Old Sport, New Beginning

July 2022

My reacquaintance with the joy of bike riding began with a call from a dear friend I had hitherto never met. Mike and I had begun our friendship as pen pals when I was in vet school, bonding over a shared love of the outdoors and enjoying over a decade of adventure stories, philosophical debates, commiseration over life’s challenges, and the occasional recipe exchange in the form of a fresh-baked loaf of bread via the USPS.

Like any good friendship, The Interstate Bread Exchange –as we came to call our unconventional correspondence– inspired us to explore new interests as motivated by one another’s stories. Mike had taken up horseback riding, I had learned to bake challah, and we had ongoing attempts to sell each other on our sports of choice.

Mike, avid cyclist and owner of the bike shop B3 Bicycles, had spent years trying to lure me into the cycling world with everything from tales of the delicious farmer’s market or ice cream shop treats he had rolled into while exploring the back roads, mid-ride photos of bear cubs and scenic mountain vistas, to the benefits one’s joint cartilage enjoys when biking instead of trail running.

What finally got me [mid trail run, as it happened] was a phone call from Mike with an offer he knew I couldn’t refuse: a sponsorship from Liv Cycling to bike the Denali Park Road and share the adventure through photos and writing. I immediately stopped jogging, plunked myself down on a boulder, and tried to get Mike to admit that it was a joke. It was not.

“But I have no idea how to bike pack! I’ve barely even ridden a bike since I was a kid! I’m completely unqualified,” I protested.

Mike patiently explained that any competent backpacker should easily pick up bike packing, that cycling was blissfully devoid of qualifications or licensure, and that remembering how to ride was, well, “just like riding a bike.”

And so, a few weeks later, I found myself the proud owner of a beautiful new gravel bike. All I had to do next was learn how to pack it, ride it, and take it on a 180-mile adventure through the mountains of central Alaska. And she needed a name…