicated and determined. The ride itself is but a small part of the process, culminating from months of training and preparation to get you to that point.
Checklist:
Make sure you have a functional bike. If you think dusting off that old single-speed you used to deliver newspapers with will be fine for an 80-mile trek over mountainous terrain, think again. You don't need a $3,000 set of wheels to do a charity ride, but you do need something that is well-maintained, road worthy, appropriate to the task, and, most importantly, fitted to you.
Train, train, train. Regardless of your cycling experience, if you're going to do a multiple-day, long-distance ride, you've got to organize a training program that gradually builds your stamina. Start early - four to six months before the ride. Don't wait until a month before kicking it into gear. In the beginning stay within your comfort level. If you haven't ridden in a decade, start small. Maybe bike one or two miles around your neighborhood every other day for a couple of weeks. Become fully familiar with all aspects of your bike: how the brakes work, how the gears work. After that, begin to schedule your increases in distance. For example, by the eighth week be able to do a 15-mile ride; and by the 12th week, be able to do 20. Two weeks before your event be able to ride 70 and 90 miles. And don't just do flat-level riding. Be sure to work elevations into your training, because there are certain to be climbs and descents wherever your trip takes you.
Outfit your bike. Make sure you have the proper tools and equipment to make any repairs or adjustments, such as allen wrenches, spoke wrench, chain tool, tire pump, patch kit, spare tubes, tire irons. Flats happen: learn how to change out a flat innertube. Decide early on what your pack situation will be and train with that gear installed. Maybe you'll just sport a backpack, or maybe you'll want to outfit your bike with full front and rear baggage to carry all your stuff. Whatever your choice, get it set up early and ride with it often so you get accustomed to it.
Outfit yourself. You may have sworn an oath years back to stay away from Lycra (and trust me, looking much more a past-his-prime linebacker than a lean cycling machine, I certainly have), but there's a reason cyclists wear the stuff. Not only does it cut wind resistance, but it also wicks away sweat and dries quicker. Ideally you should have a clean set of bike outfits for each day of the ride, but in my case, I was able to use washing machines at the motels we stayed at to keep my meager clothing collection clean. Other never-ride-without-'em essentials: helmet, gloves (full-fingered and cut-offs), windbreaker, sunglasses.
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You may have sworn an oath to stay away from Lycra, but there's a reason cyclists wear the stuff.
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Choose your route. Whether you want to bike down the coast of California or over the Rocky Mountains, an invaluable resource for bike route maps and info is the Adventure Cycling Association.
Break up your route over the number of days you'll be riding. In our Biking For The Birds ride planning, Karen and I opted for more days on the road because that translated into fewer miles per day, never more than 80. Stops and break points are also crucial. What services are available in the places you'll be landing? Again, Adventure Cycling maps are a great resource for letting you know what's out there.
Choose your dates. This may seem a no-brainer, but there's more to it than meets the eye. Does the block of time you choose to ride include any holiday weekends? If so, that could mean more traffic on the roads (not to mention overflowing hotels and motels). At first, Karen and I were thinking of doing our Biking For The Birds ride during Labor Day weekend. But then we thought about those winding roads on Highway 1 packed with RVs and we nixed that plan. Your dates should also take weather into account. Obviously biking across the Mojave desert in August would be unadvisable, but there are less obvious things than heat or cold to take into account. For example, I learned that September and October are ideal months to bike south along the California coast because the wind is likely to blow from the north. Translation? Tail wind, baby, nature's greatest gift to cyclists.
Fundraising. With mega-rider events such as AIDS rides, you are obligated to raise a set amount of money in order to participate. This is perhaps the most daunting challenge to a potential rider. For example, Karen had to raise something like $3,500 for the AIDS ride she did in 2001. There are ways to raise that kind of money once you think about it. I built a Web site for Karen and she sent out mailers to friends, family, and coworkers and even held a community event at a local pizza parlor. In the end, she raised more than $5,000. But when you invent your own ride for a more specialized cause like the World Parrot Trust, you aren't under pressure to raise a set amount. Though I'm sure the WPT would have been happy if we'd only raised $100, Karen, being the competitive spirit that she is, was as enthusiastic about promoting and soliciting for Biking For The Birds as she was for the AIDS ride. As a result we brought in more than $4,200.
Decide your accommodations. Do you want to camp along the way? Or is a hot shower at the end of a day's journey a must? Or a bit of both? Whatever you choose, get your campground and room reservations in early and confirm them before setting out.
To SAG or not to SAG? "SAG" is an acronym in the cycling world for "Support And Gear." If you do any sort of organized ride such as the L.A. Marathon Bike Tour or the 50-mile Baja Fun Ride, a SAG wagon is the vehicle that usually stays behind the riders, offering assistance with minor repairs or picking up and transporting exhausted riders. In our Biking For The Birds ride, Karen and I decided we had to have someone in a support vehicle traveling along for the trek. In fact, if we couldn't find a volunteer, our last-ditch plan was for me to SAG while Karen cycled.
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When you invent your own ride event, you aren't under pressure to raise a specific amount of money.
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Thankfully, my friend and fellow L.A. Zoo docent Sherry Kramer offered to come along for the entire ride. And she SAG'd like a pro. We would catch up to her at various stopping points along the day's route, then we would ride on and she'd eventually leapfrog us and stop a few more miles up the road. A support car is tremendously beneficial because it removes any need for the cylists to transport their own stuff. We kept everything in the car: snacks, water, equipment, luggage, spare parts, you name it. On top of that I outfitted Sherry and me with two-way Motorola radios so that when we were within a few miles of each other we could be in direct contact. The radios came in very handy on several occasions.
Document your journey. Over the eight days on the road, I took more than 200 pictures with my digital camera (and should have taken 200 more), and Sherry captured crucial video footage of us riding. As a result I was able to build a 21-minute video presentation that's a Ken Burns' documentary meets "Road Rules." It's an invaluable keepsake that Karen and Sherry and I will cherish forever.
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Will Campbell is a docent at the Los Angeles Zoo and the editor of its Web site. |
ParrotChronicles.com. Published 2003. All rights reserved
