The HERO Ride

Tom Butler: 0:04

This is the cycling over 60 podcast, season two, episode 28, the hero ride, and I'm your host, tom Butler. On the January 29th episode, I talked to my daughter about her decision to start cycling after her husband really got into doing cycling events with me. It was awesome news that she was going to start riding, but I was bothered by the bike she was going to use. You'll have to go listen to that episode to get more details on why. That being said, one thing led to another last week and we decided to help her purchase a new bike. She is getting a live avail AR1. I think this will be a great bike for her. Here are a few reasons we went with that choice.

Tom Butler: 0:58

First off, if you don't know the live brand, there are a product of giant bicycles that focuses on the needs of women cyclists. It makes sense to me that she got a bike that is designed using quote women's data. The bike is new, but it's a 2022 model. It was on sale for what I thought was a reasonable price for what you get. It is an aluminum bike, but it has a lightweight aluminum frame. A-lux I'm not exactly sure how to pronounce that, but it's A-L-U-X-X. It is a giant product using a premium alloy and fluid injection that helps the frame be lighter. To help the bike be more comfortable to ride, the Veil AR1 comes with a composite fork and a D-shaped composite seat post shaft. This means the bike is absorbing more from the road and not passing it onto the rider. She also liked having the ability to do some gravel rides, so the fact that the bike fits up to 38 size tires was a good feature as well. One of the biggest selling points for me is that it comes with a 105 groupset. I see that as being durable enough for her to do events and the training she needs to do. 105 also means hydraulic disc brakes, which I think makes sense for the wet hills that she'll be no doubt riding on here. To be honest, I'm not sure if McKenna is more anxious for the bike to get here or if Garin and I are.

Tom Butler: 2:16

Last week I talked about troubles I have been having adjusting to loading my bike on the car to go for rides. I'm happy to report that leaving the trunk rack attached to the car helps. It is funny how removing this small barrier makes a difference. I made the final tweaks to my standard route, so now I'm not just riding through the flat valley the whole time, like I was, and that means the route has gone from 384 feet of climbing to 1316 feet. That is mainly due to a 344 foot climb that I do both ways. It is for sure a test for me. The climb is just under a mile and starts out with a section that is a 12% to 14% grade. I haven't been doing much climbing since I got to Roubaix and I am struggling with the 34 to 34 gearing on that steep of a climb, but that is how I will get stronger.

Tom Butler: 3:05

One of the highlights of last week was definitely that my whole family went out for a ride together. My wife has an electric bike, so she has no problem keeping up. It was a bit cold for her, but she was real trooper about it. She chose this electric bike because it folds and is easily transported, but we didn't do any real evaluation of how it fits her and because it doesn't fit that well, our next purchase will be an e-bike that she feels more comfortable on. Then I hope we will repeat the family bike ride outing over and over again Sometime in the future.

Tom Butler: 3:44

I want to be able to escape the winter rain and take a bicycle trip someplace warm and sunny, so I am curious about where the best location would be to visit midwinter. This week I ran across the Hero Ride in Bay, st Louis, mississippi. The ride benefits the Mississippi Oregon Recovery Agency. I was fortunate to get connected to Eddie Holmes, who organizes the ride, and he joined me this week for a conversation. Eddie is also the president of the Gulf Coast Bicycle Club and has been an avid fan of bicycles for a long time. Here is our discussion. I like hearing from people around the country about cycling in their area. That's been one of my favorite things about this podcast, and today I'm joined by Eddie Holmes. Eddie, thanks for coming on. You're welcome. Thank you for having me. Before we get rolling, can you start out by sharing a memory of cycling from when you were a kid?

Eddie Holmes: 4:40

Yes, now I'm going to be 69 years old here soon and I remember this like it was yesterday. My father worked in a store in this little town that I live in, long Beach, mississippi. Across the street there was a hardware store, a Western Auto, and I went over there daily to drool over this three-speeds English racer that I was so hoping that I would get for Christmas that year. And I did. I remember that like it was yesterday.

Tom Butler: 5:11

Do you remember knowing you were going to get it at some point? Or did they pull it out, like on Christmas Day? How did that work?

