http://www.npr.org/blogs/goatsandsoda/2015/05/08/405192878/how-bicycles-are-helping-to-heal-rwanda
How Bicycles Are Helping To Heal Rwanda
MAY 08, 2015 4:34 PM ET
KAREN COATES
Adrien Niyonshuti of Rwanda heads down a field during the men's
mountain bike race in the 2012 Olympics.
Bryn Lennon/Getty Images
This weekend, Rwanda will host the Africa Mountain Bike Tour, an
Olympic-qualifying championship race.
That's no small thing for a sport that's historically been dominated
by Western men. And it's a huge thing for a country still branded by
its 1994 genocide, in which 800,000 people were killed in 100 days.
Twenty years later, that three-month period still defines Rwanda in
many minds.
i
Road racer Jeanne d'Arc Girubuntu, 20, is Rwanda's top female cyclist.
Karen Coates for NPR
Now bicycles are helping to change the country's image — and are
helping its citizens to heal as well.
Team Rwanda, a group of about 14 high-powered cyclists, is the key.
The team's roots stem from a 2006 visit to Rwanda by two U.S. cycling
greats: mountain bike pioneer Tom Ritchey and Jonathan "Jock" Boyer,
the first American to ride in the Tour de France, in 1981. The two
were amazed at the latent talent they saw. Soon after, Boyer moved to
Rwanda to develop a world-class team from scratch.
The riders now train at the Africa Rising Cycling Center in Musanze
District in the Northern Province, near the border with the Democratic
Republic of the Congo. Riders tool their bikes and hang their laundry
in sight of the jagged peaks of the Virunga Mountains where Dian
Fossey studied her beloved gorillas.
Most Rwandan cyclists come from rural villages with no previous
professional coaching. The training center periodically opens its
gates to young enthusiasts who want to test their skills on a
Velotron, a computerized stationary bicycle that measures energy
output — and raw talent.
For a Rwandan with potential, it takes five years of training and
regular practice to go from village phenom to professional, says
Kelsey Pope, an American who works at the center with her husband,
former BMX racer Weston Pope. Why so many years? It takes a long time
to build the strength and endurance to compete at a professional
level.
Rwandan cycling has caught international eyes. The team was featured
in the 2012 film, Rising From Ashes. That same year, in London, Adrien
Niyonshuti became the first black African to compete in an Olympic
mountain bike race. This March, Jeanne d'Arc Girubuntu, the country's
top female rider, was invited to train at the World Cycling Centre in
Switzerland.
Life changes when riders join Team Rwanda — starting with food. "The
traditional Rwandan diet is very high in carbs," Kelsey says.
"All white carbs," Weston adds. Village meals typically revolve around
rice, potatoes, cassava or plantains, lacking a diversity of
vegetables and protein.
"They give us lots of salads," Girubuntu says. The new diet is high in
protein (fish, chicken, lentils, chickpeas) and fats (olives, coconut,
eggs, avocado), with lots of organic produce grown on site — broccoli,
beets, cauliflower, carrots, basil, mint, ginger, mangoes, cabbage,
strawberries, spinach, rhubarb and more.
"They're not used to eating a salad with 12 different vegetables on
it," Weston says. But stomachs do adjust, and the cyclists start to
crave salad.
Education is also emphasized at the camp. "Most of our riders come
from limited education backgrounds," says Kimberly Coats, marketing
director for the team. So they need to learn skills for international
competition. English lessons emphasize "navigating airports, train
stations, directions" plus "bicycle parts, body parts, how to explain
how you feel."
Budgeting is important, too, since many riders "have large extended
families to support, and they need to know how to handle their money,"
says Coats. Each cyclist is paid a salary that covers their cost of
living as well as that of their families. (Team Rwanda is a nonprofit
501(c)3 with a host of corporate sponsors.) Plus, riders have the
potential to take home race winnings.
Where Does Rwanda Go From Here? April 7, 2014
The experience is transformative. "Now I am able to help my family,"
team member Samuel Mugisha said in an email. "They are helping me
train to be an elite rider with the team and have a good future."
"I have received many things by being on Team Rwanda ... so many good
things I cannot even tell you all of them," cyclist Abraham Ruhumuriza
emailed. "Team Rwanda came as an answer to my prayers."
Success breeds more of the same. As Team Rwanda prospered, neighboring
countries asked the organization for help. And so a few years ago Team
Africa Rising emerged, an expansion of Team Rwanda, with riders from
Ethiopia and Eritrea. "We began helping Ethiopia and Eritrea not only
because of their depth and success in cycling" but also because of
their war and border disputes, Coats says. "If Rwanda can come
together as one team, so too can the cyclists of Eritrea and
Ethiopia."
Team Rwanda rides together in a scene from the 2013 documentary Rising
>From Ashes.
Courtesy of First Run Features
Conflict isn't far from these compound walls. Just over the border, in
the DRC, fighting sporadically erupts between rebels and government
forces. But here, everyone works to assemble peace, Kelsey Pope says.
The cyclists eat together, live together and pray together. Politics
takes a back seat to teamwork, and the bike is a bridge to cultural
understanding.
"Sport has the power to be that," she says. Here, "it's all about the bike."
________________________________
Reporting for this story was made possible by the International
Women's Media Foundation African Great Lakes Reporting Initiative.
Received on Sun May 10 2015 - 14:00:35 EDT