Rebecca Rusch

Rebecca Rusch is an American endurance athlete whose career has spanned across numerous sports including climbing, adventure racing, whitewater rafting, cross-country skiing, and mountain biking. Rusch has 7 World Championship titles to her name, was a member of the US National whitewater rafting team, and captained the XXX Team on multiple expeditions on the Emmy winning Discovery Channel program Eco-Challenge.

Rusch’s experience expands beyond athletics as well; she is also the event producer behind Rebecca’s Private Idaho, author of Rusch to Glory, advocate and motivational speaker. She has been named the active.com’s #6 World’s Top 100 Athletes, singletrack.com’s Mountain Biker of the Year, Sports Illustrated Adventure Racing Team of the Year, and Outside Magazine’s Top 20 Female Athletes of the Year.

Personal life

Rusch was Born: August 25, 1968 (age 50 years), Aguadilla, Puerto Rico to Steven Rusch and Judy Tomlinson Rusch. Her father was a US Air Force F-4 pilot who was shot down in combat in the Vietnam War in 1972 when Rusch was 3 years old. She has an older sister Sharon Bannister. Rusch attended college at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where she studied business marketing. Rusch married Greg Martin in September 2014; Martin is an engineer firefighter for the Ketchum fire department and accomplished mountain biker. Rusch, Martin and their dogs Diesel & Gracie reside in Ketchum, Idaho.^[1]

Rebecca's Private Idaho

In 2013 Rusch launched her signature event, Rebecca’s Private Idaho, a 100 or 50 mile gravel bike race through the Pioneer Mountains of Ketchum, Idaho. The event benefits 3 charities: the Wood River Bike Coalition, the local voice for trail-building and bike policy; PeopleForBikes.org, a national bike advocacy group; and World Bicycle Relief, an organization that brings practical bikes to villages in Africa in order to provide independence and improve quality of life. This event and others coordinated by Rusch have increased awareness and raised over $30k for these organizations.

Rusch to Glory

Rusch to Glory was released in August 2014 by Velo Press and is written by Rebecca Rusch with Selene Yeager. The autobiography chronicles Rusch’s journey from scrawny suburban high school track runner to World Champion athlete, and all the adventures in between. The book is set in the exotic locales and extreme conditions that forged an extraordinary athlete from ordinary roots. Trekking through Borneo, mountain climbing in Patagonia, navigating the rivers of Vietnam, racing bikes across the Andes—Rusch’s rambling saw her discover the adrenalin sport of adventure racing, stare down her demons, witness the tragic death of a friend, and break through the glass ceiling in sports.^[2]

TEDxSunValley

In 2016, Rusch was accepted as a speaker to the inaugural TEDxSunValley event and spoke to 300 audience members on November 30, 2016.^[3] Her talk "Navigating Home" was 17 minutes long and discussed her windy path to self-discovery including reinventing herself as a professional athlete in multiple sports and tracking down her father’s history to find a connection with her past.

Blood Road

Premiering on March 15, 2017 at the Sun Valley Film Festival, Blood Road follows Rusch as she travels the 1,800 kilometer Ho Chi Minh Trail through Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia by bicycle. The film is produced, directed and edited by Red Bull Media House, this will be RBMH’s first full length production done completely in house. Red Bull Media House “set out to document an epic cycling expedition as well as Rebecca’s personal journey to visit the crash site [of her father], but we ended up uncovering something much deeper,” said director Nicholas Schrunk. “It’s a story about the scars, both physical and emotional, that war leaves on families, countries, and cultures, and how they still exist today.”^[4]

Sponsors & Partners

^[5] Rusch works with a variety of sponsors and partners through her events and professional biking career. Her current partners include:

• Red Bull
• Niner Bikes
• Sram Bicycle Components
• Gu Energy Labs
• Maxxis
• Assos
• WTB
• Smith Optics
• Camelbak
• WD-40
• Buff
• Thule
• Garmin
• CTS Training

Media Accolades

^[6] #19 on 2015 50 World’s Best Athletes, Active.com

#32 on 2013 50 World’s Best Athletes, Active.com

2010 Singletrack.com Mountain Biker of the Year

Sports Illustrated Adventure Racing Team of the Year (2003)

Outside Magazine’s Top 20 Female Athletes of the Year (2003)

Adventure Sport Magazine’s “Queen of Pain” (2004)

Individual Races

Dirty Kanza XL (350 miles) - 1st Female (2018)

Smoke’N’Fire 400 women’s record holder (2015)

4x Leadville 100 winner and women’s record holder (2009,2010,2011, 2012)

3 x Dirty Kanza 200 Women’s Champion (2012, 2013, 2014)

Kokopelli Trail Women’s Record Holder (2013)

24 Hours of Moab solo mountain bike race, 2nd (2007)

Mountain X-Games Adventure Race, 1st Women’s Team (2007)

24 Hours of Moab Women’s team, 1st (2005)

National & State Championships

State and National Championships

2 x National XC Single-speed Champion (2011, 2013)

24 Hour Team Mountain Bike National Champion (2008, 2009,2011)

24 Hour Solo Mountain Bike National Champion (2006)

USAC National Singlespeed Champion: Sun Valley (2011)

USA National Marathon Championships, 4th (2008)

USA Cycling Ultra Endurance Series Winner (2006, 2007. 2009)

24 Hour Solo Mountain Bike National Championships, 2nd (2007)

24 Hour Orienteering National Champion (2006)

US Whitewater Rafting National Champion Team (2001 and 2002)

Idaho Short Track State Champion (2008 and 2009)

Idaho Cyclocross State Champion (2009)

World Races & Championships

Gravel Bike Racing World Champion (2015)

World Master’s XC Champion (2010)

3-Time 24 Hour Solo Mountain Bike World Champion (2007, 2008, 2009)

Masters Cross Country Skiing World Champion (2008)

Eco Challenge Adventure Races (1997-2002)

Primal Quest Expedition Races (2002-2006)

Raid Gauloises Expedition Races (2000, 2002, 2003)

Raid Gauloises Adventure Racing World Championships, 1st (2003)

References