Trans Iowa Stories: Images of v12

  "Trans Iowa Stories" is an every Sunday post which helps tell the stories behind the event. You can check out other posts about this subject  by clicking on the "Trans Iowa Stories" link under the blog header. Thanks and enjoy! 

I've mentioned that Trans Iowa v12 had some awesome images. I was blessed to have had Wally Kilburg, Celeste Mathias, and others in the event like Ari Andonopoulous, Scott Sumpter, and others sharing their talents and experiences via images. I wanted to take a quick break in the telling of the stories of v12 to let some of these images do the talking. I will give some comments on a few as I deem necessary. 

First off, some of you may have noted that there weren't a lot of memories, and especially images, from the first, what? Six Trans Iowas? Yeah, well there is a reason for that. First was that I was very much wanting Trans Iowa not to get noticed. I figured the less the outside world knew about it, the better. Authorities and concerned citizens didn't need to know about this, in my opinion, because I was fearing interventions and more hassles and I didn't think that was really necessary. 

However; after we got the event into Grinnell, it became increasingly apparent that (1) I wasn't going to be able to keep a lid on this event anymore due to several factors, and (2) Grinnell, as a city government and as a community were largely in favor of Trans Iowa and wanted it to get noticed. So, I had a change of mind regarding all that and my philosophy regarding image taking, in particular, became more open and therefore we have a lot more imagery to draw upon for the last several events in the series. 

Anyway, there is a brief explanation for the seeming lack of imagery for many early Trans Iowa events versus the latter ones. Now, enough yakkity-yak! On with the images!

My view from the start line in downtown Grinnell. Not as cool as Wally Kilburg's shot!

An image from the Saturday morning of T.I.v12 by Celeste Mathias.

A great portrait shot of Greg Gleason from Wally Kilburg taken before the start of v12.

A great shot of the course of T.I.v12 from Wally Kilburg

Another great portrait shot of Greg Gleason (L) and Sarah Cooper at the T.I.v12 start line.

Celeste Mathias captures some of the riders headed toward Checkpoint #2 during T.I.v12

Wally Kilburg captures a gaggle of riders as they come into Checkpoint #1

Wally Kilburg captures myself (L) and volunteer Tony McGrane (R) as we watched the lead riders leave CP#1.

Volunteer and driver for Wally Kilburg, Wally's great friend, George Keslin.

Greg Gleason and Walter Zitz, inseparable for most of T.I.v12. Captured by Wally Kilburg in Tama County.

One of my all-time favorite Trans Iowa images ever. Matt Gersib at the re-route during T.I.v12.

Thanks for indulging me with this post of imagery. There is a lot more to come, but I wanted to use those for story telling later in the series here. But rest assured, there are many images to come which are as good or better in some cases. 

Next: I pick back up with stories from Trans Iowa v12 with "A Tale Of Two Trans Iowas -Part 4"