Cincinnati promises to be the new hot spot in bicycle activism as our San Jose to Washington, DC, 9th annual National Mayors' Ride will soon be showing the Nation. For starters, the voice of Cincinnati, Rob Currans, will do what he can to help us once again connect with one of his good friends, Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory.
And since Rob is switching careers, he thinks he can help us connect with some of his new friends, in, of all places, the bicycle industry where he is now a manufacturer's rep!! Long a high level cyclist, he yearly cycles from the Ohio River to the Great Lakes at an average speed of just under 20 mph, Rob will be using his skills as a composer in a whole new way.
A man who has scored a number of films and done the voice overs for countless well know national and regional commercials, with the shrinking economy, he is winding down a business that has been a decades long success in Cincinnati. Along the way, as he brought sales and an upleveled image to countless marketing concerns in the region, he rubbed elbows with innumerable shakers and movers. It will be this good will that will be sure to help him get his changed set of needs met. As he says good bye to the last of his employees, he is ramping up to bring to the cycling community what once was prized by the regional business community.
It was the passion and creativity that he translated into fun with his voice over skills that he now looks forward to bringing to the bicycle industry. Toward that end, as he helps them buy something that has always filled a lot of his waking moments - bicycle goods, he also has another service he may offer them. If he can make it cost effective, he has designed a brilliant phone call hold message service that he'd like to see bike shops take advantage of.
To hear a true master at work, click on the cartoon above to listen to to the character he long has entertained the Ohio metro with.
The man Rob will be helping Cincinnati celebrate the Busycle and our National Bicycle Greenway with in June is another man who lives his passion. From a very young age, Reser Bicycle Outfitters owner, Jason Reser has been consumed with bicycles. The former Ohio and Kentucky state mountain biking champion, Jason has always been a huge voice in local bicycle advocacy. So much so that he has been one of the main driving forces behind Queen City Bike (QCB), a nonprofit bicycle advocacy organization that is building a huge fireball of support in his region.
An organization committed to making the city Sir Winston Churchill called "America's most beautiful inland city", a fully bike friendly one, Jason wants QCB to rally their exploding membership together to receive us and the Busycle when we come through next June. He even wants them to start doing fund raisers soon so they can host our Busycle demonstration rides in the highest of style.
Go Cincinnati!!
While Cincy is already to starting to build the buzz for our arrival, and I haven't even talked about the booksinging events we foresee, other sponsors are getting in the queue for the Busycle demonstration rides we will soon be making available for their cities. Already we have opened negotiations in Napa, Oakland, Des Moines and Chicago..
THX 4 all of U!!
btw: Look soon for a Mayors' Ride schedule that is tentatively set to end in Washington DC if we can satisfactorily firm up what we need from that changed endpoint....
btw2: In case you missed it, HERE is our 2011 Blog where this and all of this season's past news can be found.
