Pedaling through Statesville, NC - A Biking Adventure

Ever been to First Flight Bicycles in Statesville, North Carolina? If not, buckle up as we take a journey with Wes Davidson, the passionate soul behind the store. He spins a charming tale of his love for biking, right from his high school days to now creating a hub for bike enthusiasts. He unravels the magic of biking in Statesville – a world where exploration and camaraderie intertwine. Whether you are an ardent cyclist or an amateur, Wes's world of biking throws open opportunities to discover new trails, taste local culinary delights, or engage in exciting tourism activities.

In the second part, we gear up to venture off the beaten path into the world of gravel and electric biking. Wes opens up about the challenges of restocking his shop post-pandemic and his role in organizing the Love Valley Roubaix , a unique blend of gravel and tarmac cycling event. He offers a tantalizing peek into the scenic countryside that awaits cyclists in Statesville. The conversation takes a deeper turn as we explore Wes's commitment to trail-building and community engagement. We talk about his role in the County Parks and Rec advisory committee and his partnership with the Tar Hill Trail Blazers. Be prepared to get inspired as we delve into the behind-the-scenes efforts that go into creating biking trails. All in all, this episode is a must-listen for biking enthusiasts and those who enjoy the great outdoors!

Transcript

Exploring Biking in Statesville, North Carolina

Speaker 1 0:00

Are you interested in understanding why the greater statesville areas the perfect destination for bicycling, or how you can get involved in bicycling in the statesville, north Carolina area? Then today's episode is for you.

Speaker 2 0:11

Welcome to discover statesville, the show that takes you on a captivating journey through the heart of one of North Carolina's most charming towns, hey everyone.

Speaker 1 0:20

Welcome to episode three of discover statesville. We're so excited to be here today. I'm cindy.

Speaker 3 0:27

I'm Richard.

Speaker 1 0:31

And um, we we hope that you are tuning in today because you've already watched the first two episodes and, uh, you were loving the the information that were that we're uncovering from the hidden gems we have here in statesville. So we're very excited today to welcome west davidson.

Speaker 3 0:47

Thank you.

Speaker 1 0:47

Welcome. Uh, who is the owner of first flight bicycles here in statesville, north carolina?

Speaker 4 0:53

That's me.

Speaker 1 0:54

So welcome west. So, um, we have A great environment for biking and we really wanted to, and west is very involved in biking in the greater statesville area. We want to have him on today to talk about, to talk about that. So I think, west, we should start out by I think everyone would be very interested in knowing how you got in to the, the biking business. How does one determine that they, they want to own A bike shop? So tell us about that.

Speaker 4 1:23

I have a long-storied career. Uh, I just started as a very young lad, while in High school, decided I did not like working in the restaurant that I worked in, and bless those people that do work in restaurants, uh, but with that, as just said, hey, I like riding my bike. Uh, maybe the bike shop has some work that they need done. It was close to christmas and, uh, that was 1997. Uh, fast forward to today. Uh, I'm now the owner of a bike shop.

Speaker 1 1:52

So you just showed up one day and said, hey, you have a job for me. And the the owner was like yeah, I need some, I need some help and was blessed to find you right.

Speaker 4 2:00

Yeah, jeff archer that was the owner at the time Founded first flight bicycles, um, back in 1989. Uh, with that, I walked in one day and I just said, yeah, flat out, are you accepting applications? And he was like, yeah, bring me something. And uh, it started out as, uh, I think, two days, uh, tuesdays and Thursdays after school. Uh, from there it grew and before I was Out of high school I was working over 30 days or 30 hours a week, did multiple years at mitchell, have degree from mitchell and computer programming and realized that was not for me and Bikes were going to be my life.

Speaker 3 2:36

No, did you start out just working on the retail floor or on, like maintenance and mechanics?

Speaker 4 2:41

Uh, I learned both of them. Uh, one thing about jeff was that he was very proficient in both. He was a fantastic mechanic Uh taught me a lot of all the mechanics and really inspired me to learn on my own. Uh, so from there I did all that and just from the Just nature of a small business Uh you, sometimes you just have to do everything and from there just learning retail. Uh, learning my path and my ways and how to greet and understand customers and the best way to get them To be happy and sure. For me it's being out on a bicycle. I want others to appreciate and understand that, yeah.

