Being a student of engineering has its advantages in a world dependent on mechanical devices for transporting us “from point A to point B,” especially if you’re an avid biker wanting that perfect cycle that fits your every need… including hauling kayaks and lumber. I caught up with Jonathan Handy on the morning of Provo’s “2024 Bike To Work Day,” thinking at the time that he might make a great subject in expressing the spirit of this highlighted event.
Jonathan began his biking experience back in the fall of 2015 when he enrolled in BYU, left and returned after completing a two-year Mission in Tucson, Arizona, and re-enrolled for the 2018 fall semester. He tells me that he had done some biking while on his mission in a city nearly five times the size of Provo and had become accustomed to biking in heavy traffic, “so I was used to the traffic levels in Provo.”
In 2021 “I got this idea to bike from Provo to Denver, Colorado.” Jonathan was “biking to classes and everywhere else to get in shape” for such a trip, then set out in June or July for the Centennial State. “I did 330 [miles] in four days,” accomplishing this on a 1987 Schwinn High Sierra that he had bought from KSL Marketplace and then improved. During 2023 Jonathan continued to work on his bike with an engineer’s enthusiasm— he stripped down and repainted the original frame, changed tire size, added disc tabs and Surly Moloko handlebars. “I can stick stuff on there [his handlebars], and it has bar pads too. The only thing original are the grips and brake levers, everything else I’ve changed.”
“Went single speed since November, tringle-speed (has three gears),” after breaking a rear derailleur and damaging some wheel spokes, “and never went back!” Jonathan can manually switch gears, depending on the terrain, by resetting the drive chain. “When I came back [to Provo] my roommate and I had twenty-seven frames,” Jonathan explains in illustrating the abundance of parts he had at his disposal for his rebuilding projects.
Where the rubber meets the road, it’s “Orange Seal - Endurance in tubeless tires, and in the winter I use studded tires.” And to add some load capacity, Jonathan outfitted his High Sierra with a front rack and panniers, along with a “Jandd Rear Rack Pack II on the back.”
With his customized bike rebuilt to his satisfaction, Jonathan then set off on another two wheel adventure, this time with a cycle sporting a Honda 4-stroke 2 horsepower engine and his destination was his “brother’s wedding in Laramie, Wyoming.” He amazed me in saying that he rode “582 miles in 54 hours from Provo to Laramie!”
Jonathan continues to bike “everywhere,” he often pedals to Springville, Vineyard and has gone as far as “Salt Lake City about ten times,” occasionally to visit friends who live there. One of those Salt Lake trips was to see a concert, “One Republic,” when he took his bike with him on FrontRunner and then rode back. On the way home, Jonathan “got a flat at 4:00 AM and couldn’t seal it,” so with little recourse until morning, he says he “stayed overnight in Lindon.”
Since March of this year, Jonathan has become BikeWalk Provo’s “Social Ride Coordinator.” I’ve participated in several rides myself with him in the last month. He’s well-prepared in planning the routes and offers biking tips on what more one can do with a bike. “I think people don’t know how fast you can go on a bike and how big of loads you can carry.”
Jonathan is now working on a cycle design that will carry a small kayak; and, yes, once he did bring home a piece of lumber from Home Depot on his custom-built Schwinn.
