Ohio is covered in biking trails and a new nonprofit is making sure everyone can take advantage of that resource.
3Wheel Therapy is a free bike ride service that allows those who can’t operate their own bikes to join experts on a short ride.
As avid bike riders themselves, Patrick and Ruth Bendel decided to expand that passion to others when the duo opened a new branch of 3Wheel Therapy on July 8. They are now offering free bike ride services that allow those who cannot ride their own bikes to hit the trails.
In just three short months, the couple has recruited 32 volunteers who have helped them host 96 rides, exploring close to 300 of the 1,500-plus miles of bike paths across the state.
That includes trails in Lebanon, Miamisburg, and then Dayton.
"Our bike trail system here, it's absolutely wonderful. Part of the trail is the Ohio to Erie Trail," Bendel said. "Then you go down into Xenia, and there's probably five different ways you can ride on the trails there. Downtown Dayton, same thing. So just a phenomenal area to have something like this."
“I'm just so happy that I was able to do this"
One of those recent rides was at Sycamore Glen Trails Park in Miamisburg. Three senior residents from Sycamore Glen Senior Living were strapped into the organization's $13,000 bikes which are equipped to have a removable wheelchair in the front.
Jim Foerster was one of the volunteers working this ride. He said all volunteers are trained to safely operate the specialty bikes with clients who are either disabled or unable to ride their own bikes in some way.
"We've signed some people up for rides just because they saw us out doing this," he said. "It's a great word-of-mouth thing. We're trying to spread the word."
Two of the residents from Sycamore Glen took their first ride with 3Wheels on Oct. 23. That includes 99-year-old Lois Welsh and 72-year-old Verna Briggs.
Welsh has macular degeneration and glaucoma which impedes her vision, but she said Bendel described the sights along the entirety of the trail so she could feel more involved.
“I'm just so happy that I was able to do this," she said. "So at 99, I got a ride on a bicycle.”
Director of resident lifestyles at Sycamore Glen, Kimberly Porter, said they have worked with 3Wheel on multiple occasions after seeing how beneficial the rides were to their residents.
"We have a lot of folks who actually love to do outside activities, and they usually will say things like, 'But I can't do it anymore,'" she said. "So this is a perfect way for us to be able to say, 'hey, you could still do it. You just sit down and enjoy the ride.'"
And the benefits carry over even after clients returned home, according to Porter.
“We had a lot of huge smiles," she said. "Even when they were getting off the bus, our executive director said the smiles just stayed on their faces an hour later.”
Expanding across state lines
Before its Dayton branch launched this summer, 3Wheel Therapy began in North Carolina with Board President Kenneth Kohler. It has since branched out through community members discovering the benefits of therapeutic riding.
"Our group from Akron, Ohio, were down there over the winter and ran into them. And they, like us, were looking for something to do in retirement," Bendel said. "And they felt that this was a great purpose to be able to give back to others that can't ride the traditional bike for themselves."
Since then, they have accommodated rides for those ages five to 99 and they hope to expand the number trips from around 100 this year to 200 next season.
“We've taken one individual who was actually on a ventilator," Bendel said. "She was able to come off the ventilator, she was trached and we took her out for probably a 40-minute ride and Gracie did phenomenally well.”
Seeking volunteers, funding
While the bike service is free to all, it is not free to operate.
Bendel said they have to pay around $80,000 in operating costs each year on top of the initial investment of buying two adaptive tricycles which cost them close to $28,000.
“We did a lot of grant writing — friends and family, reaching out to them for funds — but we're at the point where we're gonna need additional funds because we have operational costs that we have to underwrite," he said.
On top of funding, Bendel said they are always open to finding more volunteers like Foerster who has been on almost every ride this year.
“We have found two things: They want to go faster and then they get upset when we say it's time to turn back."
“In some cases it has been a young kid who's disabled, whether it be physical or mental, and has never been able to go ride a bike," he said. "I love to be able to take them out for their first ride.”
Foerster plans to sign up again as a volunteer next season and he expects even more people will follow in his footsteps.
As this year’s biking season comes to an end, first-time riders like Briggs are eager to get back out onto the bike trails for future rides.
She said her first time out even inspired onlookers at the Sycamore Park’s tennis courts to sign up their loved ones for a future trip.
“The one lady had a 90-year-old mother or a grandmother, and she wanted her to get a ride," she said. "And then the other person talked about the fact that there was an athlete who was in a wheelchair and so they were very interested in what we did.”
Bendel said he is also looking forward to kicking off next season with a growing batch of volunteers and interested community members who might even open a 3Wheel Therapy branch of their own.
And he is looking forward to bringing more smiles to their clients who almost always come back for another bike ride.
“We have found two things: They want to go faster and then they get upset when we say it's time to turn back," he said.