Speaker 3 3:19

So there's. So tell us a little bit about first-flight bicycles, because it's not just a place where you go buy a bicycle.

Speaker 4 3:24

Correct. So with with the bike shop. Uh well, first and foremost, we also serve alcohol.

Speaker 1 3:31

You gotta have some bears on crap.

Speaker 4 3:32

Yeah, you gotta have a liquid encouragement sometimes or just a place to relax afterwards. So we really want to be a little bit of that third space as well with that. You know we, we service bikes, we sell bikes, but also we want to just be that hub for all that is bicycles. Make sure that we want to hear about your story as well. We want to know where you're riding, why you're riding, and then we can also filter and make sure that you're finding those places Well well, and that that probably goes a long way too, and you know it's.

Speaker 3 4:01

It's a hub where people can come in and if they got questions about a trip, you know you get so much traffic, you know you can you can report on trail conditions in certain areas and things like that, because you got enough people that are that treat your space as a community hub. Yeah, for the bicycling world 100%.

Speaker 4 4:15

I learn about new trails all the time from our customer base and people that come in once again. That's one of the reasons that we serve alcohol Is that people come in after a ride and we'll ask them where they just went and rode and I just found this really cool new trail. And then they're telling us about new restaurants that they went to because they went to this trail. So seeing how that also dives into, you know, tourism and things like that is just really, really interesting to me. Just to be able to really sit there and talk to people about that. Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1 4:44

So, speaking of diving into tourism one of the most fascinating things for me, and what you're doing at First Light Bikes, like I think it truly is unique and amazing. So go back two, three years. Right, the world kind of shuts down and people looking at going outside, and I had just filled the tourism role and I was looking for things to talk about for people to go outside, and I'm not quite sure that I remember the steps of how I got. I think I just was in the shop talking to you and I said, hey, wes, what is this on the wall? And you described it to me and it's become a thing, right, we've partnered on this.

Speaker 1 5:27

Bike states will to let everyone know about all the different avenues there are to bike states. So we have a screen here that I'd like to put up. This is a wall painted inside First Light Bicycles here in downtown states, north Carolina, and I'd love for Wes to kind of walk us through what we are looking at and how you came, because you mentioned how it impacts tourism and that people go on a ride and then they also go to a place to eat or visit and, like this encompasses all of that, it's really cool.

Speaker 4 6:01

It definitely does so. With that, there's a lot of dots on the map, so each one of those dots represent a place to ride your bike. In the northern part of the county a lot of those are gravel routes, so gravel riding is a very big segment of cycling right now because you can get out and ride long distances with minimal traffic. You get to go and see places that you just don't ever see. Nobody drives out and wants to go see the countryside and is like, oh, I'm going to go down multiple gravel roads in my car, but there's some just beautiful and amazing places that you can get out into the countryside when you go on the gravel bike.

Speaker 3 6:39

And these have kind of been vetted, these areas that you're posting. I mean, you're not gonna end up on somebody's private property where they come at you with a yeah, waving a shotgun, like.

Speaker 4 6:47

We found those, we've seen those signs and we turn around when we do see them. There's some amazing rows that I wish people could ride, but there are some of those folks and that you don't need that interaction.

Speaker 1 7:01

That's really why he has beers on tap for when they get back now.

Speaker 3 7:04

Yeah a decompression period definitely yes.

Speaker 4 7:08

So with that you know. Then it gets into different road rides. Beautiful area that we have a lot of rolling hills, great roads to ride. Most of the routes that we have leave our shop. The routes that we have posted leave from our shop just that central downtown Statesville area. But I've ridden Thousands and thousands of miles a year for multiple years. I know virtually every road in all of our Del County and the surrounding counties. I can create routes for folks depending on how many miles. Whether you want a five mile route or whether you want a 200 mile route. I've created them for folks. So we have a lot of beginner oriented ones and then you can explore from there and a lot of our routes, also on the road, allow you to. Once you learn all those routes, you can then connect them to create bigger.

