![]() PW: Because of a good economy, the success of LeMond, and a population that wanted to be more active, road racing benefited in the 80's. It would be nice if it had the interest in racing and the groundswell that it did when I was a teenager. I love the cycling culture that exists there, today. In hindsight, Hollister was a great place for a kid to be riding a bike. We may be seeing the opposite of that, now, which makes the grass roots type club more important than ever. There were large fields, great courses, and there was funding moving into the sport from corporations big and small. The Nor-Cal road racing scene back then was really healthy. Having a club like that, which helped juniors, that's just huge to a kid. The San Jose Bicycle Club put more emphasis on their junior program by 1986, which helped. I'd have to hitch a ride to San Jose on Friday afternoon, then find a place to stay and get rides to races from there. Getting to races from Hollister before I had a drivers license was a challenge as well. That was enough to get me to ride hard every time I went out. What really drove me was knowing that my competition were going on competitive group rides after school. I did not know of one other person in town who rode regularly, so I was on my own. ![]() PW: Living in Hollister in the mid 80's.there wasn't a lot of cycling happening. SW: Tell us about the early days of cycling and living in Hollister. I don't know how I ended up with a Sinead Oconner tape but her music was great for cycling - it was defiant and for some reason resonated with me. ![]() I would head out for 6 or 7 hours with a pocket full of music and batteries. I used to take a Walkman with me on rides and stuff my pockets with tons of extra batteries and cassette tapes and pedal to REM, Winter Boys, The Alarm, and Sinead Oconner. I listen to hip hop with my girls and then something like Fleet Wood comes on and you realize it's timeless. You wouldn't find a single cyclist out there in 82'.įavorite Author: John Steinbeck & James David Duncanįavorite Band: I am at the age where I don't know the new bands. I spent many days with LeMond traversing the roads that connected Salinas and Hollister back in the day. It was close to home and I would always return to it. Hobbies: fly fishing, back-county skiing, nordic skiing, stand-up paddling, and paddle surfingīikes: Co-Motion 'norwester', Surley 'long haul trucker', 1994 Bontrager mt bike, 1926 Swiss Army original, Bianchi Milano, original Team Z bike, Della Santa (LeMond), John Cutter tandem.įavorite Road: Fremont Peak is a very important road to me. Profession: Partner in DeFeet, author, photographer, and artist Nickname: Wolf & Tom Schuler called him Free Willy Steel WÜl had an opportunity to catch up with our friend and American cycling legend Paul Willerton and he was kind enough to share some stories and answer a few questions -enjoy this exclusive interview.
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