Dennis Edison, a senior graduating in December, biked through Mount Le Salève in France this past spring break. Edison has been biking his entire life. He trained for this ride by biking over a thousand miles from the beginning of the spring semester until spring break.
In order to have enough energy to bike that many miles, Edison is on Paleolithic diet, which means that if it’s something you cannot hunt and cook or grow and eat it raw, he will not eat it. Edison said, “I’ve been on this diet for over a year and it’ll make you stronger, faster and mentally more alert.”
Edison, majoring in music performance, focusing on classical guitar with a minor in voice, is also in a band in New York.
The Minaret had the opportunity to interview Edison on his spring break biking experiences as well as other trips he has taken.
Tell us about your spring break adventure.
I started in Geneva and ended up [back] there. I flew into Geneva by myself. I biked around Switzerland and France. I totally winged it. I stayed on peoples’ couches through couchsurfers.com. I lived off of chocolate and gyros, which kept me with the fuel and energy that I needed. In total, I was there for eight days.
The mountain that Edison biked in France had a lot of sharp turns and steep inclines. If a car was going up around a turn, bikers had to honk their horns so the people in the cars knew they were coming. Edison did not have a horn so that was an issue for him.
Did you have any bad experiences in relation to people driving on the mountain while you were biking?
Yes, funny story, as I was coming down the mountain, I was flying down and I heard a car honk their horn. I yelled and hit the brakes because I knew he didn’t hear me and I knew we were going to collide. He clipped my back tire and knocked me off like four feet down a cliff and I had to grab onto a tree branch.
The man then helped me and we ended up talking and then hanging out with his friends. We drank wine for a day and he let me stay the night at his place and I was off the next day, continuing biking.
Where else have you biked?
I rode from New York to California with my friend, Ryan. This happened two years ago, lasting 48 days, from early September to the end of October, before I came to UT. Once I got to California, I stayed for a week and flew back home.
Why did you bike cross-country, did you have a cause?
Yes, we biked for Sophia, a little girl, two-years-old, with spinal muscular atrophy, a terminal disease. We raised $35,000 to get her into clinical trials. My friend Ryan set up the fundraiser and contacted the family.
I sent out a mass text for a ride to surf and then he told me to be ready in five minutes. He then told me about the bike ride and I told him I had a paycheck coming in a week, so if he could spot me money for a week and in a week in a half we left for the trip.
Who did you stay with during your cross-country biking trip?
I stayed with people through couchsurfing, camping, people paid for us to be put in hotels and we would sneak in and out of hotels in the morning and eat their continental breakfast.
What’s your most memorable time of your cross-country biking trip?
My friend Ryan and I were in Pittsburg, Penn., we got to this hill that the incline was so steep we started walking up instead because our bikes weighed 80 pounds each. The guy who was a hippie started talking to us and we asked him what was going on- we didn’t know what he did for a living, because there were a lot of military people in the area.
He said the G20 Summit was going on. We exchanged numbers and he told us if we were down for a good time, to have a fire and beer on a hill 30 miles away.
We were not going to do it, but he picked us up and took us to his [friend’s] house. He asked us if we wanted to see some cool stuff. We then went to a really sketchy area all of a sudden, a really weird warehouse and it ended up being the world champion pinball arena.
It had thousands of pinball machines. We got food from the supermarket and he left; he wanted to pay for us but he didn’t think we would let him so he drove back around the store and dropped us at home. We never heard from him again.
When is your next biking trip?
Seven days after this semester, I am going biking in Ireland with a different friend named Ryan. I am going to bike, and he will run. We are going during the rainy season for 22 days, so we will have to deal with lots of rain and mud. We will go all over Ireland, finishing in Dublin.
Is your Ireland trip going to be for a cause too?
Yes, I am going to [do it for] a cause but I am not sure what yet. In the near future, I am going to set it up. It’s going to be for one individual, someone specific, not a charity. We want to be like, ‘today’s your lucky day’, for one person, giving that one person a little break.
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For his cross-country biking trip, him and his friend Ryan received multiple awards which included a Humanitarian Award, which is given to only one person a year, but an exception was made for Edison and Ryan. They also received another award from New York Congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy.
Since his cycling trip across America, Edison has been hooked on biking. Once he had a bike, he realized how much fun it was. After graduating, Edison plans on going to graduate school, preferably, anywhere that offers a full scholarship.
Yasaman Sherbaf can be reached at ysherbaf@spartans.ut.edu.