JIM BENSON
MECHANIC
Age:
52
Single
Hometown: Lincoln VT
Favorite Quote: Sometimes I get lost in
thought and my brain is a really big place
Occupation:
Recreation Technician
Bike:
Specialized Roubaix
Favorite Ride:
The one I’m going to do
today
Hobbies:
Reading, Tour de France,
collecting maps
Jim has over twenty years of experience leading bike tours in the USA, New Zealand and France. He started with Vermont Bicycle Tours in 1983 leading trips and working in operations at the Bristol HQ. He led the first tours in New Zealand for VBT in 1988 and later served as Technical Project Manager at their Beaune, France office in 1993-94. One of his most memorable rides was the La voie de la Liberte, an 11 day tour in 1994 commemorating the 50th anniversary of D-day and the liberation of France by the American and Allied Forces. The route started in Normandy and followed the path taken by the liberators through western France, Paris, and finished in Bastogne Belgium,
His winters are spent working for Middlebury College at the Rikert Ski Center, the training facility for Middlebury’s Division 1 ski team. In addition to daily operations his main area of responsibility is the maintenance and preparation of the ski tracks and has been the “Chief of Course” for several NCAA Eastern Championships and National Championships. In 1980 he was selected to be a Course Steward at the Olympic Winter Games in Lake Placid.
Jim also works with Vermont Ski Safety Equipment, conducting hands on workshops designed to teach ski mechanics proper binding installation, release testing procedures, and ski tuning and repair. These workshops held each fall and sponsored in part by the major ski and binding manufacturers, are an important training tool for the certification requirements of those manufacturers.
This is his eighth tour with my crew at ABB. When we can get him off the ski trails, he's a pretty darn good bike mechanic. If bikes need TLC, Jim's your man...we probably won't use his ski expertise this trip.