Eddie Holmes: 5:17

Yeah, I don't remember ever thinking I might actually get it. I remember the morning of being shocked and very happy about it. That's awesome.

Tom Butler: 5:28

You are involved with something called Hero Ride there, right? I'm wondering if you could talk a bit about Hero Ride and its mission and things like that.

Eddie Holmes: 5:39

Sure, the Hero Ride is actually a two-fold thing. The first thing is that we are helping the Mississippi Organ Donors Recovery Agency in their efforts to make the importance of organ donations out there, as well as a fundraiser for them to help them with money, monetary costs and things. Also, it's to provide an organized ride for those people and show them that maybe don't ride, that there's a whole other world out there of cycling that we try to introduce people to. It's pretty much a win-win for everybody.

Tom Butler: 6:19

Now there's a few different distances. I think Is that right, correct?

Eddie Holmes: 6:24

Right. We actually this year had to move our location because of some construction in our area that increased the traffic along the previous routes. So we're going out of a state campground this year in the Wavelin Mississippi area, which has actually opened up the possibility for some beach cruiser style rides that people can join. So we'll have anywhere from a 10 mile, 5 to 10 mile ride available for the people that like to just cruise a little bit, all the way up to a metric ride 62 mile or for those people that ride more serious.

Tom Butler: 7:02

And where's the?

Eddie Holmes: 7:02

starting point. The starting point is at Buccaneer State Park in Wavelin, Mississippi. Okay, and ending point out and back.

Tom Butler: 7:10

I believe you're also the president of the Gulf Coast Bicycle Club. Is that correct?

Eddie Holmes: 7:15

It is correct. I am currently the president of the Gulf Coast Bicycle Club and have been. This will be my ninth year, and I've been involved with the club for many years. Before that I was actually the director of the biggest broad we have, this Southern Magnolia, so I've been around cycling for a long time.

Tom Butler: 7:32

And it sounds like it's a pretty active club, pretty healthy club.

Eddie Holmes: 7:36

It is. We have constantly between 300 and 350 paid members that are. You know they fluctuate, some go out, some come in, but we always stay around that number. Our goal is actually to promote cycling of all types, the beginner all the way up to the folks that ride the century, rides the 100 milers, and we have a lot of time trials for all different folks. So we we try to really do something for everybody. We have some gravel bike rides every now and then. We have a pretty active mountain bike route. Now that take care of that need. But before they were established we were trying to do some of those events as well. But we try to really cover the gamut of cycling period and we also have things like new rider clinics, flat tire, you know, things of that nature.

Tom Butler: 8:28

You and I are both in the cycling over 60 demographic. I'm wondering about other members. Do you have members who are older cyclists?

Eddie Holmes: 8:37

Yes, we do. One of the events that we do, the club handles, is the senior Olympics, and that is people 50 years and older, believe it or not, year after year. The biggest age group is the 75 to 79 year old group.

Tom Butler: 8:55

Wow.

Eddie Holmes: 8:55

There'll be 15 to 20 people in that age group every year. Two years ago we had a gentleman in the 90 to 94 age group who came out and rode the 5k and the 10k. So that's really inspirational to see that you know those guys continuing to do that. But our club does and, matter of fact, we just had our banquet, our yearly banquet, and we acknowledge five people that were in the 80 year old Calibri, the octagons. We gave them a little plaque for that we do. We have a wide range.

Tom Butler: 9:28

That's fantastic. One thing that you guys do is a Christmas bicycle drive, right. I'm wondering if you could talk about that.

Eddie Holmes: 9:36

Yeah, that's probably one of the things I'm most proud about, because I'll tell you how this works. We don't ever pressure anybody. We don't ever ask anybody to donate at all. In the six or seven years we've been doing that, I've not asked one person to donate. What I simply do is post it on our Facebook page and I always share the names of the people who want to be.

