LAS VEGAS (BRAIN) — The ladies of dirt will get their due at the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame induction ceremony as cycling advocate Jenn Dice, gravity legend Leigh Donovan and retailers Lil and Kris Koski are among those to be honored Wednesday night at Interbike.
They're joined by fellow inductees Jimmy "Mac" McIlvain, longtime editor of Mountain Bike Action magazine, and the rest of the Koski clan, who operated the influential Cove Bike Shop in Northern California during the sport's seminal era.
The festivities will begin with a reception from 5:30 to 6:15 p.m. at Mandalay Bay Room L, followed by the induction ceremony from 6:15 to 7:15 p.m. and closing announcements at 7:15. All Interbike attendees are welcome.
More on the inductees:
Jenn Dice: Nominated in the Advocacy category, Dice served more than a decade as head of government relations at the International Mountain Bicycling Association (IMBA) before joining PeopleForBikes last year as vice president of government relations.
At last year's Interbike, she was honored with the Pioneering Woman Award by the Outdoor Industries Women's Coalition. In nominating Dice, IMBA president Mike Van Abel said: "Jenn tirelessly helped shape important laws that affect access to public lands.
She has sat at the tables of every federal (and most state-level) government land agencies to secure partnership agreements with the National Park Service, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest Service. These agreements serve to significantly shape how these agencies today manage and permit mountain biking access."
Leigh Donovan: A national and world title BMX racer as a child, Donovan took up mountain biking in her 20s and quickly rose to the top of the women's ranks. Racing for the Mongoose team in 1995, she won the national slalom championship, national downhill championship and the world championship. Overall, she won nine U.S. national championships, a UCI downhill championship and a World Cup dual championship.
Donovan retired in 2001 and took a lengthy hiatus from competition before racing for the U.S. national team in 2010. She also worked for Interbike in a sales role from 2012 to 2013. Today, Donovan is putting her three decades of racing experience to work with her Southern California-based coaching and women's event business, ichoosebikes.com.
Jimmy "Mac" McIlvain: Nominated in the Hall's Journalism category, "Jimmy Mac" worked for Hi-Torque Publications' Mountain Bike Action magazine for more than 20 years, including 13 years helming the title as editor. He resigned this summer, however, over Hi-Torque's decision to include coverage of electric bikes in the pages of MBA, saying, "Mountain biking is a human-powered activity."
McIlvain's coverage of mountain biking extends back to the first NORBA National in 1983, where he shot photos. During his tenure at Mountain Bike Action, he wrote the "Mac Attack" column, reported knowledgably on new industry technologies and provided an authoritative voice on issues including trail advocacy.
The Koski family's Cove Bike Shop: Nominated as Pioneers, the Koski family—dad Earl, mom Lil, sister Kris and brothers Erik, Dave and Don—ran The Cove Bike Shop in Marin County, California.
During the "Klunker" era, they built their family shop into the first off-road bike shop and a key resource and supplier for the budding MTB industry. Among their productions were the Cook Brothers fork—the first off-road production fork—and the industry's first mail-order source for mountain bike parts, the Trailmaster catalog of 1980. The Koskis sourced many of the parts used to build early Klunkers, Dick Howard and Paul Fitzgerald recalled in their nomination letter.
"Sturmey-Archer hubs, Brooks saddles, custom cables soldered to suit and several brands of flat track motorcycle handlebars were all available at The Cove," they stated. "If you can name an early ATB, Klunker or bomber builder, the parts they used most likely were purchased through Donny and The Cove."
