INSTANT REPLAY: Brock Tully, the hippie jock

BIKE TRIP for a lifetime - Brock Tully’s 10,000-mile bicycle ride in 1970 as a “hippie-jock' was the catalyst for a life promoting kindness today.

Brock Tully collection

It was the bike trip of a lifetime, opening up the good and the bad in the world to a 23-year-old self-confessed “hippie-jock” and the beginning of a life bent on making the world a better place to live for everyone.

Long before Rick Hansen’s world wheelchair tour in 1985, Steve Fonyo’s one-legged run across Canada in 1984 and Terry Fox’s attempt at running the length of the country in 1980; and even well before West Van’s Clyde McRae walked across Canada in 1973 in a Guinness record 96 days, there was another West Vancouverite who toured 10,000 miles with a bicycle around the U.S. and Mexico.

His name is Brock Tully.

Much like McRae’s cross-Canada trek – and a later 100-mile run around the track at Empire Stadium, both of which I’ve written about in past columns – Brock Tully’s bike journey in 1970-71 was done in an attempt to discover himself and the big world out there.

Little did he know the journey would lead to a life filled with writing books, more long-distance bike rides, organizing kindness events and giving inspirational talks; to say nothing of coaching basketball at Okanagan College and football with the Okanagan Suns for four years, running marathons and competing in triathlons. Did we mention he can play the harmonica or that he can juggle and eat an apple … at the same time?

His story begins in West Van where he went to Irwin Park and Pauline Johnson elementary schools, then Hillside when it was a junior high and West Van High where he was captain of the Highlanders’ senior basketball team in 1965, his Grade 12 year, under Coach Brian Upson.

He never played football at West Van because he wore glasses; yet, even without that earlier training, when he did get contacts he played a year with the North Shore Cougars juniors and then with UBC’s junior varsity and varsity Thunderbirds as he worked on his teaching degree. While at UBC he represented his fraternity at least once in no less than 17 sports: basketball, football, hockey, volleyball, baseball, golf, field hockey, track, cycling, bowling, curling, tennis, badminton, field lacrosse, wrestling, swimming and soccer.

Unaware that alcohol and drugs were overtaking his life, but depressed and suicidal, he decided – almost on the spur of the moment and with very little preparation – to head to the Bahamas… on his bicycle.

Now you have to realize that long-distance bike riding was not a common activity in 1970. He would, in fact, be the first person to cycle around North America, covering 31 states and all of Mexico.

The story of his journey (beginning Sept. 8, 1970, and concluding in mid-March of 1971 after a right-hand detour in Florida took him to Mexico instead of his plan to hitch a ride on a boat bound for the Bahamas) is recounted in diary form in his first book Coming Together.

I knew of the book but had never read it. Published 40 years ago in 1972, it’s been out of print now for some time, so is hard to find. Sadly the West Van Memorial Library doesn’t have a copy, but I did find one at the Burnaby Public Library.

Let me tell you, when I started reading, it was hard to put the book down. He realized almost immediately that cycling day after day was not that easy. Things like wind, cold, rain, snow, heat, flat tires, huge distances between water bottle fill-ups, steep hills up and surprisingly, even worse, downhill; all made for daily adventures. Mixed in there was an encounter with barbed wire, gunshots, nasty bugs, close brushes with big trucks, and an egging (while on his bike). The word perseverance comes to mind.

It reminded me a lot of the comic character Tintin whose escapades in and out of jams on every page of the Adventures of Tintin series of comic books leaves one gasping at the excitement of it all.

At times Brock rode the rails in empty box cars. He pedalled through the black section of towns where blacks and whites did not mix. He bought a dog that he had to carry in a wire basket on his bike. He had no light on his bike and often rode well into the evening darkness.  Yes, the word foolhardy comes to mind too.

He had a small pup tent but a most amazing thing happened more often than naught. People – complete strangers – were intrigued by his adventure and, despite his unkempt, shaggy-haired look during this tail-end of the hippie era, would offer him accommodation for a night or longer. However, sometimes he began his search for a bed so late at night that it’s no wonder he once had to beg the local police to sleep in a cell… true story.

So the word kindness came into play, a word that is his trademark now. In 2000, he did a second ride, some 18,000 kilometres through seven provinces and 33 states, called “Cycling for Kindness.” He created and co-produces Kindness ROCKS, a 75-minute inspirational and educational show performed in schools. He is the producer of the annual World Kindness Concert, held in Vancouver each November which will have its 12th event in 2012. He co-founded the Kindness Foundation of Canada.

All these things are done to promote kindness, the antithesis of bullying and violence. When I suggested the Stanley Cup rioters should be made to attend some of his events, he wrote the idea down and went further by thinking they should volunteer at the events.

You can learn more about Brock’s projects at brocktully.com and at worldkindnessconcert.com.

Brock turns 65 on Sunday. That seems unbelievable because he’s still kind of a “hippie-jock”… with the emphasis on kind as in kindness.

This is episode 453 from Len Corben’s treasure chest of stories – the great events and the quirky – that bring to life the North Shore’s rich sports history.