Rod Leveque, 2000 – Loves Riding and Writing
By Laurie McLaughlin, Poly Trends
His most recent race was the hardest he had ever done. “It was 55 miles through fire roads and trails in the Cleveland National Forest with approximately 11,000 feet of vertical elevation gain,” says Rod Leveque of the excruciating seven-hour trek. “To give that some context, it’s more than twice the distance of a marathon, through the wilderness, with an elevation gain equivalent to climbing the stairs of the Empire State Building 10 times over.”
Leveque competes in as many as 30 mountain-bike races a year, and last season, he won the state championship for an intermediate rider in his age group. He’s 5-foot-7 and currently weighs 145 pounds, but fewer than four years ago, he was pushing the scale at 200 pounds and hadn’t ridden his bike much since high school.
“I just decided I didn’t want to keep gaining weight, so I dusted off my 10-year-old bicycle and started riding again,” he says. “I took to it really well, and I lost more than 50 pounds.”
He also spent a lot of time at a local shop getting parts for his old bike, and the employees encouraged him to start racing. So he joined the beginner circuit two years ago and came out No. 1 in the nation for all age groups at that level, and he moved up to the intermediate level last year.
When Leveque isn’t riding, he’s writing. He’s a reporter for the Daily Bulletin newspaper in Ontario and covers the courts and legal affairs. Most notably, he’s been writing about the appeals case of Kevin Cooper, an inmate who escaped from a Chino prison in the 1980s and was convicted of killing four people. “I’ve been at the paper for seven years, and I’ve covered this case for as long as I’ve been here,” he says.
Leveque got his first taste of journalism as a staffer and editor of the Poly Post. “I wrote about a lot of controversial subjects back then,” he adds. “I had a really great advisor, Tim Lynch, an editor at the Los ngeles Times, and it was through him that I got into the business. “It’s an exciting job because you have a lot of freedom, and no day is the same. You are out talking to people and coming across things you would never come across if you had a more conventional job behind a desk.”
He earned a degree in journalism at Cal Poly Pomona in 2000 where he met his wife, Maryann Tolano. She was also a journalism major who graduated in 2000 with a bachelor’s degree and in 2006 with an M.A. in Education.
“She was ASI president when I was the editor of the Poly Post. You know how the relationship between the press and the government is — they sometimes have to battle each other a bit. And, initially what attracted me to her is the way she handled that. She was so honest and direct in her dealings in student government.”
There was no conflict of interest between government and the fourth estate back then, he adds with a laugh. They began dating when her term ended, and she joined the campus newspaper’s staff. They were married in 2005, and she’s now a student government advisor at Mt. San Antonio College, and Leveque is again racing in a new category.
“This year, I’m entering the elite levels, and so far, I’m staying competitive,” he adds. “The races are longer, more technical. There are a lot of steep climbs and tricky descents. Some courses are brutal and rugged.” The circuit he participates in is predominantly in Southern California, and his sponsor, Upland’s Jenson USA bike shop, helps him travel and get the gear he needs.
“I don’t know why I’m good at this. A lot of it is mental,” he says. “But, I think some of the riding I did when I was heavy got my legs really strong. When the weight came off, I had a body built to haul a bunch of weight that wasn’t there anymore.”
In the meantime, Leveque is staying in gear with his professional and riding careers.
Originally published in PolyTrends Spring/Summer 2008