Eddie Holmes: 10:01

Some people want to be anonymous, but the people that donate, we call them our bike angels, and how this works is we have them donate to a fund that's tied in with the club and we actually go pick up the bikes for them and donate the bike in their name. So we try to make it really easy for them to donate. It's grown quite a bit. Actually, the local storage facility here in my town has actually donated the use of a couple of storage units every year so that we can keep the bikes until we give them away. That has been just a blessing, because in years past my wife and I have had over a hundred bikes in our house or around our property. So it was really difficult to do that and we were really thankful of him when he offered that to us, and last year not this previous year, but last year we hit the 1000 bike mark. We have had that many donated in about I think that was the eighth year or something, but we're proud of that. We're proud of that.

Tom Butler: 11:04

For sure Is there a merchant nearby that works with you guys.

Eddie Holmes: 11:09

It varies A lot. Of years we deal with Academy, some years we deal with Walmart. I mean, the bike stores who we deal with a lot know that we can't, you know, for cost effectiveness. We have to find the retail bikes and we do use the local. Any local businesses that will help work with us and they're good about holding the sale price over things like that, and I didn't mention this. But how we hand these bikes out, we have a great relationship with law enforcement here on the Gulf Coast. We've worked with the Harrison County, the Stone County, the Jackson County and the Hancock County Sheriff's Department. So they come out to our rides and work intersections and help us in a safety way and so for that we donate the bikes to them. We give each one of them a certain number of bikes because they know who actually needs the bikes and so it's kind of a. It helps us all to do it that way. We're appreciative of their help and they're appreciative that we will donate the bikes to them. So that's how we distribute them.

Tom Butler: 12:11

What a great collaboration. That's awesome, right, right. Another thing that I saw that made me want to come down there to visit it, and that was the vintage bike show. Right, right.

Eddie Holmes: 12:22

Right, what's that like? I am really into vintage bikes. Somebody's asked me, or I'll ask somebody do you know how many bikes I have? And they say no, I don't. And I say neither do I, because the sad part is we really love the old bikes the old Swans and the old Rollies. I've got a 1955 Western Flyer that matches an old antique truck I got. So we have our local cruise on the coast. The bike goes in the back, but anyway.

Eddie Holmes: 12:47

So the cruise in, I mean the vintage bike show, about five or six years ago we had the first one and we had over 200 people attend that ride. Not 200 bikes, we had 200 people. A lot of them brought multiple bikes. We had a 1923 five seater bike that was a Shriners bike, a custom made Shriners bike, and we just had a number of incredible bikes and for a number of years that was pretty popular and then it kind of you know, like anything else, the current fad, I guess ran out for a while but it's starting to come back and last year we had a couple of shows and we have a couple.

Eddie Holmes: 13:27

We have a cruise in next month and we have a show in November. So, and we give different categories and the local bike shops are in on it and they donate and one of them even hosted this year. We're actually going to be at the Shuckers feel, our local Monterly baseball teams facility, and we're thinking about, we're trying to work it out that we have a bike build off contest with the theme of the baseball team. I mean, we're, you know, just fun stuff that we're. We're trying to get going, but it works well. We always have 40 or 50 people show up.

Tom Butler: 13:59

Yeah, that's so cool. I have an older trek bike, yeah, and I was looking up something to try to get a part replaced on it and found it listed as a vintage bike.

Eddie Holmes: 14:13

And it's like wait a minute right, I'm not that old Right. We actually had a race last year and we had a vintage bike category, so that was included in the race, but they were only racing, of course, other vintage bikes, so that was pretty yeah.

Tom Butler: 14:30

Yeah, that's really fun. Yeah, is cycling well supported local, locally, by community leaders and legislation?

Eddie Holmes: 14:37

It is. I think that it's grown over the last few years, especially because we have actually a number of times there've been an accident with the car and the cyclist and the cyclist has not always come out. Okay, you know, if you know what I mean, about five or six years ago we had a huge safety meeting with our club and people interested in that, which included a few law enforcement people, and at that time we chose somebody from our club to go out and actually speak to the chief of police or whoever was in charge of their local law enforcement agency and just kind of be one-on-one with them and and find out if they had, indeed were up on the rules of the road and the safety laws in Mississippi and and more or less kind of introduce themselves to us and say, hey, what can we do? You know, you're, you guys mind? What can we do to help ourselves Be a safer club? So we did a lot of that for a few years.

