This past spring and fall I had the opportunity to coach my first two seasons of youth cycling with Devo here in Durango. One Thursdays I coached the Exploras, a 5th-9th grade all girls group that is bikepacking and fun focused. On Tuesdays, I helped coach a high-schooled age co-ed mountain bike group.
Devo is Durango's largest youth cycling program and the foundation of our huge cycling community. On weekdays in the Spring and Fall, between 4:30 and 6:30 p.m. hundreds of kids of all ages, in groups coming from all different directions, flood the trails. It is a very cool and sometimes scary thing to witness when you are out on foot or solo on a bike during those times...
Devo's mission is to develop each individual, in a team setting, as life-long cyclists. Founded by Sarah Tescher and Chad Cheney in 2006, Devo has grown into a program with 600+ kids, 100 coaches, and groups for every age, ability, and interest.
What I like about the Devo program is that it groups kids based on age rather than skill. To me, grouping kids this way seems more fun and to build community around cycling rather than making it a constant competition at a young age, which, more often than not, seems to end in burnout. Some of Devos' most famous alumni are Tour de France stage winter, Sep Kuss, and multi-world champion and olympian Christopher Blevins. Both athletes credit their success to the cycling upbringing they had through the age-based Devo program.
Co-founder Sarah Tescher now travels around the country to consult with existing youth cycling groups and to help other communities start their own local Devo program. If you are in a place that doesn't have a youth cycling group yet, consider looking into Devo’s Secret Sauce Seminars.
Spending time riding with the youth of Durango's cycling community has been good for me. I have been lucky enough to coach with Sarah Tescher and other folks who have been coaching Devo since the beginning. What I know is that I have a lot to learn and I couldn't ask for a better crew of coaches to learn from. So far, the kids teach me patience and remind me what a pain in the butt I to my coaches as a youth/teenager. In addition, riding with Devo is also making me a better mountain biker. Watching the kids push themselves to try new things has inspired me to get outside of my comfort zone on my mountain bike rides around town, and I am pleased to report I am clearing more obstacles than I ever have. Having had grown up in a place where I did not have access to a youth cycling program, I try to remind the Devo kids what a privilege it is to have access to such a program. There is no doubt that many of these kids, having this life-long experience, will be leaders in Durango, if not for all of us in the future. I am grateful to play a small role in preparing them for the future and learning more about myself through the process.
The photos above are from our seasonal Exploras trip which we did in John's Canyon in Bears Ears National Monument and a couple of bloopers from the season mixed in. We had eighteen girls on the trip where we rode bikes, camped, splashed in puddles, played games and went on an epic scramble!