Elle inspires dad’s big ride

Andrew Mathieson
RIDING a bike the stretch of Tasmania – and back to Geelong – feels like baby steps for charity cyclist Jasper Boyd when he reflects on his daughter’s own tough journey.
Two brain haemorrhages marred Elle’s start to life within just three and a half weeks of birth.
Doctors warned Drysdale parents Jasper and Ruth their baby daughter would be riddled with a series of disabilities and would probably never walk.
“We pretty much were told to expect the worst – they just really didn’t know what the outcomes were going to be because of what had already happened to Elle,” Mr Boyd said.
“Anything beyond that was going to be a bonus for her and for us.”
Elle has since battled away, suffering cerebral palsy, autism, left optical nerve damage and hydrocephalus.
But somehow the bright and bubbly five-year-old not only started walking in 2007, she is now also running and jumping.
The transformation has followed years of painstaking therapy sessions at Geelong’s Kids Plus Foundation.
The charity organisation has inspired Elle’s 36-year-old dad to hop on a mountain bike and train for months to take on the rugged 370-kilometre, four-day trip from Tasmania to Geelong.
“I’m not just doing this for myself,” Jasper said.
“I have got friends who I have made through Kids Plus and their children are just as good an inspiration for what I am doing.
“They all go through a hell of a lot.”
Mr Boyd said he planned to raise at least $6000 – about $16.21 for every kilometre – from donations to pay another child’s therapy for a year.
That was the easy part.
Cycling Tasmania’s hills, stocked with panniers full of camping gear and supplies, would be tougher.
To simulate conditions, Mr Boyd said he had cycled 30km at the end of most working days before stepping up to 100km on weekends.
Still, the first-time cyclist joked his training had not been enough.
“Geelong as a training area is very flat, it’s not very Tasmanian like, so I’ve had to go up and down the same hills quite a few times,” he said.
The trip will start next Thursday when Mr Boyd sets out from Hobart to Devonport before embarking on the Spirit of Tasmania for a leg from Port Melbourne to Geelong’s Eastern Park on Sunday.
Mr Boyd said anyone wanting to support his charity ride should phone Kids Foundation Plus on 5223 1475 or donate online at www.kidsplus.org.au.