Speaker 1 7:57

Yeah, and you do community rides too, like where you they can participate with you and go on a ride.

Speaker 4 8:02

Yeah, and that's part of that community as well is just being able to ride together, learning other folks that do ride. And Then there's a lot of people that ride together on different days that aren't scheduled rides from our shop, that they've met through our shop rides.

Speaker 1 8:17

Hey, richard, I think that Should be an adult, adult program through recreation and you know Anything, we're open to any ideas. We said we do everything before we spoke to people we should have gone.

Speaker 3 8:31

I've read a bike before today.

Speaker 1 8:32

Well, I've ridden a bike, but I think we need to go on a ride with. Can we go back to?

Speaker 3 8:36

the map real quick. Yeah, yeah, so the dots you mentioned it, and then along the bottom there Are the. That's more detail about the routes that correlate to the dots correct.

Speaker 4 8:46

On the very bottom we have a QR code system that does take you to each individual route. So there's one of the routes on. There is Signal Hill, which is a mountain bike trail here in Statesville. We have a link for that. It shows the map of it. It has a quick description of what kind of trails that you'd find out, so you got it on your phone that correct.

Speaker 3 9:06

When you're out there you can reference that.

Speaker 4 9:08

Yeah, exactly so it takes you to that page and shows you exactly the same thing, but also shows you the directions, sure, yeah.

Speaker 1 9:15

Yeah, it's a full. It's a full route. When you scan that QR code and it it pulls up on your website, right? Yes, you've built these rides and then you've built individual pages on your website.

Expanding Routes, Inventory, and Events

Speaker 4 9:24

Yeah, and this is just a start. You know we've added a lot more to it as well. Just to keep and expand that, we have more road rides or more road routes than on that map. We have more gravel routes as we add mountain bike trails or you know anything like that. We would continue to add those to our system.

Speaker 1 9:42

Do you know offhand how many? I should have looked that up, but it's mountain biking pathways, gravel on road. Do you know how many? Not that you've built, because I know it's way more, but like on, like on bike states, well that we're linking to your website to share with people how many routes so on, that there's three gravel routes, three pathway routes which is a greenway, nice, easy family riding for mountain bike, trail systems and and four road routes okay, okay.

Speaker 1 10:13

And then if you're local and you don't know much about biking and you don't have a bike, for slight bikes rents bicycles rent spikes too right.

Speaker 4 10:23

We do. We've fortunately been able to, after the pandemic, bring some more Inventory back in. We were very low on inventory. We're very fortunate that we saw a lot of bikes during that, but then it was very scarce so we ran out of all of our demo and rental bikes. We're building that back up. It's not perfect, but we do have quite a few to rent and have fun.

Speaker 3 10:46

Okay, I was one of those people that bought a bike during that time frame and and this is when you guys were kind of doing appointment only in Stephen and I remember you telling me how lucky I was to find the bike that I was looking for at that time because the, the, the inventory was I mean, it was months, yeah we were, we were.

Speaker 4 11:02

We normally have somewhere around 250 to 300 bikes and we were below 50 bikes in our store.

Speaker 1 11:08

I bought a lot of bikes from Fresh Flight over there, yeah we appreciate it, we had we had the benefit of doing a promotion, a tourism promotion, with Visit North Carolina to promote bicycling in the greater state's area, and West came in on his vacation To do that with us, which we really, really appreciate. It definitely has a passion for bicycling, but I say that because During that process I got to ride an electric bike and I almost felt like I was cheating, but I really liked it.

Speaker 4 11:38

It's not cheating as long as you're having fun.

Speaker 1 11:40

And I was. I had a lot of fun.

Speaker 3 11:42

I remember the first time I got on an electric bike. It's like that first pedal stroke and you, your smile, you're just like oh man.

Speaker 4 11:49

It's absolutely amazing. They're so fun.

