Meet Your 2022 Napa County Bike Champions Of The Year

Press release from the Metropolitan Transportation Commission:

NAPA COUNTY, CA — Bay Area Bike to Wherever Days organizers have named the winners of the 2022 Bike Champion of the Year awards. Given to individuals for inspiring bicycling in their Bay Area communities, this award recognizes individuals in the nine San Francisco Bay Area counties for their commitment to bicycling as the primary mode of transport.

The 2022 winners include Terry Tracy and Tammy Wong of Napa County. Tracy has been a longtime recreational cyclist and mountain biker. It wasn’t until late in 2020 that he bought an electric-assist bike and became a dedicated bike commuter.

“That was a game-changer because I no longer had the excuses of ‘I'm running late’ or ‘I don’t want to show up to my meeting sweaty’ as reasons to drive my car,” Tracy said. “I can get to most locations in town in about the same amount of time with my electric bike as a car when you consider looking for a parking spot.”

Tracy, an architect who lives in the city of Napa, fastened a custom-designed box to his bike rack to carry prints and architectural drawings without wrinkling them — as well as groceries and other items.

“I now use the bike about 95% of the time in town when I'm not carrying a large load,” he said. “I use it all the time to pick up prints, visit the building department, go to meetings, go to the gym, or meet friends to play tennis.”

He continues to ride his e-bike through a recent back injury and actually used it to assist his recovery.

“Biking was the only exercise that didn't hurt my back, but I couldn't bend over to reach my drop handlebars on my road bike, and I couldn't push hard on hills. I normally don't use my e-bike on recreational rides for exercise, but it came in really handy and allowed me to ride with my hurt back,” Tracy said.

He now logs around 30 to 40 miles each week commuting and running errands. His favorite commute paths are the river trails between Lincoln Avenue and Trancas Street or south of Third Street.

“I like doing my part to cut down on pollution, greenhouse gases, and energy consumption,” Tracy said. “I recently filled up my car with gas for just the second time in six months.”

Tammy Wong began riding later in life, motivated by her growing awareness of the climate crisis and wanting to be healthier.

“I’d been thinking for a while to replace car trips with bicycle trips for short errands. After all, I do live in American Canyon and our city is like 5 miles wide,” Wong said.

She had been riding her bike sporadically until last May when she participated in a Bike to Wherever Days event and decided then to bike regularly. She biked 147 miles last year, the majority of which would have been fossil-fuel car trips.

“I replaced my three times a week car trips to my community garden plot with bicycling trips,” she said.

Wong is also an advocate for making the streets of American Canyon safer. After her neighbor was nearly struck and his dog was struck and killed by a speeding motorist, she worked with another neighbor on a traffic calming project, tracking speeds of over 70 mph in a 25-mph zone and installing pilot traffic calming measures.

She then worked with the Fire Department and the Public Works Department to install speed cushions in her neighborhood — the first in American Canyon on a public street. That success has not slowed her advocacy, though. She and another local resident have since launched a Change.org petition to stop speeding throughout her hometown.

Wong likes how biking allows her to pedal fast or slow, depending on her mood or the weather, and enjoy the fresh air. Her favorite spot for a recreational ride is the American Canyon Wetlands out to the Brazos bridge.

“There’s just some aspect of pedaling really fast, feeling the rush of air on your face, that reminds me, just for a moment, of being a young and carefree kid,” she said.

Each winner will receive a Lezyne Strip Pro Alert Drive from Mike’s Bikes, a bicycle-only membership for 24/7 roadside assistance from Better World Club, a laminated, boxed set of San Francisco Bay Trail map cards from the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG), and a customized cycling cap from the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC).

Don’t miss Bike to Wherever Days during the entire month of May, as well as Bike to Work Day on May 20! Details can be found online at Bayareabiketowork.com. Follow us on Facebook at @biketoworkday, Twitter @BikeToWorkSFBay, and Instagram @biketoworkday_bayarea.

Bay Area Bike to Wherever Days is presented by MTC (the transportation planning, financing and coordinating agency for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area), 511 (the region’s traveler information system), and Amazon. BTWD 2022 also receives regional support from the Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD), and Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), as well as from many sponsors at the local level. Prizes for the Bike Champion of the Year winners were donated by the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG), MTC, Better World Club and Mike’s Bikes.

This press release was produced by Metropolitan Transportation Commission. The views expressed here are the author’s own.