Family of champions in biking for MS
Jayce Riley, grandson of legendary
Monongah High football coach Jim Feltz, will be pedaling his bike from Yorktown,
Virginia to San Francisco to honor his mother, Jaimie Feltz Riley, who battled
MS for 13 years before passing away when Jayce was a Fairmont West senior.
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| Jayce Riley |
Fairmont State junior Jayce will
participate in June and July in the Bike the US for MS campaign, which began in
2007. Jayce’s cousin took part in the biking for MS cause a year after Jaime
passed away.
The Multiple Sclerosis Foundation says
more than 400,000 Americans have MS, a debilitating attack on the central
nervous system.
Jim Feltz’ widow is Betty Lynn Wilson
Feltz, Class of 1954, who lives in Fairmont with son Jon Pat Feltz, who taught math at Monongah Middle School for decades. Betty and
Jim’s other child is Jay Feltz, who quarterbacked Monongah High to its fifth
and final state football title in 1973. Jim coached the 1952 and 1954 MHS state
football championship teams.
The MS trip will cover 3,785 miles. MS
campaign hopes each biker will raise $3,785, or one dollar for every mile.
The Fairmont Times story about Jayce’s bike
for mom and MS:
Pedaling for a cause
Cross-country bicycling trip to honor memory of FSHS grad’s mother
Editor
FAIRMONT — To drive from Yorktown,
Virginia, to San Francisco, California would take a person 43 straight hours.
That’s a long time to sit in a car.
Imagine riding a bike all that way. It
seems like an outlandish thought, but it’s not. It’s what Fairmont resident
Jayce Riley will be spending two months of his summer doing.
Jayce will be biking 3,785 miles across the
United States throughout June and July. But his motivation for doing so isn’t
because he’s an avid cyclist.
“I’m not like a road cyclist or a mountain
biker or any of that stuff,” said Jayce, a graduate of Fairmont Senior High
School who is currently a junior at Fairmont State University, where he’s
majoring in exercise science. “I don’t think I’ve even ridden a bike the past three
years.”
So what would possess Jayce to undertake
this journey? He’s participating in “Bike the US for MS” in honor of his mother, who had multiple
sclerosis (MS) and passed away in 2014.
Honoring an amazing mother
It’s estimated that more than 400,000 people
in the United States have MS, according to the Multiple Sclerosis Foundation.
It is “an unpredictable, often disabling disease of the central nervous system
that disrupts the flow of information within the brain, and between the brain
and body,” states the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. Its cause is
unknown.
Jayce’s mother, Jamie (Feltz) Riley battled
MS for 13 years, and passed away from it when
Jayce was a senior in high school.
“She was an amazing, amazing mother,” Jayce said. “She was such a loving person. She cared for
so many different people, and was always willing to accommodate others.”
He recalled how strict she was with him
when he was a child in school, pushing him to be the best person he could be.
“When I’m going to college, I’m using all
this knowledge that she gave me, all these lessons ... and I think it’s made me
the person I am today,” he said. “Without
her, I don’t
know who I would be. I really don’t know.”
A year after his mother passed away,
Jayce’s cousin participated in the Bike the US for MS program.
“Since then I knew I wanted to do it, but
it was just a matter of time,” he said.
A cross-country trek
Bike the US for MS started
in 2007 to raise funds for MS treatment
and research, as well as to raise awareness about the disease. There are
various pre-plotted courses cyclists can take; Jayce will be part of a team of
bicyclists on the TransAmerica Route.
There are about 14 people in his team so
far, and Jayce said they’ve been getting to know each other through online
posts. Teammates live in nearby states, as well as other countries, such as
Bill Slott, hailing from Kibbutz Ketura, Israel, and Bart and Mirjam Van
Slageren, who come from Purmerend, Netherlands and will be making the trip on a
tandem bike.
Participants are asked to raise at least
$3,785, which is $1 for every mile they will be biking.
“Almost 50 percent of that is going to go
directly toward MS research and other things that they deem worthy of getting
some money,” Jayce said. “The other 50 percent is going to go toward us. It’s
going to buy our uniforms, our meals, water along the way, some spare bike
parts, gas for our van that carries all of our supplies.”
After departing on June 1, the cyclists can
pretty much set their own pace, Jayce said, riding around 6-8 hours each day.
As it’s not feasible to bike on the main routes, such as interstates, he said
they will be taking a course that uses more backroads.
“It’s a lot of America that you don’t get
to see.”
Along the 3,785 miles, he’ll bike through
nine states, taking pictures and doing some sightseeing along the way. He’ll
share his journey through Facebook and Instagram pages, where he’ll post photos
frequently to update followers.
As the team makes stops for lunch or to
camp at night, they’ll be wearing Bike the US for MS shirts,
and traveling with a van emblazoned with the same message. Jayce said they’ll
talk with people and media outlets along the way in an effort to raise
awareness of MS. And that effort has started already.
“Even here in Fairmont, I’ve had a lot of people that have come up to
me and talked to me about it since they knew that I was going to be doing
this,” he said. “It’s been awesome to hear people’s stories like that too.”
Supportive efforts
While Jayce has been gearing up for his
journey on stationary bikes at the Fairmont State campus, he doesn’t yet have a
very necessary component: a bike.
“I’m gonna get one pretty soon,” he said,
adding that he’s been looking at some online. A few friends have offered to
lend him a bike, but he said being 6-foot, 2-inches makes finding a bike that
works for his frame a difficult match.
Separate from the fundraising efforts
through the Bike the US for MS site, Jayce is also raising funds for himself to buy his
bike, as well as other necessary gear, such as a helmet and camping
necessities. These donations are being collected at jars set up at the Fairmont
and Bridgeport Hermosilla’s Deli Markets, where Jayce works.
While he’s on the trip, his family will be
supporting him, as he said he anticipates they’ll be sending care packages and
letters to him along the way. Jayce said they also plan to visit him in
Blacksburg, Virginia and at a stop in Kentucky.
“They might not be there with me all the
time, but they’ll be back at home sending me messages and videos and pictures.”
Reactions about the trip from friends have
been varied, but Jayce said he thinks his mom would have thought it was crazy.
“After a week long of her not believing me,
she would have got on board, she would have helped me,” he said. “She
definitely would have supported me through anything that I would ever want to
do, especially a bike ride across America.”
The Clarksburg WBOY-TV story about
Jayce:
FSU student plans cross-country bike
trip
By: Paige Hopkins WBOY-TV
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FAIRMONT, W.Va. - A Fairmont State University student will
soon embark on a cross-country, two-month bike trip.
Jayce Riley is participating in Bike the US for MS in honor of
his mom who passed away from Multiple Sclerosis.
Riley is working to raise 3,785 dollars for MS
research and for his trip.
"So my mom had MS and eventually passed away because of it. And I wanted
to honor her somehow. And then my cousin actually ended up doing this, she's
actually done it 3 times now. So whenever she did it I was like 'I'll do it,'
so it was only a matter of time," Riley said.
