Memories from 10-year RFTF Participant

Rebecca Abernathy is a 10-year Ride for the Feast participant.  She was a crew member for the first RFTF in 2003 and continued as Crew until she first rode in 2006.  Rebecca has continued to ride the past 7-years as a very proud member of Team Atomic.  Rebecca is passionate about Moveable Feast's mission and currently sits on our Board of Directors.

The first ever Ride for the Feast - 2003, Crew
Waking up Sunday morning and realizing there was no coffee--anywhere--and wondering what we were going to do once all those riders woke up and realized it, too.

2006, Rider
Completing my first century was amazing, of course, but what I most remember about this year was quitting on the second day. After riding two miles into a headwind and up four miles of hills, taking six hits off the asthma inhaler, and getting a flat tire, I knew I had nothing left in me. The moment I accepted that fact, I started sobbing. I tried to choke it back long enough to ride up next to my teammate Joey to tell him I was going to sag. Before I could say anything, he said, "Hey, doing ok?" With tears pouring down my face, I shook my head "no," at which point he said "Alright, then we gotta have a singalong" and launched into a screaming version of Twisted Sister's "We're Not Gonna Take It." That got me another mile and a half.

2007

Feeling so confident in my riding ability that I decided to join a bike tour of the Oregon Coast Range Mountains. The sixth day of the tour started with a 6-mile near-vertical climb to the summit, followed by an 8-mile non-stop downhill. Unexpectedly, it was on the downhill--not the uphill--that I burst into tears. It happened as I realized that I had given myself the gift of this beautiful place, that it was a reward for a tough year, that a stunning downhill is something you get when you've survived a really gnarly uphill. I was grateful to be wearing a RFTF tee shirt in this moment, because it never would have been possible without the love and support of my RFTF family. 

 

Every year since I started riding

Getting up in the middle of the night to pee, catching my reflection in the mirror in the locker room, and thinking, "damn, my ass looks great." 

 

Click here to read the entire list of Top 10 RFTF Memories from Rebecca Abernathy