Speaker 3 11:51

Well, and I've seen videos of where you know, you see, you think about electric bikes as being sort of a commuter thing and stuff. But then I've seen some videos of where really now you know, electric mountain bikes and things like that they're, they're getting people back into remote areas that they they couldn't do on a standard bike anymore. Just that you know that that pedal, that extra pedal support, is what helps, you know, helps them get out. You Further.

Speaker 4 12:10

Yeah, whether it's an aging cyclist that just can't go as far as they used to, they just really can't stand the fact that they're not able to do what they used to be able to do. That's great. But then also for people that aren't just die hard cyclists that want to go further than just a couple miles, it just aids them and allows them to go further and have more fun. Very cool.

Speaker 1 12:32

Let's talk about gravel for a minute. And I hope I'm not going to say this wrong.

Speaker 4 12:36

right Gravel is that when you go out to Love Valley, that is one of the places that we ride a lot yeah it's a lot of gravel, which makes me want to ask you about the Love Valley Robe.

Speaker 1 12:46

So, you are very involved in putting on a cycling event, so let's talk about that.

Speaker 4 12:53

So first off, you did say Robe correctly. You taught me well.

Speaker 4 12:56

Most people say Raboo or Rubaru or something like that. But yeah, with the Love Valley Robe it is a mixed gravel and tarmac or pavement event. There's over 50% of it is gravel. We started that event in 2013 with one of my friends, cameron Frazier, who had a racing company. At that point in time, I was riding up in that area a lot and told him how great it was. So from there, he created the Love Valley Robe. I partnered with him and I think it was 2018. 2017, he stopped doing a lot of the events.

Speaker 4 13:32

One of our friends took over the Robe for a couple or for a year. Then he did not want to do it in 2018. So we took it over and just made it our own. We get to dictate all sorts of fun stuff, but from there, it was always a one day event. So it was just Sunday and while we had great crowds, the thing was just like, well, what can we do to expand it and make it bigger and better?

Speaker 4 13:55

So my idea was to have multiple days. That's it, and it just keeps people in our area. So from there, we originally started as a two day that unfortunately got hampered by COVID pretty quick, but during that, it gave me a lot of time to think even more, and we've actually expanded it to three days, so we've made it even, even harder. But that's the weird thing about cyclists is we like hard. The harder it is, the more enticing that it can be. You're out and glutton for punishment, but from there the great thing is that there's just as I said earlier, there's just so much beautiful countryside and places that you just normally wouldn't go, and that's what Love Valley Robey allows a lot of people from out of town to come see.

Speaker 1 14:42

Yeah, the pictures that you post on your social media channels when you do some of these back roads, rides or just, and you do it when you get the sunsets and the sunrises and the they're really are beautiful. But the love, the love Valley Robey, which is which I love, because you know I'm charged with having people stay longer in states, full, and stay in our hotels and those multi day events do that. So we want, we want, you know we five days of bicycling would be even, but no, but more maybe bike riding events, but tell us when is the next Robey and how people can get involved in that.

Speaker 4 15:19

That's to be determined.

Speaker 1 15:20

Oh, is it to be determined?

Speaker 4 15:21

Okay, our normal weekend is typically the third weekend in March. Okay, and just through the calendar that falls on Easter weekend next year. So we will not be doing it on Easter weekend. So from there I have to decide whether I'm going to do it little earlier, a little later, or change something pretty dramatically. I've got some ideas working with a couple other folks, but I just have to figure that part out.

Speaker 1 15:46

Well, that's life, yeah.

Speaker 4 15:48

It'll happen next year. If anybody has questions on it or would like to be involved one way or the other, just contact me at the shop would be the best way.

Speaker 1 15:56

Well, and once you set the date, we'll have you back on Discover Statesville so we can tell people specifically about that event and how they can get involved. Definitely. I know this isn't your event, but it's another bicycling event that I think is really cool that Purple Heart Homes partners with Southern Distilling to do, and the reason I feel comfortable asking you about it is because you took home the, the you won right the last year, or, but it's called take that hill, correct, yeah?

