I have been a loyal participant in The ALS Association’s Ride to Defeat ALS since 2011. I ride in memory of my dear friend, Mitch Gart, who was suddenly taken from us by this cruel disease.
This year played out a little different. Due to a schedule conflict I was not able to ride on the official date (9/19/2021) so I turned it into my own "virtual" ride like last year. I did arrange to be accompanied by 8 other riders, many of whom have ridden with me on this ride in the past.
We rode a 39 mile route from Brunswick to Richmond (Maine), the same route several of us rode last year in the official virtual ride. It was an absolutely beautiful day for a bike ride, if just slightly chilly.
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Our team is named for Mitch Gart, a friend who succumbed to ALS in January of 2012. Here is what I said at his memorial service:
Mitch was a really easy friend. I remember how we first met, and after that we started doing more things together, but that happened so smoothly that I can't remember how it happened.
I first got to know Mitch when Mireille asked me if he could join the Intermetrics softball team I was managing. A few years later we started biking together, which expanded into an ad hoc group of us who have been riding together on weekends for the last 10 or 15 years. Then, six years ago Mitch and I started skiing together in Utah and Colorado.
His passions extended to more than sports. He showed avid interest in politics, film, yoga, and theatre. When I heard a mention yesterday about the Sundance Film Festival (going on now in Utah), it reminded me that our first ski trip to Utah together was exactly six years ago -- the last day we were there, he got up very early so that he could go to a morning showing of a movie that attracted his attention, and get back in time for our flight home.
I never tried to play tennis with him. I know my limits.
His coolheaded, calm outlook was amazing. I only remember once that I saw him angry, and then it was probably only apparent to me. It was at a public meeting in Weston about extending a bike path through the western suburbs, and when someone objected that "the bikes would scare the horses" I could see the pressure rising.
And so it was this active lifestyle and intense passion that made his ALS especially cruel. It is always an awful disease, but to see Mitch suddenly unable to participate in all these things he enjoyed so much was particularly difficult.
Shortly after Mitch was diagnosed with ALS, Mireille told me about an ALS Association fundraising bike ride. It was an obvious match, and many of our weekend riding group, and some of Mitch's other friends, signed up to ride. The team that we organized in Mitch's honor was the largest team in the ride, about one tenth of the registered riders. Be on the lookout for an invitation to ride with us, or sponsor us, again this year.
I miss him already, and I am sure I will miss him more as time passes.
More about Mitch:
More than 20 years ago I met Mitch Gart. I was managing a company softball team, and Mitch's wife, Mireille, asked me if it would be OK for Mitch to join the team. After a few years of playing softball together, Mitch and I started biking together, which expanded into an ad hoc group of riders who have been getting together on weekends for the last 10 or 15 years. More recently Mitch and I have made a few ski trips out to Utah and Colorado. In January, 2010, at Alta, Mitch convinced me to ski with him into "Catherine's Area", a slope that he had just skied that looked way too steep for me (and required climbing up from the top of the lift, something that I am loathe to do at an elevation of 11500 ft). He was right, it was worth the effort to climb up there, the snow was great and the trail was a blast to ski.
The next December (2010) I asked Mitch about ski plans for that winter. He told me that he had been having some numbness in his legs and he was not sure how it would affect his skiing, so he was going to try skiing on Christmas. I called him a few days later and he told me that he had made just one run and had to quit, he could not control his skis well enough.
I did not think much of it at the time. So it was a crushing shock to call Mitch when the snow melted in early spring to arrange our first bike ride of the season and have him tell me that he had just been diagnosed with ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease). By the time of the 2011 ride his symptoms had already progressed to the point that he could no longer participate in any of his many athletic activities.
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