Oxford Finds Race Across America

-by Shawn Elliot Zetzer

OXFORD – Last Wednesday, a stereotypical hot and sunny June day, Talawanda graduates Jenny Haidet and Elley Pieterick volunteered at Oxford’s time station to take part in another one of the cities hidden treasures, Race Across America (RAAM).

Last year, Oxford first took the plunge of hosting one of the few manned stations on RAAM’s path. Both Pieterick and Haidet stopped one afternoon at the time station’s tent located next to McDonalds, completely unbeknownst to the race. What they discovered astonished them.

RAAM is a 3,000-mile cycling race across the United States involving solo and team riders. Of the 30 solo riders involved this year over half did not finish. One team’s RV flipped and a car hit one rider at 25 MPH, according to his team’s estimates, only to get back on the bike and continue riding. This year’s winner, Yuri Robic of Slovenia, rode from the piers of Oceanside, California to the docks of Annapolis, Maryland in 9 days, 1 hour and 1 minute.

They left momentarily, then returning with chalk and posters to support the RAAM riders the rest of the week. They continued that tradition this year. Haidet & Pieterick, who both will be attending Miami University this fall, do own bicycles, but are not ultra-riders nor are they even avid bikers. “This makes us wish we did [cycle],” joked Pieterick.

“It’s hard to find two young ladies of that age that can get wrapped up in something so beyond themselves,” said time station night volunteer, Lee Kreider.

At 3:35pm that afternoon, Robic, one of the world’s greatest ultra-cyclists, entered the old Wal-Mart parking lot for a quick 20 minute break as his crew followed closing blasting “I’m Yours” by Jason Mraz.

With 10 fans present, some hoped Robic might stop and interact as he did last year with the two girls. However, Robic signed one autograph and gave a wave to the fans before taking a right at Spring Street, headed down rt. 73 and out of Oxford almost unnoticed.

“Name me another sport you get to participate in for free, be right next to the stars and talked to them yourself,” said Kreider quoting a friend. Lee Kreider is retired and currently works at Office Depot as a technician.

Inspiration

The first team to come through calls themselves TeamType1. 25 crewmembers, seven riders, two RVs, and a couple minivans stickered with sponsors and logos sat in Oxford time station Wednesday night. TeamType1 is made up entirely of Type1 diabetics and won the 8-team portion handedly this year with a time of 5 days 1 hour and 48 minutes. In Oxford, however, they did more then pass another checkpoint.

Of the 20 fans present, Scott Backer, is a member of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. This national organization spear heads new advancement for type1 diabetics. Backer came down from Dayton with his family to cheer on and meet some of the racers. Racer Dustin Folger took an hour to meet the Backers and all the fans present fielding questions and comments.

“Gotta make sure I have enough food on me,” said Folger preparing his insulin for his next pull of the race. He wanted fans to know exactly what he is doing.

Jack Bannik is a volunteer on teamtype1’s crew. He is also the father of TeamType1 racer Jeff Bannik, the rider hit by a vehicle while racing. He hopes the team’s cause can create an impact through the stir of their accomplishments. “You can do some very unusual things,” said Bannik noting his son’s second year on the team. “Hopefully he will be an inspiration to the other kids.” Bannik is a retired painting contractor and currently drives school buses for a college in Wisconsin.

History

“It’s a different sport, you don’t see anything happen. You sit here on the Internet and twitter and try to put it all together,” said Kreider.

Before riders had scout crews and there was GPS, riders use to know how far away they were from the leader by the “color of the banana peels he passed along the side of the road,” said Walt Smith, a time station volunteer, as he reflected on an old memory.

The founders could never have imagined the technological ends RAAM has met, just as the race cannot imagine it’s future --- it’s still being molded. RAAM began as the Great American Bike Race 29 years ago, according to head race official Mike Roark.

RAAM’s founders, 4 young men, chose to race each other across the United States that year. As they gathered a following, other racers and fans began to ask if it was going to continue the next year. It did, with double-digit ridership, according to Roark.

