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Pittsburg resident Vonnie Gallegos stopped driving four and a half years ago.
After two car crashes in two weeks totaled her car and put her in the hospital, she said, she reconsidered whether driving was a good idea. It wasn’t a decision she made lightly.
“I had the coolest, coolest car,” the diminutive 50-year-old said Monday. “It was a black Mercury Cougar with a steel stick shift. I felt like Mario Andretti.”
Gallegos, who lived in Amarillo, Texas at the time, said she was always a good driver. In the first wreck, a 15-year-old driving with a friend nearly totaled the car. Soon after she got it back from the repair shop, another driver blind-sided her on an icy road.
“When I was pulling away in the ambulance I thought, ‘Something’s not right here,’” she said. “Then the insurance company said they wouldn’t fix the car. I’d seen a lot of people riding, and thought I could be Bike Girl.”
She bought a mountain bike from a friend for $75, and never looked back. She road the bike everywhere; to the store, to work, on social outings. It was tough at first, she said, but she quickly got used to it.
“Within a couple months I blew up like the Hulk,” she laughed. “People didn’t recognize me, and somewhere along the way I lost 100 pounds. I couldn’t believe there was room on me for that.”
With all that pedaling, Gallegos said she quickly racked up about 150 miles a week. In the last four and a half years, she has biked nearly 24,000 miles. She also said she had to learn to “take the lane,” or ride in the middle of a traffic lane just like any other vehicle. The practice is vital, she said, and ensures drivers give her enough space. Most people, she continued, don’t realize bicycles are considered vehicles, just like a truck or car. Often, their ignorance of that fact shows when she rides. But when she moved to Pittsburg four years ago to work training customer service reps at the Backyard Discovery facility, she said the daily commute became much safer.
“Pittsburg is a polite city to ride in for the most part,” she said as she recalled one driver who pulled up close and laid on the horn, rather than pass her. “Some people resent it, and they’re like, ‘Don’t you clog my lane!’ But most people smile and wave.”
Pittsburg resident Vonnie Gallegos stopped driving four and a half years ago.
After two car crashes in two weeks totaled her car and put her in the hospital, she said, she reconsidered whether driving was a good idea. It wasn’t a decision she made lightly.
“I had the coolest, coolest car,” the diminutive 50-year-old said Monday. “It was a black Mercury Cougar with a steel stick shift. I felt like Mario Andretti.”
Gallegos, who lived in Amarillo, Texas at the time, said she was always a good driver. In the first wreck, a 15-year-old driving with a friend nearly totaled the car. Soon after she got it back from the repair shop, another driver blind-sided her on an icy road.
“When I was pulling away in the ambulance I thought, ‘Something’s not right here,’” she said. “Then the insurance company said they wouldn’t fix the car. I’d seen a lot of people riding, and thought I could be Bike Girl.”
She bought a mountain bike from a friend for $75, and never looked back. She road the bike everywhere; to the store, to work, on social outings. It was tough at first, she said, but she quickly got used to it.
“Within a couple months I blew up like the Hulk,” she laughed. “People didn’t recognize me, and somewhere along the way I lost 100 pounds. I couldn’t believe there was room on me for that.”
With all that pedaling, Gallegos said she quickly racked up about 150 miles a week. In the last four and a half years, she has biked nearly 24,000 miles. She also said she had to learn to “take the lane,” or ride in the middle of a traffic lane just like any other vehicle. The practice is vital, she said, and ensures drivers give her enough space. Most people, she continued, don’t realize bicycles are considered vehicles, just like a truck or car. Often, their ignorance of that fact shows when she rides. But when she moved to Pittsburg four years ago to work training customer service reps at the Backyard Discovery facility, she said the daily commute became much safer.
“Pittsburg is a polite city to ride in for the most part,” she said as she recalled one driver who pulled up close and laid on the horn, rather than pass her. “Some people resent it, and they’re like, ‘Don’t you clog my lane!’ But most people smile and wave.”
Gallegos rides 365 days a year, in rain, shine or snow. At night, neon tubes light her up for blocks, but they haven’t always protected her. Once, while riding home in a rain storm with her lights blazing, a driver ran into her from behind, sending her flying into a ditch. He didn’t stop to help.
She rides for other reasons, too. Riding has helped Gallegos put drug and alcohol issues behind her, and to stay in shape.
“It helps so much with recovery,” she said. “It tunes my brain just right. Nothing tunes it up like riding a bike.”
She says spending so much time outdoors has become more environmentally aware.
“You start to respect nature when you’re exposed to it for so long,” she said. “Now I know what it’s like to be alive.”
The only processed food she buys is powdered milk, and she recycles everything that is recyclable. Her small apartment is Spartan in its decor, and she doesn’t watch TV, preferring instead to read five to seven books a week. And the thousands of dollars she has saved in gas, auto insurance and car payments have stacked up.
“I never have to worry about my paycheck,” she said.
She said when she decided to kick automobiles to the curb, there were no second thoughts. People have often explained to her why they would never be able to do what she does, and she says she understands why many of them couldn’t.
“But I just didn’t give myself the option of ‘Can’t,’” Gallegos said. “I hope to ride for the rest of my life. When I can’t ride anymore, I’ll walk.
Her co-workers have accepted her as one of their own, she said, and built her a small closet to hold the clothes she changes into when she arrives at work. Pittsburg as a whole, she said, has been a great place to live.
“Pittsburg has taken me in as their little commuter,” she grinned. “I think they like me here.”
