Opinion: Cycling efforts paying off for Lake Tahoe

To the community,

Wow, what a May – still sliding and riding during this Tahoe-style spring.

I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge and express appreciation for the tireless effort by so many that helped bring and prepare for America’s most important pro cycling event – the Tour of California. It was the first time since the 1960 Squaw Valley Olympic Games that the region and its agencies, businesses, organizations and residents came together with a unified purpose – to welcome a global audience and showcase Tahoe’s natural beauty, hospitality, and important role cycling plans in our community.

While the blizzard conditions made it unsafe for racing and the event had to be canceled, and moved off the hill, what still remains is the experience of excitement and regional collaboration with the anticipation for a more promising future for our community.

For me, and for others, those positive experiences of excitement and anticipation continue to live in us and through our daily actions as we pedal forward by participating in the Tahoe Bike Challenge, Bucks 4 Bikes, daily rides and events, and by the unglamorous tasks of planning, asking for dollars, navigating through small town politics, taking a stand for the right action and challenging actions that don’t serve the highest and best use of community resources, and continually building new and maintaining existing strategic alliances with the regions’ stakeholders, and you – our Tahoe Bike Buddies.

Are we disappointed the big race didn’t happen? Yes, of course. However, our community did produce a race that day with the passionate effort by people and organizations that are accustomed to racing everyday with no crowds, no media, no big budgets, no promises of rewards or congratulatory pats on the back. For them, and us, the reward is in knowing that their, and our, efforts are driven by a vision of Tahoe being a healthy place where residents and visitors can enter a new context of: livability, beauty and wonder, rejuvenation and reconnection with their innate affinity to nature; learning and accomplishing new activities they may never have experienced before; and to more intimately bond with family and friends.

This is the Tahoe we know and the fuel for transformative actions that has inspired generations – it is Tahoe’s legacy and brand. We shall continue our selfless mission to fostering and remembering our role to help humans and nature be balanced, regenerative, resilient and adaptive, and able to anticipate and manage variability and risk in order to sustain this unique bio-region — where angels breath, nature thrives, and humans must be reminded of their stewardship responsibility to this sacred place.

Keepin it real and rollin,

Ty Polastri, president Lake Tahoe Bicycle Coalition