A father-son duo’s epic bike ride for hope

Home > About City of Hope > News & Media > eHope > Volume 11, Issue 2 - February 21, 2012 > A father-son duo’s epic bike ride for hope

Quick Links

By Wayne Lewis

Desert heat, sore muscles, blood-sucking mosquitoes and scores of flat tires. These are the stuff of legend — at least for Ryan Hornstra and his father, Rick, who crossed the country by bicycle last year.

Covering 3,000 miles in six and a half weeks, their journey raised cancer awareness as well as funds for research at City of Hope.

Ryan Hornstra planned the ride two years ago, when he was a sophomore in high school in Manhattan Beach, Calif. He was looking forward to having an adventure the summer after graduating. And his father had made a similar cross-country trek after high school — a trip that spawned indelible memories and lifelong friendships.

Photo of Ryan Hornstra, left, and his father Rick

Ryan Hornstra, left, and his father Rick (Photo courtesy of Pedal4Hope.com)

He and his dad were inspired by his cousin, Brandon Bullough, who successfully battled testicular cancer at City of Hope.

“When we visited Brandon in the hospital, all the nurses and doctors were really nice and helped us understand his situation. We saw City of Hope as more of a family than just a place you go to get treated,” he says.

So they named their trip Pedal 4 Hope, aiming to raise support for the institution as they journeyed across the country.

They started at the Pacific Ocean and wheeled up to 100 miles a day in scorching heat in the Southwest and South, finally ending at the Atlantic Ocean in Cocoa Beach, Fla., in August 2011.

The pair documented their journey, filled with colorful characters and near-harrowing experiences, on their website. By the time they’d returned, they had garnered more than $11,000 in donations for City of Hope. The South Bay newspaper Daily Breeze chronicled their trip in an article, as well.

Both father and son said they missed the adventure once it was over.

“It changed my life,” says Ryan Hornstra, now a freshman at Washington State University looking forward to entering the school’s athletic training program. “I’m more confident in myself and the things I can do. It was the experience of a lifetime.”

Ryan and Rick’s excellent adventure

Six memories from the Hornstras’ cross-country trip:

1. Hope deferred

As the sky darkened on day six of their trip, the Hornstras picked Hope, Ariz., as their stopping point. Only one problem: Amid the summer heat, the snowbird community was completely deserted.

They ended up setting up camp for the night near the town’s church. (Continuing on their way the next day, they noted with irony the billboard on the way out of town: “Your[sic] now beyond Hope.”)

“We thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be appropriate for Pedal 4 Hope to be pedaling for Hope?’ But there was nothing. No people.” —Rick Hornstra

2. Target practice

Two weeks into the trip, the Hornstras encountered a trio of cowboys and their truck and horse trailer parked along the side of a Texas highway near the Mexican border. Saying, “I bet you don’t do this in California,” one of the men offered his rifle to the Hornstras to shoot at some tin cans.

“He walked back to his truck, put his gun away and brought out a $100 bill to support the cause.” —Rick Hornstra

3. Surprise visit

Around the halfway point of their tour, in Austin, Texas, Ryan Hornstra awoke to some familiar but unexpected faces. A friend from Manhattan Beach, Calif., had flown out with her father, a baseball scout in town on business. The family visited to offer some moral support, and the Hornstras joined them to take in a minor league game.

“I was in shock, because I couldn’t believe they were there. It was fun being able to share the experience of our ride with more people.” —Ryan Hornstra

4. ‘Down, boy!’

Riding through Texas, the cyclists occasionally gained some unwelcome followers: dogs from local ranches on the chase, snarling and barking. They picked up a pair of air horns to startle the dogs away, but the elder Hornstra’s horn quickly broke.

“I told my dad, ‘I don’t need to go faster than the dogs. I just need to go faster than you!’” —Ryan Hornstra

5. Fellow travelers

The Hornstras ran into a few other cyclists who also were on, or had completed, long tours.

In Arizona, they met a couple of Londoners riding from St. Augustine, Fla., to San Diego. The day before entering Louisiana, they waited out a rainstorm for hours with a man named Marvin, a welder and native of Cuba who was riding from Miami to El Paso, Texas, in search of work.

And in Florida, a motorist flagged them down to tell of his own ride from Florida to Texas and north to Colorado. He offered them a motto for the last leg of their journey.

“He met tons of people on his ride also. His quote was, ‘It’s not about the miles. It’s about the smiles.’” —Ryan Hornstra

6. A new team member

Two days before the end of their trip, the Hornstras made an acquaintance who was enthusiastic about their cause. Offering to be their “P.R. person,” the man drove to Cocoa Beach, Fla., ahead of them. True to his word, he reserved a room at a Hilton hotel and achieved a mention of Pedal 4 Hope on the local TV news. He also arranged for a reporter and a photographer from FloridaToday.com to be among a small welcoming party at the Cocoa Beach Pier.

“We’d put all this energy into the ride, and we wanted to have a sense of ‘Ta-da! We’re here!’ It was quite a moment.” —Rick Hornstra