She Rides To Work--And Through Labor

 The next time you don't feel like pedaling to work or school because you're tired, have a headache or worried about the weather, think about Julie Anne Genter.

She's a member of New Zealand's Green Party and Parliament--and perhaps not surprisingly, a cycling advocate.  On Sunday, she did something she'd planned on doing:  She gave birth to her second child after arriving at the hospital by bicycle.

The way she got there, however, wasn't quite as she'd anticipated.  Her original plan was for her partner, Peter Nunn, to pedal a cargo bike with her in the front.  But when her contractions started, she realized that she and her hospital bag would add up too much weight. So she "just got out and rode," she explained.

Fortunately for her, the ride to the hospital took only ten minutes. Her daughter, whom she described as "happy and healthy," was born at 3:04 am local time.

The daughter is her second child.  She also pedaled to the hospital for the birth of her first child, which resulted from induced labor.  That same year, New Zealand's Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, gave birth while in office and brought her three-month-old baby to the United Nations assembly hall.

So, if you're trying to decide whether to ride to work, remember that Julie Anne Genter "wasn't planning to cycle in labor," but did.  

Will She Ride Home?

Today I read a news story that made me think of someone about whom I wrote two years ago.

Then I opened my page for this blog and found that someone had left a new comment on that post.

The subject of that post was Mary Jane "Miji" Reoch, arguably the first of a generation of American female cyclists that would dominate their field during the 1970s and 1980s--and put the US on the world's racing map for the first time since the era of the six-day races.

So what brought her to mind?  Well, it was something a political figure in New Zealand did four decades after "Miji."

Well, they've both won races. Except that the ones Julie Anne Genter weren't in the peloton, or on the track or singletrack.  Rather, the races she won were decided in voting booths and ballot boxes.

Now, when I say "won", I don't mean it in the way one wins a head-to-head election in the US.  Instead, as I understand, in New Zealand's system, members of parliament are elected from lists of candidates and the ones with the most votes gain parliamentary seats.  Some of them, anyway:  Some seats are awarded proportionally by parties (New Zealanders get two votes, one for a candidate and one for a party.) and a few seats are reserved for Maori residents.

So, you can say that she won the right to become a member of Parliament, a post she holds along with those of Minister for Women as well as Associate Minister for Health and Associate Minister for Transport. All of that, one imagines, wouldn't leave her much time to train. But, still, she cycles---which brings me to what she has in common with Miji.

Well, they both continued to ride during their pregnancies.  In Miji's time, doctors were still counseling pregnant women to forego all physical activity, so continuing her training regimen was still fairly radical in the 1970s.  Today, of course, doctors are more likely to encourage pregnant women to exercise as much as they can, even if they have to modify whatever regiments they followed before.

Which brings me to something that was considered really "far-out" (to use a '70's expression) in Miji's time, and is still seen as fairly unusual today: Both women rode their bikes to the hospital where they would deliver their newborns. Yesterday, Julie Anne, who is 42 weeks pregnant, arrived at the Auckland hospital where she will be induced.  Once her child arrives, she will become the second New Zealand government official to give birth this year, following Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in June.

Oh, I can offer one other cycling-related connection between Miji and Julie Anne:  They were both modest about cycling to their deliveries.  The New Zealander demurred that her route was "mostly downhill."  Donald Huschle, who left the comment on my post about Miji, recalled that, whenever anyone mentioned her ride to the delivery room, she would point out, "Well, I didn't ride home."

Now, if Julie Anne Genter--who was born and raised in the USA--can ride home, she'll've done something neither Miji nor Jacinda did.  As if she hasn't already done enough things that most people don't do!