In honour of #BlackHistoryMonth and #WinterBikeToWorkDay, here’s an entire #ListenReadWatch devoted to one of our favourite cyclists, Ayesha Mcgowan–now a professional cyclist, former bike commuter.
LISTEN
You’ve got your choice. Here’s a link to EIGHT PODCASTS featuring Ayesha Mcgowan.
Who is Aysha Mcgowan? From Quarantine Companion #4 with Ayesha McGowan: “Ayesha McGowan is a professional road cyclist. As the first African American woman to reach pro status in cycling, she balances her racing career with advocacy for greater representation in the sport.”
READ
You can read about Ayesha McGowan here.
“I usually go into things without knowing what I’m getting into,” Ayesha McGowan tells me as she dumps a pile of flour into a bowl without measuring it. “And I’m fine with that.” She is in her apartment kitchen in Spain, just outside Girona, attempting to make pancakes while converting imperial measurements to metric in her head. “Close enough,” she says, eyeballing the mound. “If it was my grandma, she wouldn’t do the math.”
It is fall 2022 and I have made the trek from California to Spain to spend time with a person who is one of the only African American professional women cyclists on the planet. Which is amazing when you consider that 12 years ago, she was a commuter who just liked riding her bike around and found that she was good at it. Working as a preschool teacher in the Bed-Stuy neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York, it began to occur to her that Black women were practically nonexistent in professional cycling.”
WATCH
If you’re in LA!
An independent short documentary; A RACE IN THE SUN focusing on Ayesha McGowan’s journey to becoming the first African American woman professional cyclist will be screening February 10, 2024 at the LA Black Film Festival at 8:00pm at
The Other Space Theatre
916 N Formosa Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90046. Spread the word ❤️🖤💚🎥🎥🎥
https://www.lafilmfestivals.com/tickets
Sounds like the rest of us might have to wait to watch A RACE IN THE SUN.
