PMCer Turns Annual Father's Day Ride into a Greater Challenge and Tribute

This August, Joel Loitherstein’s 20-year PMC journey will come full circle as he puts a new spin on an old ride for the annual bike-a-thon as a tribute to his late father, Lenny Loitherstein, and late mother-in-law, Dorothy Spilka, who both lost their lives to cancer in the early 1990s. The Ashland, Mass., resident will ride for the first time from the saddle of his father’s vintage Royce Union three-speed bicycle he restored years ago as a fixed gear training bike.   

Loitherstein will use this “vintage ride” to raise money for lifesaving adult and pediatric patient care and cancer research at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute through the Jimmy Fund. The “fixie” has only one gear and cannot be coasted, not even when going downhill. The bicycle is more than 60 years old and weighs much more than bicycles made today.  

Loitherstein stripped everything off of the bicycle, put on a new fork, handlebars, seat, and wheels.  When he finished cleaning the frame, he noticed some scratches on the top of the tube where his father had etched their last name many years before.  

“My father had a habit of personalizing everything in this manner,” says Loitherstein. “When I was growing up it seemed to be just a quirk, but now I realize how much his handwritten etching connects me to him. Finding our last name engraved by hand made me feel like he was there by my side completing the project with me.”  

The challenge: Loitherstein has never ridden much more than 50 miles on a fixie. Every Father’s Day, he completes a 50-mile loop from his home in Ashland to Sharon Memorial Park, where his father is buried. This Sunday will be no different. Looking ahead toward PMC weekend and riding this bike is taking Loitherstein back to his first PMC in 1995. 

“At that time my training consisted of a few 30 to 40 mile rides and I thought I was in decent shape by doing a lot of swimming,” says Loitherstein. “Well, the problem was there were no callouses where I needed them and was in a lot of pain.  The second day it poured all the way from Sandwich to Provincetown, which just made the saddle sores worse. What got me through was thinking about my father and what he had gone through. The pain I was feeling was temporary and would be over soon.”   

Loitherstein knows that riding the fixie for nearly 200 miles will be a whole new experience, much like the first PMC. On Aug. 2 and 3, he will be among more than 5,800 cyclists who will ride in the 35th annual event with the collective goal of raising $40 million. He will ride as a member of Team PHAT Tuesday, a group of 30 cyclists representing towns in the greater MetroWest area who can be seen hitting the road for their weekly training ride, clocking in 25 miles every Tuesday evening in preparation for PMC weekend.  

PHAT Tuesday annually participates in the PMC Pedal Partner program and has been matched this year with Kira Corning, a pediatric cancer patient who is being treated for the third time at the Jimmy Fund Clinic. She was also PHAT Tuesday’s Pedal Partner in 2006 and 2007. In 2013, PHAT Tuesday raised more than $324,000 for the cause, bringing the team’s overall PMC contribution to more than $1.7 million. 

To register to ride in the 35th annual Pan-Mass Challenge, which is set for Aug. 2 and 3, or to support Joel Loitherstein or another PMC cyclist, visit www.pmc.org.  

PMC veteran Joel Loitherstein holds the vintage bicycle he restored that belonged to his father as well as a photo of his late father who he lost to cancer that he will ride and carry with him in the PMC this year.

Post courtesy of Allison from Teak Media + Communication