Schreck, George
Although this started about racing, I think the bigger picture is just
getting children on bicycles or doing any form of exercise. I believe
someone already suggested as much in an earlier post. One reason it is
difficult to get juniors for racing is that it is difficult to find
children who ride bicycles or exercise at all. We live in auto-oriented
times with a fatter populace and it gets worse. I was able to ride to
school growing up, but I doubt that where I used to live it would be
possible now. It seems cycling is more the province of an adult who can
navigate high traffic roads or ride or drive out to the country. First
we need to get children riding bicycles regularly and then we can worry
about whether they race. We should be supporting Safe Routes to School
and other similar programs if we want to build the ranks of junior
racers, because unlike other sports, no one starts out racing bicycles.
-----Original Message-----
From: Luciano bailey [mailto:ride-@hotmail.com]
Sent: Thursday, October 06, 2005 11:46 AM
To: ragg-@yahoo.com; Cycle-@hotmail.com; mad-@huttig.com;
eva-@ci.hillsboro.or.us; ob-@topica.com
Subject: RE: [OBRA Chat] kids and bikes
My work has not only extended to CCC and the BIKE program. It's about
bang
for the buck the $50-110 K is a real figure between just those two
groups.
Again where are the kids CCC is not interested in racing still one would
expext some participation as a by product and there is none. BIKE and I
have
long been at odds as far as getting the most for there money. Nine years
and
no national champions other than Rocky Serna and he was an add on to the
bike program. Proof of good spending would be like Major Motion in LA
who on
limited funds has had at least two national champions in the last five
years
Rasaan Bahati now a pro and Ali Camara national crit champ two years
ago.
For Oregon to continue to produce national champs it takes a committment
to
the future of junior racing.
From: Randy Dreiling <ragg-@yahoo.com>
To: ride-@hotmail.com, Cycle-@hotmail.com, mad-@huttig.com,
eva-@ci.hillsboro.or.us, ob-@topica.com
Subject: RE: [OBRA Chat] kids and bikes
Date: Thu, 6 Oct 2005 11:23:15 -0700 (PDT)
What about working with the CCC. BTA is more about
getting people out of cars then racing, youth, ect...I
think the CCC is a good fit of the few groups I know
about in Portland.
--- Luciano bailey <ride-@hotmail.com> wrote:
Well Mike you hit it right on the head there are NON
profits out there being
well funded to do just that. My question would be
with $50-100 K per year
going to urban cycling programs locally how many
juniors have you seen at
races. For many kids here in the city I am one of
the few up close and
personal people of color they see on a bike. I have
been building and giving
away bikes for thirty years trying to encourage the
use of the bike wherever
I have lived. I am not throwing a pity party for
poor kids who can't afford
to race what I see is a wasted resource of
knowledgable mentors who could
possibly go further to bring young racers into the
sport. As for me
personally my son has gone above and beyond to
participate in this sport
giving great effort to reach success, but if were
not for the genorosity of
minor sponsorships he would not be racing.
From: "J.Michael Manning" <Cycle-@hotmail.com>
Reply-To: Cycle-@hotmail.com
To: mad-@huttig.com, eva-@ci.hillsboro.or.us,
ob-@topica.com
Subject: RE: [OBRA Chat] kids and bikes
Date: Wed, 05 Oct 2005 20:55:49 -0700
Mike,
I like your
sentiment. I could not have expressed it better!
Mike Manning
From: "Adams, Mike" <mad-@huttig.com>
Reply-To: mad-@huttig.com
To: eva-@ci.hillsboro.or.us, ob-@topica.com
Subject: RE: [OBRA Chat] kids and bikes
Date: Wed, 5 Oct 2005 15:39:26 -0500
I am all for assisting junior racers and potential
junior racers. I believe
the best way to do that is mentoring i.e.
encouraging them. When you see
that child riding that K-Mart special as fast as he
can and has a helmet
on, ride up next to him and compliment him, nice
form, nice looking helmet
etc. This they remember more then subsidized fee's
for racing. If they have
chosen to race then they are past the point of
whether they can afford it
or not. Lance's mom was single and worked her butt
off to support her
child. B.I.K.E. is a great way to funnel funds for
all kids to ride safely
let alone hope to race. The kids in my neighborhood
watch me come home and
then speed up and down in front of my house hoping
that the guy on the
sweet bike notices. I have and have at times raced
them from the cul-de-sac
to the
end of the street always mentoring them on safety
and the sport. They
actually liked catching the Tour on T.V. after I
told them what channel. We
should all be mentors, that in itself promotes the
sport. Just a thought.
-----Original Message-----
From: Evan MacKenzie
[mailto:eva-@ci.hillsboro.or.us]
Sent: Wednesday, October 05, 2005 1:24 PM
To: ob-@topica.com
Subject: [OBRA Chat] kids and bikes
Have you seen some of the bikes those juniors ride?
They don't all need our help, I can tell you that.
What we need is a concentrated effort to assist
groups like B.I.K.E.
(Bicycles and Ideas for Kids Empowerment) and the
Community Cycling Center
that help kids with cycling in general, including
racing. While I am all
for helping those of us that need assistance
(competitive cycling is not
cheap no matter who foots the bill), I don't think
we all need to pay a
little extra so some guy who pulls up in a $40,000
gas-guzzling SUV can get
a break on race entry fees for his 14-year-old who
rides a Litespeed.
We should not just be looking to help the next Eddy
or Lance or George or
Jackie or Allison or Paola or whomever. We should
also help nurture the
next Candi Murray, or Mike Murray, or Evan Manvel,
or Tim Blumenthal, or
Jay Graves, or Chris Kegel, or Earl Blumenaur...the
list goes on.
Short of giving every kid a free bike that will
stand up to a 40-mile ride,
and then seeing who has the strength and
determination to get there real
fast, we are not going to grow the ranks of actual
racers. Bicycling
competitively is expensive, and bicycling at all is
not safe (either in
truth or perceived), especially in the suburbs
where cars rule. We must
address the root cause of not getting more kids on
bikes before we can
worry about why we don't see more at races. We are
talking basic
development patterns and socio-economics here,
something that is not high
on the priority list for our friends at OBRA (and
probably not at the UCI
either).
If you want to see more kids at races, start with
parents who drive their
children everywhere. The poor kids probably have
bikes, because their
parents can't afford to be chauffeurs all the time.
Those kids will race a
$40 Kmart bike with their friends any day of the
week, just for fun. Those
are the kids with the will but not the entry fees.
If they can stomp all
over that kid with the Litespeed, more power to
'em!
Just a thought...
Evan MacKenzie
Urban Planner I
City of Hillsboro
150 E. Main Street, 4th floor
Hillsboro, OR 97123
503-681-6154
eva-@ci.hillsboro.or.us
http://www.ci.hillsboro.or.us/Planning_Department/
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