Speaker 4 16:25

so that started three years ago and I participated in the first event. I wasn't able to participate in the second and last year they changed the format just a little bit to start it out at Southern Distilling, but it's a great fundraiser for Purple Heart Homes. It's a lot of good riding. We go out and to bear at mountain area out in Taylor'sville, a really really hard hill. You ride up it as fast as you potentially can and out of the two longer distance ones distance routes last year the 60 mile or I just happened to be the fastest person up the hill that year, so I was excited about that it it always feels good to be fast, sure had a good day.

Speaker 3 17:03

The tell us a little bit about. You know we talked about the map.

Volunteering for Trails and Biking Community

Speaker 4 17:06

Tell us a little about about the mountain biking areas here in town and in the greater statesville area yeah, so within the just in general downtown statesville area or greater statesville area, we have two wonderful trails at signal hill, which has been around for a long time. It was mid 90s when signal hill was built. 2016, we built big leaf slopes outside the Twin Oaks golf course a great little trail with the county there's. Both of them are somewhere around four miles each, but great local community trails, both hikeable as well, but of course I want to ride them, sure, from there. Town of moorsville has mzeppa park. Down at mzeppa park with all their baseball field soccer fields. It's a wonderful five mile trail that I think they're expanding right now. And then the big crown jewel for iardale county is lake norman state park, which has 30 miles of trail. It's a very big destination trail for people throughout the area.

Speaker 3 18:06

So wonderful, wonderful trail one of the coolest things and I can't speak necessarily to moorsville or the lake norman state park, but one of the coolest things I think about our two local trails right here in town is that those are pretty much volunteer driven efforts yeah, virtually all of them.

Speaker 4 18:19

The town of moorsville did pay to have their trail built. Lake norman was built. Majority of it was built volunteer base but there was some paid work done in the later years once we got grants. And everything but signal hill and big leaf are truly volunteer. They're still volunteers every day at all those trails. I know mark's out at signal hill this week clearing out trees from the wind storm. He came in the shop yesterday and we talked about that a lot. There's a lot of trees down and all the trails have trees down right but they don't clear themselves. So if somebody doesn't go out there and fix them then people can't ride.

Speaker 3 18:55

So which I think is just that speaks to the mountain bike community, and I think that's so cool is that you know their desire, a desire to have these nice things in town, and and the people will step up and say, well, we'll, you know, we'll make it happen and then maintain it.

Speaker 4 19:07

Yeah there's a lot of selfless people. Sure, there's a lot of hours given just because they really enjoy it, and but that's also the fun thing is the the trail. Working itself is a lot of fun. So not only there's a very big pride, prideful moment that when you go out and you fix something and then you get to go rise like oh man, I did a good job or you get the no, you suck. You did a really bad job at this. You got to go fix it again.

Speaker 3 19:31

Sure, that's also a part of it, but it's a really fun learning process and I assume you guys are also first flight is probably also a good hub if if people are interested in learning how to volunteer for trail work days and things like that, probably contacting you guys and then you can put them in touch with maybe who that point of contact is for the different trails and opportunities.

Speaker 4 19:48

Definitely yeah, we love doing that cool yeah speaking of volunteerism and selflessness.

Speaker 1 19:55

Um, so I learned recently I didn't know, but I learned recently that that you were a critical that your involvement in big leaf slopes is one of the main reasons we have that trail here in this, in this area. So tell us a little bit about your passion for that and how, how that got started like, because I know it didn't stop with that. You're very involved in making sure that this community is a destination for bicycling, and that's all Volunteer and passion, so tell us about that a little bit.

Speaker 4 20:33

So big leaf came about because we were building the trails at Lake Norman State Park. Jeff, who founded first flight bicycles, was the spearhead of Lake Norman State Park but it's all the way down in Troutman and we already had signal Hill. There was a lot of people working on signal Hill but it's a tough trail to maintain. Just wanted more trail and Fortunately I was able to at that point find more land that was potentially available. So went through all the normal processes working with the County Parks and Rec advisory committee, then going to the commissioners getting approval to build the land, showing that we knew what we were doing. Working with the Tar Hill Trail Blazers out of Charlotte that we built a lot of trails with. And yeah, we just you go out and you walk the land a lot of times and you learn it and just you see, you can just start to envision. It's a really interesting process.