Eddie Holmes: 15:33

We had a, we had a couple of commercials made. We actually worked with one of our local members who's that's his job, and we had commercials that are still running, and one was about the local Rides with the family in the neighborhood and one was about the harder core rider. So we've done a number of things like that over the years. Yeah, I think certain cities, of course, are gonna always Promote it more than others, I think, but they're all on board here along the coast where we live, I believe. I'm happy about that too.

Tom Butler: 16:05

Yeah, it seems like that's a natural place for people to want a bike. Yes by the coast, so it's good to hear that, going back to the hero ride, organizing a cycling event Involves a lot of planning, of course. Right, I'm wondering if there are some Key logistical challenges that you face in coordinating the hero ride and especially Considering your location there on the Gulf Coast coast.

Eddie Holmes: 16:31

Well, I always and I've said this a hundred or a thousand times the average person that comes to a ride really doesn't understand what all it took to put that event together Because, you know, in some cases there are permits to get, in some cases there's special permission needed to have the event, and and then the logistics of the route, always trying to find a Safe route. You know the safest possible. When I started with the club they did a lot of routes that were a big circle. They would start going out one direction and end up another direction and I immediately changed that to out and back Because of the number. Logistic wise it's just so much easier because you need half the manpower and it's also safer because you see people on the road and and and that type thing.

Eddie Holmes: 17:20

But one of the things we do is we are really concerned with we have sag support. We have people that more multiple sag support when we give them a bit. We have the sag support contact information on the back of the bit. We make sure they know that. We also divide our sag support up into sections of the course when if somebody needs somebody, they're not 50 miles away. They may be 15 miles away or something like that, because that's the problem I faced in the past myself with other events.

Eddie Holmes: 17:52

We also make sure that the directional Indicators are there, you know, the markings on the road, as well as signs. We use duct tape, colored duct tape, and we use one color for to go out on the course and one color to come back, and that has really I don't know it's just cut down on the number of people that say I'm lost. In fact, I hear, I really hear a lot and I'm not, we're just, I just hear this a lot. We hear people say man, your course is really marked. Well, we really appreciate that. So we really spent a lot of time with that.

Eddie Holmes: 18:23

We have a lot of signs and we have some people that are good at the sag support and they help with picking up, because we Another part of that is that law enforcement is always, you know, adamant about is we don't mind you putting the signs out, but when it's over, let's pick them up. So we have somebody who follows the last rider in and they also are picking up signs as they come in. But lots of part and then rest stops always a big part, and one of the challenges we always face is Trying to make sure people register in time. The ones that wait to the last minute really make it difficult to plan as far as Supplies you need for rest stops and things like that, which in some cases are, or safety issues you know when it's really hot here in the summer and you know make sure people are or having the fluids and nutrition and all that stuff. So, like I said, lots of parts to an event really is.

Tom Butler: 19:13

Do you have to worry about storms and things like that? Is that a concern?

Eddie Holmes: 19:18

It always is a concern.

Eddie Holmes: 19:19

So my history is that of a high school coach.

Eddie Holmes: 19:23

I was a high school coach for many years and it was just engrained in me that when you plan an event or have an event like in those days, ball games or whatever that you have to remember people are not only coming to participate in that event but they're driving to and from that event. And so if we have the time to cancel or not, we don't hardly ever cancel event, but we might reschedule an event if the weather is actually Calls for it. You know what I mean. It's not, and I'm not talking just rain, but if it's a really dangerous situation or a Question mark in our mind, we're gonna always err on the side of caution and Reschedule if we need to. We we don't do that very much in our area, we don't have to do that very much, but we have done it and we're not opposed to doing it if it means that it's a safer ride, because in retrospect You're not gonna have as many participants if you try to go on and get it in and under those conditions.

Tom Butler: 20:24

Yeah, that makes sense. I'm always interested in places to escape from the north in the wintertime. So talk about Mississippi as a place for people to, to travel and cycle in March.

