Biking Through Loss and Building a Legacy
Sandy Noble
I had the monumental good fortune to meet today's guest, Sandy Noble, at the Vertical biking and fly fishing weekend I went to a few months back in the Northeast Kingdom (if you don’t know what I’m talking about, make sure to listen back to the recap episode I did with my friend Trish on September 16th, it’ll make you want to join us next year for sure.)
This was the classic case of meeting someone, and hearing a little kernel of back story that piques your interest.... once upon a time, I would’ve left that weekend thinking Sandy was cool and a decidedly bad@ss biker, and would have wondered about the rest of her story, but left it at that.
But now I have this podcast (aka excuse to be aggressively nosy with strangers) so I dove in all guns blazing and stalked her online to hear more - that’s what I’m sharing with you today. And I definitely wasn’t disappointed, I think you will enjoy this deeper dive with Sandy too.
Sandy and her husband Tom were pioneers responsible for building some of the first skate parks on the East Coast, back when skateboarding was considered a fringe activity, and skateboarders were the pariahs of urban centers and suburban downtowns. So that was already cool enough.
Then I find out that Sandy isn’t just a recreational mountain biker, but has raced the 12 Hours of Temecula, has raced cyclocross, and even dabbled in enduros and hare scrambles on motorbikes - I had to Google that last one, but holy crap, did I have even more respect for Sandy when I saw some of those videos online!
But wait, there’s more!!!! Sandy has also managed to raise four kids to functioning adulthood in her spare time. And by functioning, I mean they all have pursued their passions and achieved extraordinary individual success, while being amazing humans as well.
We cover a lot of ground in today’s episode - loss, grief, recovery, legacy, the power of the little guy, perseverance, parenting, flipping off the patriarchy….. And of course, Sandy telling me how she didn’t think she was that interesting. Seriously…
Lots of fun links from this conversation:
#bunnyhopthepatriarchy (video)
Kingdom Trails (location of Vertical event)
Caroline’s Dream (hand-crafted skincare)
The Smith Preserve (Kennebunkport, ME)
Rasputitsa Gravel (home of Vertical)
Heidi Myers on GGW - creator of Vertical
Jenn Minery on GGW - another badass cyclocrosser and Vertical-er
Cori Brago on GGW - hilarious and inspiring fly fisherwoman and Vertical-er
Sabra Davison on GGW - cofounder of Little Bellas and Vertical-er