Tyler Heishman & Bryan Stinchfield

BIKING THE USA AND ELIMINATING POVERTY By Guest Bloggers Tyler Heishman and Bryan Stinchfield of MicroBikeUSA - September 8, 2008 This summer, we had the opportunity to spend nine weeks touring the United States on our bicycles. Throughout the trip from Darien, Connecticut to San Francisco, we consistently met some of the nicest people in the country. Everyone, including those who invited us to their house for dinner and a warm place to sleep and the person walking by who we said hi to at a red light, wanted to know what drove us to take this adventure. For all of you who are curious, it was a combination of effects: chasing a childhood dream with the perseverance to make it come true, wanting to grow by forcing ourselves into uncomfortable situations, and a hope that we could help others. Most people, including us a year ago, imagine that the hardest part of a cross-country bike trip is putting up with exhausted legs, a sore butt, and surviving in nature (unless you can budget to stay in hotels instead of camping). As we have discovered, that physical discomfort that we faced was only a small component of the larger challenge we faced. Often times, it was harder to manage the group dynamics of six strong personalities all wanting different things, emotionally forcing ourselves to continue, and mentally working to fundraise and promote microfinance. While it was tough to survive a 130 mile day through heat and wind, the diverse combination of challenges made us much stronger men. Each day, we found a certain amount of simplicity in riding our bikes. Having only the bare necessities to survive the voyage became comforting.  A certain routine emerged of waking up as the sun rises, eating a constant stream of food as well as having a certain amount of satisfaction when you set up camp and know that you completed another hard day of riding. As the trip wore on many of us came to realize it was less about the things we had, or the places we had seen, or what we ate for lunch, but the sheer joy in meeting a new person, or having a great conversation, or having an epiphany in the middle of a wheat field in Kansas. We decided a year ago, that with the opportunity we had in front of us becoming more real each day, knew we could leverage our adventure to make a small difference helping others. When the idea of promoting microfinance was discussed, we were energized that we could truly make an impact; not only would a donation go much farther to those most in need, but we could help to educate and inspire the vast majority of Americans (again we had just recently been part of the group) who know little about the potential power of giving small loans. There was many times where we felt very connected to our cause of microfinance. One instance in particular stood out when a few of the riders tried to rent a car and drive down the California coast after the trip was over. We were rejected because we didn’t have a credit card, and we briefly sensed the hard reality of what it is to be without credit, like billions of people in this world. Biking across country certainly had it challenges, but understanding the injustices faced by those excluded from modern credit really made us want to help part of the effort to alleviate poverty.  Today, we are proud that we biked from ocean to ocean, more impressed that we raised over $30,000 for ACCION, and excited about the opportunity for those of us who are privileged to help end poverty. Photo Source: www.microbikeusa.com Top: The team riding through the Midwest.  Middle: MicroBikeUSA team members Tyler Heishman, Michael Delorenzo, Keith Kolakowski, James Watson, Bryan Stinchfield, Freddy Piumelli.  Bottom: Tyler and Bryan. You can read our earlier Tonic News interview with the team during their ride here. Tyler Heishman is from Boiling Springs, PA and received his B.S. in Economics-Finance at Bentley College, Waltham, MA this past June.  Bryan Stinchfield is from Darien, CT and received his B.S. in Economics-Finance with Tyler at Bentley College this spring.