Eddie Holmes: 20:39

Well, even right here and where we live in Mississippi Gulf Coast, I mean it might be 30 degrees tomorrow, but the next day it might be 75. So if you can't ride one or two days in a row, just hang on, because it's not long before you will be able to get out On the bikes. And in our area we have a beachfront that's along the highway that's about 26 miles long, so that's a mecca for people running, walking, jogging, cycling. I mean it's, it's great. So we, you know we have that facility, for we're just really happy and lucky to have that here, but it's a great place to ride. You can ride most of the year, around almost 12 months a year.

Tom Butler: 21:21

Is it a destination place for tourists?

Eddie Holmes: 21:24

Yeah, I mean sure, we have the casinos here which draw people in. We have the Beauvoir home Jeff Davis is home and Biloxi. We have Coliseum here. Locally we have a big aquarium that was just built and we're 75 miles from New Orleans, louisiana, to our west, and Mobile, alabama, to our, to our east, so we're kind of in the middle there. It's a good place.

Tom Butler: 21:46

Normally with that comes good restaurants and things like that.

Eddie Holmes: 21:51

A lot of good restaurants on the coast here. I haven't mentioned this, but one of the One of the events we have and this came out of just sheer coincidence, but we have an event that we call the retiree slash work skipper ride, and that is a ride that we do. We'll have 30 35 people show up to that rise, some retired, some skip and work, and we go ride and come back and we go to a restaurant and we eat as a group and we go 35, 40 miles from here either way. We have these rails to trails and we and we'll do some of those, but so we have some and those are cool people of them. They get what they will start and say, okay, meet back here at this time and then we'll go eat. Yeah, we eat a lot.

Tom Butler: 22:37

Well, it's such a great way to build community, I think is to do rides like that and eat together and experience, experience places, so that that's great. Has the hero ride evolved quite a bit since it's an inception?

Eddie Holmes: 22:51

the hero ride was something that Mississippi organ donors started up in the northern part of Mississippi and so I think they got wind of our club and I think somebody in that organization actually cycles, probably and they approached me about having an event. So With Trisha bird, who is the director of that organization down here, she and I put together the first hero ride and right off the bat we had over 200 riders the first year. They broke all the records of everything they've had in north Mississippi. So we'll draw between 200 250 riders every year. That's been a pretty consistent so far for a pretty system number.

Tom Butler: 23:38

Is it pretty easy to engage Volunteers and people to help out for the hero ride.

Eddie Holmes: 23:44

They have a wide range of not only volunteers but and or employees. I believe that come out for that day. That is that is the challenge that I face all the time with our other events. But it has not been for that ride because they do have a lot of people that come out and we place like a minute ago we talked about safety aspect of it, but we really we have people when it ever possible. If it's a an intersection that we're a little concerned about, we try to have somebody there with a yellow vest on and helping direct traffic and just being there, so that that takes more manpower when you're trying to do something like that, and they always provide a good number of people to help out with that.

Tom Butler: 24:27

I imagine. I mean, it's such a great program. I don't remember the name of the organization. What's the name of the organization that it benefits?

Eddie Holmes: 24:34

Oh, the Mississippi Organ Recovery Agency.

Tom Butler: 24:37

Yeah. So that's a great agency and obviously great work they do Right right, and so I'm sure that all year long they have people that are interested in supporting what they're doing.

Eddie Holmes: 24:49

And one of the cool things about it is some of the people from the agency will get up and welcome everybody before the ride and talk about the importance of it, and there's always people that are about to do the ride. That are either people who donated or the recipients of it, so they're always willing to speak up and say I appreciate this because I've benefited from it, and that's pretty cool and that happens every year, every year.

Tom Butler: 25:17

That really is a great element of it. That's awesome. Do you have any memories from the ride, anything that you can think of? That built awareness or memories about unique things about the ride.

Eddie Holmes: 25:31

About the hero ride, yeah, yeah, I think the fact that there's a lot of people that are willing to donate their time to help, but also there's a lot of people that register and they have no intentions of riding, they're just trying to help the calls out, and it's just the fact that people do little things like that, I believe it make it what it is and, like I said, it's a great pause and it brings community together. I think that it just gonna continue to grow. Honestly, but I've always had that first year, I think when somebody spoke up and said I had a kidney because of so-and-so. Who donated, and that kind of sticks to your mind.

