The Cycle Effect in Eagle County wins national award for work empowering women and girls
Jesse Star Productions/Courtesy photo
Tam and Brett Donelson started The Cycle Effect in Eagle County with a plan to empower girls through mountain biking. Eleven years later, the nonprofit serves over 1,000 girls and women across five Western Slope counties, and the Donelsons have plans to triple the organization’s reach in the next three years.
On Sept. 28, The Cycle Effect joined the ninth class of Everyday Hero Award recipients at the espnW: Women + Sports Summit 2024, receiving $15,000 for its work empowering women and girls through mountain biking. The espnW award will serve as a catalyst for the organization to grow its outreach even further, Brett Donelson said.
“This award, for us, is super important because it validates us. It validates us for some of the largest outdoor and women’s leaders in the world,” Brett Donelson said.
“On our end, this is a massive milestone, and really, from The Cycle Effect’s perspective … this is a really great opportunity to amplify the voices of the girls that have gone through the program, whose lives had actually been touched,” said Becca Gould, The Cycle Effect’s director of development.
Living (and learning) through the program
When she win in eighth grade, Coco Andrade was one of the first girls to learn from the Donelsons.
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“I know when I started, I was like, ‘First of all, I don’t even know how to ride a bike,'” Andrade said.
Andrade learned much more than how to ride a bike in the following years.
“I remember when I was a senior in high school, I kept telling Brett, ‘I don’t know if I can go to college, that’s not for anyone, being a Latina girl, I don’t know,’ and he’s the one that motivated me to and was helping me with the process as a first-gen(eration college) student, telling me what I needed to do,” Andrade said.
Andrade participated in the program through the end of high school, and then attended and graduated from college. She then earned her master’s degree in social work and now works as a therapist at the Eagle County Detention Center. In between, she returned to The Cycle Effect as a volunteer. Now, at 27, Andrade serves as a board member for the nonprofit.
“Living through the program, going through it, I want other girls to experience the same connection,” Andrade said. “It’s not just a simple sport that you do one time in the season and that’s it. You do it all year long, and the friendships that you build, the network that you build, family is really important to (the Donelsons) and I see that a lot.”
What makes The Cycle Effect unique?
The Cycle Effect deliberately reduces barriers to accessing mountain biking, from the cost of the equipment and coaching to transportation to trailheads.
“Almost every single thing these girls come in contact with at The Cycle Effect, there have been intentional, conscious choices around that are best for those girls,” Brett Donelson said.
Through The Cycle Effect, mountain bikes become a tool to teach valuable life lessons.
“It’s such an independent sport. Yes, you have a team, but I think it teaches you a lot of independence and responsibility, because up on the course, you’re out by yourself, you have to trust yourself and the gears that you’re shifting in, trusting yourself that you know how to maneuver the bike,” Andrade said. “You have the responsibility to keep up with maintenance, cleaning your chain, changing your tire if you get a flat in the middle of the race.”
The Cycle Effect has several types of programs: Girls Mountain Bike & Mentorship Program, for girls 10- to 18; The Cycle Effect+ program, for more experienced riders who want to challenge themselves; a junior coaching program for high school riders who want to share their expertise and get real-world job experience; and Mujeres y Pedales (Women and Pedals), a bilingual program for women 18 and older.
At The Cycle Effect, mentorship comes first. The Cycle Effect prioritizes finding the best people to serve as leaders and mentors for the women and girls who participate in its programming.
“What makes our programs really magical are the people that are a part of it,” Gould said.
“I think a lot of people think our program is just about free bikes … and that’s not the most complicated thing,” Donelson said. “The most complicated thing is getting amazing mentors, and amazing coaches, and amazing people, because we are definitely a people-oriented organization, and we need amazing people to deliver the service to the young women in these communities.”
Coaches go through “significant” training before taking girls and women on the trails, which covers both technical and mental elements, Gould said.
“For our coaches, it’s less about that extensive mountain biking experience than it is about being a good mentor, and (providing) connection and support for the riders,” said Ashley Ojala, The Cycle Effect’s marketing manager.
“We also place a tremendous amount of effort and emphasis on bilingual coaching,” Gould said. “That intentionality is that if any girl or woman shows up to our program, that they feel comfortable and are supported to navigate in what is, oftentimes, a very uncomfortable position.”
Like Andrade, 17-year-old Summit County resident Aila Harmala grew up with The Cycle Effect, which she joined the summer before she started seventh grade. Harmala is now a coach for the program, and just received the Colorado High School Cycling League “Outstanding Student Athlete” award.
“I feel like The Cycle Effect has deeply impacted my whole being,” Harmala said. “The Cycle Effect is what introduced me to cycling, and I honestly would not be who I am without it. It introduced me to the sport, it taught me to love the outdoors, and helped me develop better ties with my peers, and I feel like it’s a really great community.”
Preparing for a program expansion
Currently, The Cycle Effect serves over 1,000 girls and women across Eagle, Summit, Routt, Mesa and Garfield Counties. In the next three years, the nonprofit hopes to be serving 3,000+ women and girls.
“Our programming product is one of the best I’ve ever seen in terms of really having an impact on youth, and we think we can scale that to — definitely Western Colorado, and potentially beyond — and so that’s the exciting thing about this award, is we get to show it to people and say, ‘Hey, we’re playing in this league now, and we want to keep expanding and helping more kids,'” Brett Donelson said.
“The first step always comes through that partnership: ‘Is there a demonstrated need for what we’re offering?'” Gould said. “I think one of the special things as we’ve gone around the Western Slope is we have this hub and spoke model of our program locations. We have some of our resources that we can spread across different locations that allow us to be nimble and flexible in this way, and really be hyper-efficient with all of our dollars.”
The Cycle Effect is currently fundraising to support the program’s expansion, with every dollar donated through Dec. 31 matched 100%.
“I feel like the more women we can get in this sport and the more people we can get on bikes, the better the community will be, and a lot happier,” Harmala said.
