Tulsa World: MS cyclists show their toughness

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MS cyclists show their toughness

By ZIVA BRANSTETTER World Staff Writer
Published: 10/5/2009 2:21 AM
Last Modified: 10/5/2009 4:32 AM

I had just finished the first day of a two-day, 130-mile bicycle ride across the state last Saturday and was feeling very proud of myself.

Until I met J'Nell Ash.

J'Nell, 46, has been fighting multiple sclerosis for more than four years and was one of about 800 cyclists who took part in Bike MS last weekend. The trek from Tulsa to Oklahoma City runs along Route 66 and is expected to raise about $500,000 this year to fight this debilitating disease and provide support for its victims.

About 15 miles into the first day's ride, J'Nell took a nasty fall on a set of railroad tracks in Sapulpa, a spot where several other riders also fell.

I didn't see the accident, but I saw J'Nell after she biked the 70 miles that day to the overnight campground in Chandler. The entire right side of her face swollen and scraped and her eye blackened, J'Nell looked as if she had been in a car wreck.

Yet she finished that day's ride and the next day's 60 miles also.

Like J'Nell, about 20 riders on the Bike MS ride last weekend have diagnoses of multiple sclerosis, a disease that attacks the central nervous system.

One of them, Mike Paston, told me that a bicycle is one of the few places that he and other people with MS are free from the struggle to keep their balance. Although I was happy to get off my bike at the end of both days, perhaps the riders with MS missed the freedom those two wheels provided.

Many of the 300 volunteers who handed out Gatorade and energy bars in the blazing sun at every 10-mile stop along the ride had relatives with the disease or had it themselves. One woman — who thanked each sweaty rider as she handed out snacks — said it was her way of honoring a 27-year-old son who has a diagnosis of MS.

According to the national MS Society's Web site, MS strikes about 200 Americans each week, and about 400,000 people in the U.S. have the disease. Symptoms may be mild, such as numbness in the limbs, or severe, such as paralysis or loss of vision. The progress, severity, and specific symptoms of MS are unpredictable and vary from one person to another.

To be honest, I hadn't given a lot of thought to the issue until last weekend. I took up the sport of cycling this year as a way to keep in shape and spend time with my husband, Doug, doing something fun and social.

Earlier this year, we rode in Tulsa Tough, a wonderful weekend of rides and races that has quickly become one of the nation's top cycling events. We figured the two-day Bike MS ride would give us a good goal to train for the rest of the summer.

Checking in for the ride Saturday morning at OSU-Tulsa, I began to see cyclists with pictures of loved ones pinned to their jerseys, or signs that stated simply: "riding for Mary.''

Sitting on a grassy median near the Capitol on Sunday, I watched as wives, children and other family members hugged the cyclists as they crossed the finish line.

Ray Mack, the chairman of the Bike MS event, sat with us as we waited for the bus back to Tulsa. He described the effects of the disease this way: Imagine wearing a pair of goggles smeared with Vasoline. Now put a high-heeled shoe on one foot and a swimming flipper on the other. Now cinch a belt around your stomach as tight as you can, walk across the room and try to have a coherent conversation with someone.

That's what it's like to have MS.

And I thought riding a bike 130 miles was hard. By ZIVA BRANSTETTER World Staff Writer

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copperhead, (10/5/2009 4:22:03 PM)

Indeed an inspirational story of the dividends of perseverance. Nice story Ziva B!

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