It’s Teamwork, Baby!
News was not good this morning. Murray Zucker (Penn, Class of 1967) was not able to change his flight to leave tomorrow. Bruce Lederman, Penn’s Team Captain (Class of 1964), was not any better today and admitted he could not ride. That left two riders in the Penn van (Mike Shockro and Nir Tal).
After some discussion of options, Bruce and I decided to move Kyle Rosendale and Jay Kosa (both 2007 Bucknell grads) to the Penn van. This left three of us in the Bucknell van (Dr. McConnell, Pat O’Malley and me).
We had two mountains to climb today that were both nearly 10,000 feet high. The second one included a 3,000 foot climb.
Jay had been recruited to be a full time driver for the Penn van, but insurance issues had prevented him from driving until yesterday.
A few days ago Bruce and I thought it might be helpful if we could use Jay as a rider. When we could not find a pair of biking shoes large enough for Jay in Flagstaff, I gave Jay my backup pair of biking shoes. We then purchased the appropriate bike cleats so Jay could ride Kyle’s bike.
Jay road some on Thursday and Friday. Today the two joint teams performed perfectly!
Kyle and Jay road extremely well for the Penn Team, and Walt, Pat and I all had one of our best days riding today. For example, Walt biked over 86 miles, and Pat and I both biked over 62 miles in some very steep terrain. Jay get’s my Rookie of the Week award for his stellar performance up both 10,000 foot mountains for the Penn Team.
Bruce and I anticipated that we would have problems completing our daily riding goals if any rider became sick or injured.
What we didn’t anticipate was 1) how well prepared all the riders would come to the ride, 2) how adaptable the riders from both universities would be to help each other and 3) how motivated they would be when one or both teams were short handed bike riders.
Today was a great reminder of lessons in life:
1. Be prepared for what you have to do
2. Always help team members and work as a team
3. Have a positive attitude, no matter how difficult the task
As the senior riders talked together tonight, we all took great pride in our accomplishments today. This is what our ride is all about for both of our universities.
Working for student’s scholarships helps students and helps the university.
I thought of other team’s working together. The development of a new Environment Studies program at Bucknell is involving faculty from many disciplines. This requires much teamwork.
We had lunch today at a restaurant for the first time. It was a small cafe in La Veta, CO. Three people were involved: 1) a mother doing the cooking, 2) a teen- age son taking orders and 3) a seven year old daughter operating the cash register (see Cindy’s picture below). What a great example of teamwork!
We now have completed over 1,200 miles of bike riding and we have climbed over 43,000 feet of elevation (over 40% of the total elevation we will climb in 19 days).
Tonight we are sleeping at over 6,000 feet in Trinidad, CO. Tomorrow night we sleep in Dodge City, KS at 2,700 feet of elevation (a drop of 3,300 feet in one day).
