This article first appeared as the Cyclist of the Month column in the March 2012 issue of the Cascade Courier , our membership newsletter. Nominate a Cyclist of the Month! Cyclist of the Month: JOHN WELLER Age: 65 Wheels: Cannondale Synapse Occupation: Retired (“Every day is Saturday.”) John Weller began his bicycling career during the summer of ’97, on three-speed Raleigh from ’73. It was pure happenstance. “The gym was closed for a week,” he said. “I couldn’t run anymore because it hurt. I told my son, ‘Let’s go ride on the Burke.’” A habit was born. From his start on the Burke-Gilman Trail, he became a regular bike commuter. And instead of parking his bicycle when he arrived at work, he pedaled it on the range roads of his “60,000-acre office.” John was a range officer for the military, and he bicycled to visit his “customers” – military units training for maneuvers and artillery firing. “There I was, working in an environmentally destructive field, and my carbon footprint was a size 11,” he told me, delivering the joke with such austerity that I didn’t catch on for several seconds. I wondered whether showing up on a bicycle might undercut his authority among gun-wielding military types. Instead, his bicycle – combined with his quick wit, hardened demeanor and a whole host of ribbons and buttons – had the opposite effect. “The army is a physical fitness culture,” he told me. “My going to see the officers and sergeants by bike got better reviews than driving.”
