Born To Ride Women’s World Open Road Girl-Sarah Andrea, Story By: Myra McElhaney
Growing up in a strict religious family she learned traditional family roles so when she married, she rode on back of her husband’s motorcycle without giving thought to riding her own.
After Sarah started working for a motorcycle dealership, others encouraged her to take a safety riding class. She passed the class, got her license and bought a Honda Shadow as her first bike. She’s been riding for eleven years now and has a Harley-Davidson Softail Deluxe Heritage.
Now she’s the Director of Operations and Training for Ohio Motorcycle Group which consists of four dealerships. Sarah finds the group a female-friendly workplace. There are two female general managers and women working as technicians and in service, parts and sales departments. The group holds an annual Ladies Adventure Weekend for women riders. When they needed additional women to lead rides, Sarah stepped up.
On one of the rides, the group stopped for lunch and as they were paying at the cash register a shy waitress stepped up and said, “My boss said I should talk to you.” The young woman dreamed of riding a motorcycle but didn’t know how to get started. The women who’d all ridden in on their bikes were eager to share their stories of learning to ride and encouraged her to follow her dream.
Sarah loves the camaraderie of female riders and how welcoming, encouraging and helpful they are to each other. As a coach and author of a book on career strategies; it wasn’t long before Sarah had an idea for a book about women who ride motorcycles in order to share stories and encourage others.
Women Who Ride: Rebel Souls, Golden Hearts and Iron Horses was released early this year. It’s a compilation by and for women motorcycle riders. The book, available in paperback and on Kindle, features women from twenty-five states in the U.S. as well as women from Canada, Australia, and Thailand. They range in age from twenty-three to sixty-plus. There’s even a story submitted by a man. He wanted to make sure Sarah knew about Sadie Grimm who rode in a cross-country race from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada to the town of Winnipeg Beach at age 19 and was the first woman in Canada to win a race open to men way back in 1914.
There are three sections: Rebel Souls which includes stories of Finding Courage, I’m Too … and Cool Grandmas. The Golden Hearts section includes stories of Loving Support, Inspiration and Free Wind Therapy. The Iron Horses section includes stories of Oops!, Just Ride and Who Will I Ride With?
The book is available on Amazon.com and at www.WomenWhoRideBook.com.
Sarah says that writing the book has lead to meeting many amazing women. Her editor, Nicki Snyder, got her motorcycle license in 2008. Sheryl Roush, whom Sarah met at a Toastmasters event is a speaker and coach who encouraged her and guided her through the book writing process. Sheryl introduced her to June Cline, the Southern, Savvy, Sassy Harley-riding Humorist who wrote the forward for the book.
Liz Miller invited Sarah to appear on her Motorcycles & Misfits podcast which lead to her hearing from a wide variety of women who ride and either wanted to take part in the project or made an introduction to another rider.
It’s meeting women like this and having them introduce her to others that Sarah loves. In the introduction, she says, “It is not however, just the riding that I have fallen in love with…It is the women who ride. They have this beautiful camaraderie that is hard to find anywhere else. They come together to ride and nothing matters about their personal lives except the fact that they ride.”
If you’d like to submit a story for the next edition of Women Who Ride go to www.WomenWhoRideBook.com and follow the submission guidelines.
Keywords: Sarah Andrea, Strasburg Ohio, Motorcycle Dealerships, Harley-Davidson Softail Deluxe Heritage, Director of Operations and Training for Ohio Motorcycle Group, Ladies Adventure Weekend, Women Who Ride: Rebel Souls, Golden Hearts and Iron Horses, U.S., Women from Canada, Australia, Thailand, Sadie Grimm cross-country race from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, Winnipeg Beach, Rebel Souls, The Golden Hearts, Loving Support, Inspiration and Free Wind Therapy, WomenWhoRideBook.com, Nicki Snyder, June Cline, Liz Miller, Motorcycles & Misfits podcast, Women Who Ride