THE COUPLING

Mark Schulze and I met on Valentine's Day of 1982. By April Fools' Day, we were aboard a jet bound for the South Pacific where we spent two months backpacking.

In 1986, Mark and I embarked on a nine-month, 25,000-mile journey around North America and Canada. We learned about the sport of mountain-biking in Canada's mighty Yukon where the riders judged a mountain by how many "headers" you could experience going down. The higher the rating, the more thrilling the ride, and the more favored the mountain.

Mark and I listened enviously as the Yukon "wild bunch" showed off their neon machines and recounted the fun they all had exploring the wilds of the Great North. "You'll never know what a great feeling it is," they said, "until you try it yourself."

When we returned home to southern California, we bought two Univega Alpina Sport mountain bikes and took our maiden voyage in the nearby Laguna Mountains where we had hiked for years. We reached our favorite watering hole in one-third the time it would have taken us to hike there. Lying around the bathing pool and basking in the sun as we did in the old days was no longer enough. We had to get back on our bikes and ride. We learned how to move into the right gears, how to let our strength, breath and desire propel us and our bikes over the varied terrain. Then, woe of woes, the sun began to dip behind the western range, and we knew we had to head back down the mountain.

In July of 1987, Mark and I were married on our mountain bikes out in the Lagunas. A month later, we both started racing at Big Bear.

MOUNTAIN-BIKE VIDEOS

One thing led to another, and in the late 80's, Mark and I, doing business as New & Unique Videos, pioneered the production and distribution of mountain-bike videos. Over the next decade, our titles sold at K-Mart, Wal-Mart, J.C. Penney, Sears, Blockbuster, REI, and featured in the catalogs of numerous distributors, schools and libraries the world over.

Go to Bike Videos to learn more about the videos we produced.

PHILOSOPHY

Since 1987, when we entered the sport of mountain biking, Mark and I have considered ourselves "goodwill mountain-biking ambassadors." Our most ambitious video, "World Odyssey" took us to nine countries where we lived, breathed, ate, (hardly) slept and spoke nothing but mountain biking. Through our video work and travels, we have preached the Word of Mountain Biking, gaining happy converts around the world.