Tom Butler: 26:14

Yeah, for sure. You said, if I heard you right, this is the first year that you're having a beach cruiser kind of more casual ride. Is that correct?

Eddie Holmes: 26:22

Yes, it is actually what we're calling a beach cruiser ride. We've had some shorter rides, but this is actually because you're over there by the beach and it's actually a better area for us to do that than where we were before. And, honestly, most people ride the further distances. You know, a lot of people will do the full metric, but a lot of people will do the 40-mile or that's gonna be a big. What's cool this year is that, because we're on a new route, there's an area that's it's a neighborhood that's named after Florida and every street in there has got a name Daytona Road or Ocala Road or whatever and so we titled that ride Ride to Florida and do some things like that. And people say I'm riding to Florida today and gonna get a kick out of it, so it's just all in fun, all in fun.

Tom Butler: 27:13

Yeah, that is fun. I like that. Do you see some broader impacts from the Hero Ride as far as the community is concerned? Are people pretty familiar with it coming up or is it featured by news organizations? How's the kind of broader impact?

Eddie Holmes: 27:33

The media does cover it. The media will talk to one of the representatives there a lot of times. Occasionally they'll talk to me about the ride itself. I do think that it's pretty much established itself as an annual event, because I have a lot of people that are asking me for dates for the following year so they can make sure that they plan accordingly so that they're off or make arrangements to get a hotel room or something like that. So I do think that it's established enough to have those things happen. The local communities like, for example, we had to move this year to another town, and I say that it's only four miles away from the start, but it is another town, which means another police agency that you're dealing with, and people like that, and they're always willing to help when you tell them that this is what you're doing and this is why. So, and I think it's well enough now that we really don't even have to tell them that anymore.

Tom Butler: 28:29

Gotcha, how do you measure the success of the Hero Ride?

Eddie Holmes: 28:34

Well, I think it's twofold really. It's the number of people that come out to participate, but then in turn it's also the amount of profit that they make that they can put into that organization for that cause. That has to be one of the most things considered. You know, a success when you are able to really make a profit good enough to turn around and help do what you're trying to establish there.

Tom Butler: 29:01

I think there's something that's maybe a little hard to measure.

Eddie Holmes: 29:05

It is, it is, but I think that you know it's like anything else, if you're able to cover, and I'll give you an example our big ride is called the Southern Magnolia Ride. This was the 15th year that we put this event on. Just this past year, at our banquet, I asked our folks in the audience there who are, you know, established riders, have been riding for years and years and years how much do you think it costs to put this ride on? We had 320, 330 people participated and we had rest stops and all that. And my question was how much do you think it costs to put this event on? And I asked $5,000,. Raise your hand.

Eddie Holmes: 29:47

number of hands went up, you know, 8,000, 10,000, then the hands went down when it got up to that and the answer to the question is it's $15,000. People have no idea what it costs to put all these things on. To say that an event is successful would, in my mind, is that number one. Here's the first thing If everybody gets back safe, that's my number one goal. I consider it a success if that happens right off the bat. Our number one thing is always safe.

Eddie Holmes: 30:20

We preach that and we preach helmets and we preach lights and we preach you know, all that stuff is something that's really necessary. But if everybody gets back, then of course we consider it a success. And we also consider if we've covered all the expenses for the event and can go forward throughout the year giving a lot of free things to free ride or low cost rides. And we try to do things where we can involve the family. You know where we can not just the guy, the dad or the wife or whoever, but the family. We try to do some family things. We have scavenger hunts on bicycles and they love it. So we do a lot of things that draw those people in and I think it's from the bigger wise success we're able to do those things, if that makes any sense.

Tom Butler: 31:04

Yeah, for sure, and I think that there's also a blend of things where you've got people doing something good for the organization, for the cause, getting awareness out of people thinking about tissue, organ, eye donation that might not have thought about it, and that just people enjoying being on a bike with other people. I think that's a fantastic thing as well. Looking forward, what are your goals and aspirations for the future of the hero ride?