This year, the race began with over 200 riders, according to Kreider. However, most of those are teams. The field is made up of almost 50% rookies every year. “It’s hard to find more then 30-35 ultra-cyclist riders willing to take on a task like this,” said Roark.

RAAM now features riders from 6 continents, and 20 countries, according to Roark. “The only reason we don’t have the seventh [continent] is we couldn’t find a penguin to ride a bicycle,” said Roark.

Roark, and his wife Cindy, have been apart of RAAM for 26 years. “Every year this is a great adventure on the road,” said Roark. As an official, who also takes the title volunteer, you are sent all over the route to follow riders, mostly getting just as little sleep as the riders.

Sheila Forakes, a fellow race official, describes her involvement similar to Roark, “Sometimes when you hang out with the wrong people you get involved with stuff.” However, each one does it because the love the race, and maybe more importantly, the people that make up the race.

“You can’t really quantify [this race] to someone who hasn’t been out there,” said Roark, wearing a ‘world’s toughest bicycle race’ RAAM t-shirt. Roark is a retired schoolteacher from Fallbrook, California. Forakes works as a bicycle event planner for Perimeter Biking Association of America in Arizona.

Friday Morning, 2:00am

Connor Ellison has liver cancer and is one rider on a team of eight --- Ellison is also 12-years old. “I know in order for me to live to the fullest I have to take risks,” Ellison says on his donation page. “I have to try things that most people would say are impossible.”

Friday morning, Connor’s team rolled into the time station, the next rider up for the team was Dr. Carolos Esquivel, Connor’s surgeon. Esquivel, who is not an ultra-cyclist, was asked by Connor to join the team and jumped at the task.

Esquivel proceeded to ride off at the next transition to start his next pull of the race. Just a few minutes later, race officials Steve and Deirdre Geenholz pulled into the Oxford time station.

As the conversation commenced with the officials, Dr. Esquivel and Ellison came up.

“You mean Carlos Esquivel?” asked Steve Geenholz. “I’ve known Carlos Esquivel for years. I didn’t know he was a cyclist. I’ve sent him patients for years.”

Geenholz is actually Dr. Geenholz. He first knew Esquivel in Denver where he was a practiced pediatric surgeon before moving to Sacramento, where he continues his practice. Esquivel is the only surgeon in the nation doing pediatric transplants, according to Geenholz, and still refers patients to him.

Although Dr. Geenholz knew Esquivel, they had never met before and only spoken over the phone. Neither knew of the other’s involvement in RAAM. “This can only happen on RAAM,” said Kreider. “I am so excited to be apart of it.”

What We Have Here

“We’re an unusual time station,” Time Station Captain Jim Lawyer told a team’s crewmember. “We do it better then anyone else.” Lawyer is on call 24/7 as an IT agent in greater Cincinnati but is an avid cyclist and great fan of the race.

‘Operation Progress’ is team made up of Los Angeles Police officers. A crew of 13 and a team of four, the members of this team hope to fundraise to create opportunity for children trapped in bad situations through a sport they love.

When Oxford police found out they would be coming through, they offered to treat the crew to skyline and escort them into the Oxford time station. McDonald’s donated food coupons to riders and crewmembers. Kroger donated cases of water. The Glass Packing Institute came to the race to donate t-shirts, water and sporting goods.

“It’s such a big deal,” said volunteer Jenny Haidet on Wednesday. “But nobody knows about it.” Due to RAAM’s youth, larger-than-life athletes and media outlets have not become a large part of RAAM since it’s inception.

“Thank you, thank you. Thank you all for this,” said one crewmember as they left the station. Another believed this to be the nicest time station in the country, not just due to the amenities offered but also the people.

Some of the toughest cyclist in the world came through Oxford between June 16th and June 19th. Oxford is use to people from all over the country, and world, becoming apart of their community for a short period of time, but RAAM creates a class of it’s own.