Speaker 1 21:30

Yeah, and you chair that committee right with the county for.

Speaker 4 21:34

That I was on the board for nine years total and yeah, I was not on the board when I got all that approval. But going through that process and seeing that board and what they did was really interesting. But then and that's another part about just volunteering for anything is just as I got on that board, I thought, and mostly it was going to be about soccer fields and baseball fields. But every master plan that the city does or the county does, the number one and number two thing that folks ask for is open spaces, green spaces and trails, and that that is absolutely true. Yes, 100%.

Speaker 1 22:14

The Richard knows that well you know to Wes's point.

Speaker 3 22:19

You know it's. These are the things that have been known for years, but there's, there's still more to come. You know what? Wes and I met a couple weeks ago to talk about a piece of property and start thinking about, you know, brainstorm and what could this be? What kind of trail could be you know could be built here, and so I mean these are, these things are still on on the radar for the biking community and certainly for the city and the county as well. I mean we want to give people what they want.

Speaker 3 22:38

Yeah and that's trails and greenways.

Speaker 4 22:41

It's a big margin of what people want, sure, and it's a great thing. Yeah and it's usually put in places that you can't build anything else. So that's the other part of it. You know, most greenways and paths are built in floodplains, where you can't build anything else. Most mountain bike trails are built in areas that have a lot of Terrain that you can't just yeah, there's, there's one of those and we're blessed with all of those in the greater state area but look at the amazing.

Speaker 1 23:10

Yeah, look at the amazing things that have come from that and we're running short on time, but I do want to make sure to mention One of the things in every episode Thankfully so far and hopefully moving forward is that we've been able to recognize the servant leader and everybody that we've, that we've spoken to and and speak to, that is truly the people of states for North Carolina that make it the amazing Place that it is, and that includes you.

Speaker 1 23:38

So thank you Just for our listeners. West was most recently the the board chairman of our downtown statesville development corporation and and when we saw the amazing things he was doing with bicycling and Things that could impact tourism, we bugged him until he agreed to be on the state's will convention and visitors Bureau board. So that's what really excited to have you on that board. Thank you for Volunteering your time, because that's what it is. It says it's selfless giving of your time for people to be on these boards that and, I think, recognized recently at the tourism summit right right, right, for he got our visionary, visionary warden so very honored.

Speaker 1 24:25

Well, well, very well deserved, and and we look forward to To seeing seeing what's next out of out of first flights, first flight bicycles and and West so so if you, if you, if you don't have a bike, go see what's about a bike.

Speaker 3 24:42

If you have a bike, knock the dust off, take it in. Maybe it needs to be serviced, get it repaired. If you just want to go talk about what's in there, can grab a beer. Yep, yep, check out the map system, yeah.

Speaker 4 24:51

There's all sorts of one stop shop for getting outside.

Speaker 1 24:55

Definitely need to check out them. If you have not checked out the map system that's painted beautifully on the walls, you need to go check that out or you can go to things to do. I want to discover states full and hit bike states full and it'll take you to all things the map system for first flight bicycles, because West built something that most communities would love to have and wouldn't even know where to start. So thank you, and thank you For being with us today.

Speaker 4 25:23

It was an honor.

Speaker 1 25:24

Yeah. So If you know of anybody that you think would be perfect for our discover states full show, we encourage you to go to statesful NC comm, hit the contact us button and send us their information or your information, and be sure, while you're there, to check out all the fun things there are to do here in states for North Carolina. Thanks, west, it's Richard.

Speaker 3 25:46

Yeah, thank you, see you next week.

Speaker 2 25:48

Thank you for joining discover states full. You can email us at discover at statesful NC comm. Check us out on Facebook at discover states will NC Hashtag discover states full and our website states will NC comm. Catch us next week as we continue on our journey to uncover the hidden gems, culinary adventures, entertainment, and to be inspired and enlightened as we discover states full.