Eddie Holmes: 31:38

Well, we of course want to make it bigger each year. We're hoping that we can accommodate, believe it or not. We've certain rides we've had to relocate because we could not accommodate the number of people parking and all those things, and actually sometimes roads are just not. You try to get in a rural area where you're safe, but sometimes space is an issue. So we want to make the hero ride as big as we can. At the same time, we want to be able to control it and handle the safety aspects of it and all. So you're always walking the line what's too big for the number of people that we have, that we can safely handle it, but at the same time let's let it grow. So it's a catch-22 thing. So a good problem to have, but sometimes you have to really consider what you're doing there.

Tom Butler: 32:39

So if someone's listening to this and wants to get signed up and take a trip down to the Mississippi Gulf Coast, how would they get signed up?

Eddie Holmes: 32:49

There's a number of ways. I think if you go to the Mississippi Organ Donors Recovery Agency, Mississippi, they have a link there. We also have a link on our website and that is wwwvgufcoastbicycleclubcom. We have our yearly calendar there and you can click on any one of those and get to a registration form, and the hero ride is in there too. So there's a number of different ways, and you can actually sign up the day of the event. We encourage people to do it in advance, but sometimes work schedules and things like that don't allow people to do it until the day, and we accommodate that.

Tom Butler: 33:25

Cool. I'm thinking maybe you're too busy to actually ride the ride. Do you actually get out there?

Eddie Holmes: 33:31

I do, I try. I am only able to ride this ride because it's not necessarily our Gulf Coast Bicycle Club folks that are doing the rest stops and all that. It's the Mississippi Organ Donors Groups and so that does allow me to ride. However, I am the guy that's out setting up the course, putting all the signs, arrows and all that stuff out, and it is one of our sad guys that picks up at the end. But I am thankful that I most of the time get to ride and sometimes I'll cut it short to get back and be sure you know and that everything is going OK. But Trish and I keep we I check in with her sometimes stop and check in with her or she'll call me and let me know how it's going. And I do stay busy pretty much during those events and I don't always get to ride, but I appreciate the times that I do.

Tom Butler: 34:24

So I'm wondering for you personally what are some goals that you have? What are some challenges that you're taking on? Do you have anything scheduled for you?

Eddie Holmes: 34:35

Well, yeah, it just so happens, I'm actually training right now for my 15th Ironman event which is a half Ironman, I should say Going to Kona, hawaii, and we're going to do that June 1st. This is not the world championship, this is just that half Ironman. So I'll be doing that, getting ready for that. And then we've done a number of long rides. We did a century ride the first day of the year. This year we had a group do that and organize ride and so, yeah, I ride seven, eight thousand miles a year usually, and that's another thing our club does.

Eddie Holmes: 35:08

I didn't mention is we have a distance challenge contest throughout the year and we have them in different months, and the reason I wanted to do it that way is because that allows everybody to participate. It's not about speed, it's just about how far can you ride. It doesn't matter how long it takes. So we'll have a month long challenge, we'll have a single day challenge. Like I said, a yearly challenge, and we just had some incredible numbers. I mean last year the young lady that won the overall thing was over 15,000 miles. So it's just incredible. But you know what the key to that is? That it gets people out riding Even if they don't get into the award thing. They rode more than they ever had before, which created a more fit person and, in some cases, a lot happier persons. That works real well for us. It just gets people interested and keeps them out there. Well, I appreciate things like that.

Tom Butler: 36:04

Those are things that, for me, keep me motivated, right, you know, if I'm like, oh man, I'm just, I'm so close to the top 10. Right.

Eddie Holmes: 36:12

I'm so close to the top 20 or something like that.

Tom Butler: 36:13

Right, and that is one of those things that, for me, is a personal motivation, right, I want to thank you as somebody that does rides, you know, and benefits from the work people like you do, you know, rolling into a rest station or a food station or whatever. Thank you so much for caring about people, cycling and doing what you do Well.

