Sedalia woman bikes 3,000 miles

Connie Koch rode her bike for 3,000 miles and lived to tell about it.

The Red Hat Society, a national organization for women older than 50, released “Sassy, Classy and Still Sparkling,” an anthology that features a story by Koch, of Sedalia, and other women in the group.

“A Gift for Jesse” is dedicated to Koch’s son, Jesse Harrison, who died in an automobile accident 10 years ago when he was 17. In the story, Koch talks about meeting people on a 3,000-mile bike ride with the Five Points of Life cycling team.

“Their mission was to raise awareness for the need to donate blood, organs, tissue and bone marrow,” she said. “And all of us on the ride had a story to tell, and my story was of Jesse’s organ and tissue donation.”

While in school, Jesse decided to become an organ donor after learning about it at school, Koch said.

“He saved or enhanced the lives of over 50 people, which was pretty inspiring in itself. So this story is published, and that is my gift to Jesse.”

After he died, Jesse donated his heart, liver, kidneys, corneas, ligaments and tissue.

“It was wonderful when I met his heart recipient. He didn’t want to meet me. He was nervous. He had survivor’s guilt,” Koch said. “He felt Jesse had to die so he could receive that heart, but you know, Jesse was going to die anyway and for him to have left all of those wonderful gifts behind. It is awesome. Jesse is my hero.”

Koch and the other members of the team road from Ottawa, Canada, to Miami in seven weeks, and she said nothing could have prepared her for the experience.

“It was really intense. It gives credence to my motto that nothing is ever as easy as you think it’s going to be,” Koch said. “But I had a lot of experience in speed skating. For 25 years, I’d speed skated, and I thought that it was going to carry me through. But no one had ever asked me to speed skate for eight hours at a time like we were on the bike.”

Some days Koch rode her bike more than  100 miles.

“It was definitely an experience,” she said. “And what I have determined at this time in my life is that once was enough.”

Koch credits her son for being able to finish the bike ride.

“Along the way people would tell me, ‘Gosh, Connie, how did you do that?’, and I would tell them I always felt like Jesse was right there on my shoulder helping me along,” she said. “But I said, you know, if he had been any kind of a guy at all, he would have slid down my leg and help me pedal. And many times I thought he was doing that too.”