Parlin – The first time triple amputee Denny Gordon signed up for Ride the Rockies, he wanted to prove he could complete the seven-day cycling ordeal with his one remaining arm.
Now on his fifth ride, he’s drawn by the camaraderie, camping on high school gym floors in the host towns.
“You get to see people, know people,” said Gordon, 55, comparing the experience to the “mainstreaming” parents do with disabled children.
A retired financial analyst and father of three, Gordon lost both legs and his left arm in a land-mine explosion when he was a platoon leader in the Vietnam War.
He rides a three-wheel, hand-powered cycle, using his right arm and a prosthetic arm to turn a crank that propels it.
On Thursday, the fifth day of this year’s 405-mile route, Gordon acknowledged serious fatigue. He and some 2,000 fellow riders – including another dozen disabled cyclists on similar adapted cycles – faced early head winds and light rain as they approached 11,312-foot Monarch Pass.
“It took me three hours to get here,” he said, resting at the 18-mile aid station. “I’m going to be tired before I get to the mountain. I’m going to try to make that pass.”
Another tour veteran and disabled rider, Steve Ackerman, 51, of Fort Collins, rode up behind him soon afterward. Pressing on at speeds as slow as 2 mph, Gordon told him: “We gotta stop doing these rides. They’re no good for you.”
Ackerman, who in recent years rode his adapted cycle on an around-the-world tour, began passing Gordon. “Stay back with the underachievers,” Gordon joked.
Moving past, Ackerman shook his head at the self-effacing remark.
Gordon impresses him, Ackerman said – “a kind and generous man” with a good sense of humor who seemingly holds no anger at his plight.
Able-bodied riders often shout encouragement to the disabled riders and bring them food and water at aid stations. Gordon said he loves that support.
“The whole ride is my group,” he said, referring to ride volunteers who watch out for him and occasionally offer a lift, as they did during the punishing 91-mile ride Monday when hundreds of riders struggled up the Grand Mesa.
As Gordon pedals, his mind wanders from the surrounding pastures and mountains to the subject of war.
Drafted as a 19-year-old from Great Falls, Mont., he became a platoon leader in Vietnam. The land-mine explosion hit him in December 1969. By the fall of 1970, he was walking on artificial legs and attending the University of New Mexico.
In 1975, a fellow Army Vietnam veteran helped line up an interview with a steel company, setting up his 26-year career. In 2003, he retired to Longmont, where he lives with his wife.
Now he is meeting new amputees from the Iraq war. He speaks with them at disabled-skier gatherings in Colorado. They’re mostly keeping to themselves, and many want nothing more than to go back to their buddies in Iraq.
“They know at some time, they are going to have to put the Army career behind them, but it’s hard for them to do that now.”
Seeing the young amputees upsets him, Gordon said, though he understands their loyalty to their military buddies.
RIDE NOTES
Just the thing for your hangover: yodelers!
When Ride the Rockies rolls through, towns tend to pull out all the stops to show the 2,000 riders a good time.
In Montrose, the regular weekly Music on Main Street was pushed up a couple of evenings to show off the town’s fine cadre of musicians on Tuesday. In Gunnison, a community party Wednesday at the ice rink ran late into the night and had more than one rider complaining of a hangover Thursday.
And in Salida, Karin Mari Lechner, a 13-year-old national yodeling champion, and her siblings, Colin, 15, and Evan, 10, were slated to entertain the crowd at Riverside Park. Karin Mari and Pony Express have played their brand of country music with the likes of Michael Martin Murphey and drawn rave reviews from awestruck audiences.
A Burr in the saddle and a nice, warm PBR
Rider Ryan Burr of Frisco is carrying a can of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer from start to finish of this year’s tour.
The beer, which he carries in the place of a water bottle, was rattled so much on the first day that Burr was forced to fashion a soft- sided holder.
“The chicks really dig this,” Burr said.
He said he realized the beer will likely be warm and fizz a bit when he drinks it at the end of the tour Saturday in Breckenridge.
Watch Larry Green on CBS4 between 5 and 7 a.m., at noon, and at 4, 5, 6 and 10 p.m. today with reports from The Denver Post Ride the Rockies.
