SBT On The Road Tucson
On January 28th we traveled to Tucson to kick off our SBT OTR series, where we bring coffee, pastries, and communities together to ride and raise money for advocacy partners. We set out with a goal of raising $1000 for Outride, and thanks to a matching donation from Chamois Butt’r we were able to double it to get more kids on bikes, like the amazing young riders who joined us from Tucson’s youth cycling program; El Groupo. Thanks to everyone who joined us as well Ali Tetrick for tagging along and our amazing partners: Specialized, Chamois Butt’r, Castelli, Speed Hound, Honey Stinger Floyd’s of Leadville, Wahoo, and Zealios for providing raffle prizes to help us meet and exceed our fundraising goal. We look forward to seeing a new crew at Pedalers Fork in Calabasas on March 19th as we ride to raise money for Bahati Foundation to bring six new athletes to Steamboat in August.
Thanks to Sarah at the AZ Central for covering our story, which you can read HERE.
And, to our new friend Nick @surlypotpie for sharing his take on the day:
”A funny thing happens when you get complete strangers together to bike up a mountain—they get to know each other! Even this gregarious chimp will admit, there is that initial moment of the social unknown: who will be there, what will they think of me, do I look like a weirdo in these shoes, wait, did I brush my teeth?
It feels a little like the first day of high school. But really, after a few hellos that apprehensive mumbo jumbo just melts away. Coffee is slurped, neurons fire, passing niceties take the form of complete sentences, communication is achieved.
But unlike high school, we’re gonna skip class and get to the good stuff. In this case, the rebellious youth of Steamboat Gravel took a lil' field trip south to Tucson from the snowfields of Colorado to throw a bike shindig—called SBT GRVL "On the Road"—and they invited all their new friends.
As of late Tucson had been reeling from a cold snap (maybe a slight exaggeration), but that oh so generous Sonoran sun began to thaw our hands, fingers, knees and toes on that crisp late-January morning, and then we were on our way. The objective: climb Redington Pass. Redington is a Tucson gravel staple. It’s close to town and gets you ecosystem-hopping between two "sky island" (look it up, it's special) mountain ranges, the Rincons and Catalinas. The road is also bumpy as all get-out, and on the weekend you might see a burning car! We’ll call it the "poor man’s Mount Lemmon." But it’s a classic and frankly presents a myriad of challenges for the pedaling-inclined.
Like any gravel road, Redington was originally constructed for more utilitarian purposes long before ripping gravel was a thing. It was once a rickety byway traveled by all the Wild West archetypes: prospectors, outlaws, ranchers, Apaches, stagecoaches, and maybe a bordello madam and snake oil salesman or two, who can say?? At one point, the pass was called Cebadilla, a tip of the sombrero to the fact that this whole area was part of Mexico. So it’s got some layers and lore to it, and I'd recklessly wager a satchel of gold flakes that most of those aforementioned individuals wouldn’t have the faintest why any city slicker would want to ride a bicycle up such a thing. But…these are just the times we live in now, and I would much rather get bounced around on my bici than get caught up in a gunfight with some hot-tempered character that goes by the name “Squirrel Eatin’ Ned” or the like.
Gunfights aside, this wasn’t my first rodeo on Redington so I opted for my big kid mtb tires. However, the majority of the 70 or so riders were on their gravel skinnies. Some tough buckaroos, I tell you. One such badass made Redington her first gravel romp ever and she’s already talking about getting in the chutes again soon!
The ride itself went as expected: pavement turned to gravel and gravel turned to chunder. Small seasonal creeks were crossed. Snow became visible in the high country and those whimsical saguaros and ocotillos segued into junipers and oaks. We were also bisecting national forest land, and as anyone in the West knows, the “land of many uses” can mean *many* things. The local weekend warriors were out strutting their stuff: rumbly pickups and those spidey lookin’ UTVs were burning testosterone, and the “Redington gun club” was periodically making me feel like a war correspondent without a flak jacket. I guess those are the realities of riding gravel too; we’re still sharing the road, which comes with its compromises, but all in all, most people are courteous…except for you, Mr. Misanthropic Coal Roller, who will never read this.
As far as I know everyone made it off the mountain that day, and so I suppose this is the point in the story where I knock your cycling socks off with some platitude about life, love, and how we were all actually riding our bikes on a tiny blue marble suspended in an endless universe soup. Instead of that, I was remembering how just shy of 3 years ago, when our little marble turned upside down, I was riding my bike by myself A LOT. Maybe you were too? How glorious is it that we now get to connect with complete strangers again in meaningful ways and feel like we're part of a cycling community again! So what are a few calculated risks on the roadway when you get to share the experience of it all with such nice folks? I'm here to say that this is the stuff of life, and I'm happy to be living it.” -Nick @surlypotpie