Eddie Holmes: 36:39

I appreciate that. Those of us that are out there, I mean we just enjoy it. We enjoy the cycling world. You know what I mean. It's just you know I used to when I was growing up. There used to be guys over, guys retired, and they go hang around the general store with the stove and all and tell stories. Well, my group goes to bike shops. We sit around looking at the newest and latest and doing all that type thing. So but but I do appreciate the kindness and the thoughts. We are in a really good location. We just have a good group of folks and they really they like to come out and represent the club. When we go off to other events, we represent the club. You know, in those ways as well, we'll go out and take 25, 30 people to a local ride and ride as a club in some cases. So we we have a good group because a good organization. That's fantastic.

Tom Butler: 37:28

What bike are you riding these days? Or bikes are you riding these days?

Eddie Holmes: 37:33

My road bike is a specialized Roubaix that I have. Of course. I have Tom trial bike, a Trek speed concept. That was actually most of that was donated when I retired. My staff actually made a donation towards that, which largely covered it, so that was pretty nice. But my I'm on the roubaix most of the time. The road bike Enjoy it and that's what I have.

Tom Butler: 37:56

a roubaix I got last year. I got a 2022 roubaix and I'm really enjoying it.

Eddie Holmes: 38:03

Well, I can tell you a quick story about mine. That is probably in all the years that I've ridden, and it's been a long time. That is definitely the most comfortable bike I've ever had and one year, about five years ago, after the first ride of the year, we were all fired up and excited about it and I put it on my back of my rack which I'll really ever do and I got down the road and stopped at a store and my bike was gone. Oh, and I knew nobody took it. But it fell off the rack. It was my fault. I didn't sit down like I always do.

Tom Butler: 38:36

I was so excited about riding.

Eddie Holmes: 38:38

So a number of us went out and looked and looked, and looked and we just couldn't find it. And a month went by, five weeks, six weeks went by. So I bought a new roubaix and my daughter, who was persistent, kept looking and found it.

Eddie Holmes: 38:52

Wow, she found it on Marketplace a gentleman in another town had it and trying to sell it. So through some law enforcement agencies I was able to recover it and I liked it so much I sold the new bike and kept it on so much. I sold the new bike and kept that one. That has been a story that has stayed with me over the years. People I pull up on it and he'll say is that the bike you lost? Well good for your daughter yeah.

Tom Butler: 39:21

Yeah.

Eddie Holmes: 39:23

He was definitely adamant she was going to keep looking for it.

Tom Butler: 39:25

Eddie, thank you so much for taking the time to talk about the hero ride, for again taking the time that you take to do all you do, whether it's the club or the different rides that you do. That's awesome, and thanks for jumping on here and talking about Mississippi as a place. If you're looking for someplace to escape, to go check out the hero ride.

Eddie Holmes: 39:48

Yeah, come join us. We've got room and we can get you in.

Tom Butler: 39:52

Awesome. Well, take care now.

Eddie Holmes: 39:55

Thank you.

Tom Butler: 40:05

It is easy to admire someone like Eddie. He puts in so much time that goes directly to making cycling more enjoyable for his community. It is people like him that, in my opinion, make the cycling community really special. I am sure that the Mississippi Oregon Recovery Agency knows that Eddie is very valuable to the hero ride.

Tom Butler: 40:24

I now have several reasons that I am attracted to the Mississippi Gulf Coast as a cycling destination. One is the hero ride. I think it would be great to experience a metric century along the Gulf Coast. Secondly, I would like to visit the vintage bike show. Maybe I can find a vintage bike show closer to me though. And finally, I would like to experience the senior games first hand. I do know I can find the senior games locally, but I just bet they do a really great job of it there in Mississippi. If anyone listening has participated in a senior Olympic cycling event, I would love to hear from you. You can find my email and the show Instagram in the show notes. You can also find a link to the hero ride and the Gulf Coast Bicycle Club in the show notes as well. Plus, there is a really nice local TV story on Eddie. Definitely check that out Whether you are training for the senior Olympics or just biking around for fun. I hope you have some great two-wheel adventures this next week and remember, age is just a gear change.