My Trail To Becoming A Mountain Biker

 My Trail to Becoming a MTBer - Elizabeth Levai-Baird

It is quite unfortunate that mountain biking wasn’t a more well known and established sport when I was growing up in the 1980s and early 90s.  In fact, I got on the MTB train quite late; 42 to be precise.  As a child I biked all over my town and sometimes even to other nearby towns 8 or 9 miles away. Those of us who are older refer to them as the time before technology and endless forms of entertainment. It was either sit around being mind numbingly bored or find something fun to do. 

My mornings were mostly spent on the back of my light pink Schwinn bike, not so pink that it was obvious, a muted pink (I would have hated it any other shade). It was my pride and joy because it had gear shifts. It wasn’t my first bike, but in many ways it felt like a big kid bike and it made me feel more sophisticated. When I rode it I was just as cool as my big sister, Gwynne, whom I equally admired and disdained. A relatable idea to others with older siblings, I am sure. 

 The bike made me feel like I had wings and could quite literally soar; it was so light and fast. I changed gears constantly adjusting as we went up and down hills of sidewalk, dirt, gravel, and concrete.  My crew at that age usually consisted of my brother, James, and our neighbor boy, Harold. My brother was older than Harold and I, but he was only a little over a year older than us. And even though today my brother is the tallest of us all, he was, at the time, the same size as me. We both had blue eyes, sandy blonde hair; his short, mine longer. We sort of resemble the Dick and Jane characters from those old children’s books, except you had to wrestle me into wearing dresses. Harold had brown eyes and hair, a big head, and was a bit thicker than my brother and I. I’m not saying he was chubby or fat, think more farm boy (that is what he was) that ate a lot and worked with his parents on the farm a lot. Harold was a daredevil, a provocateur, a hot head, a curser, and seemed to have a plethora of knowledge on all things my parents would never tell us and would probably not have wanted us to know. Harold, I would learn as I grew up, was not one to be trusted with your safety or your life, but regardless he was one helluva childhood best friend.  I owe many of my childhood stories to him and my brother James. 

There were many mornings and afternoons James, Harold, and I would spend riding around on, what I can only describe as a large dirt mountain that sat behind the elementary school. It was about five or six  blocks away from my house.  I remember when Harold told us about it and said no one yelled at you when you rode on it, so let's go! James and I jumped on our bikes and our legs pumping the speed of lighting bolts with Harold in the lead. 

When we got there we rode all over it. It was clear other bikers had been on the large dirt mountain. I saw other tracks and realized that other kids knew of the little piece of heaven too. However, we rarely ran into anyone when we rode there.  Immediately, we went up and down it, following at first the paths of others and then creating some of our own. 

I remember the feeling of freedom behind the bars as I flew down those dirt paths…ahhhh, it was bliss. I honestly smile when I think about it.  If I had paid any attention to that notion and remained in the mountain biking world as I grew older, I think I would have been a professional mountain biker living near one of the major MTB meccas. However, I had an accident instead that scared me shitless and, later, no place to roam. 

The accident was a good lesson in peer pressure - that took a good few more lessons for me to learn. My brother and the neighbor boy talked me into trying to jump over a barbed wire fence. As a young girl, I often felt I needed to prove myself and go the extra mile to show I could do all the things the boys could do (this need would lead to many injuries and a broken elbow). So when they “double dogged dared” me to attempt the jump, one neither of them had ever tried, I just had to say yes. Now, I get it, instinct should have told me that failing lead to failing onto a barbed wire fence, but for some reason, unbeknownst to me in my old age, I didn’t. I looked at it and thought, “If I jump this it will be so rad.” Then, sized it up. It was the steepest side of the large dirt mountain and it went down and then a quick up that, if successful, would land me on the other side of the barbed wire fence. So, I looked at and thought, “I can do this.” Clearly, I was at times an overly confident child. 

I remember as I went to get on my bike, my brother grabbed my arm and told me I didn’t have to do it if I was scared. 

“I’m not.” I smugly said. 

But then, I turned my head and looked at it from behind the wheel. I would be lying if I didn’t say my heart immediately dropped out my butt onto the ground and then ran home. I should have followed it. Yet, I couldn’t, I said I could and so I just pushed myself forward and held onto my dear, little schwinn pink bike for dear life. The biggest problem was the jump up, it wasn’t gradual at all, it mostly went straight up and so then did I. The bike and I flew straight into the air and just slightly forward. So as I came down my legs and bike fell right onto the barbed wire catching my pant leg and hanging me upside down with my bike laying on top of me - not on the other side of the fence. 

My brother and the neighborhood boy were running down the dirt mountain as fast as they could sprint. My brother yanked the bike off and they both helped me unhook my pants from the fence. After I was free I checked myself for injuries, no broken bones, some cuts from the barbed wire on my leg, but not too deep (thank god for thick jeans and long socks). My head, which of course had no helmet because it was the 80s, was unbruised and with no lumps. My ego…dead. My bike…broken. My heart….also broken. 

I struggled not to let any tears fall down my face. My bike's front wheel was broken, so my brother offered to carry it home and let me take his bike. I wouldn’t ride ahead without him so we ended up walking back together, him carrying my bike and me pushing his. The neighborhood boy also walked with us and helped my brother with the carrying at times. When I got home my mom cleaned me up. I honestly don’t know if I told her what really happened, or made up a lie because I was afraid I would get in trouble for doing something dangerous. However, in the end I was without my bike and it would be a while before my next. By then the big dirt mountain would be gone and new houses started being built. In my mind this was my first small scale mountain bike adventure. Today, it makes me smile and laugh at what a silly, little kid I was and it makes me happy that I picked it back up again so many years later.