A few months ago, I was contacted by Cindy Saldivar regarding an article she wrote and was picked up by Bicycling Magazine’s Emily Shiffer called, “How Cycling Changed Me”.

Cindy writes of how she was introduced to cycling through the necessity of commuting to school and how this hobby developed into her full-time passion and lifestyle. She shares her experience and gives some advice that she’s learned through her direct encounters with drivers.

Being a part of the cycling community within Los Angeles, you hear countless stories of people’s experience with reckless drivers. Los Angeles is a massive commuter city, and with that you are bound to have many close encounters as Cindy shared in her piece, “I’ve probably been hit at least six times. This year alone, I was involved in two car accidents while I was on my bike.”

Here at Road Runner Bags, we pride ourselves in being both part of the cycling industry and a small business based out of Los Angeles. Most of our staff commutes to work by bike, and we deliver postage daily by cargo bike through the bustling streets of downtown. It has always been so important to us to advocate for safer cycling conditions within our community. 

For this article, Bicycling Magazine was arranging a photoshoot to accompany the article in a printed issue. As she states in the article, she rides every day with a backpack and she told me over the phone that her current Jansport had seen better days. It was really short notice and we only had 2 hours left in our work day, but I really wanted to hook her up with a Medium Roll Top in time for the photoshoot!

She let me know that the kit she got was varying colors of teal and blues. Even though we didn’t stock Teal backpacks anymore, I just knew we just had to get her a Teal Roll Top and Cell Pouch to complete the whole look!

Juarez cut the pieces I was missing, Juan was on cell pouch and liner duty, and I put together the body of the bag. Now we just had to get it to Cindy. She was on my way home from work so I decided to stop by the velodrome where she works to personally drop the bags off in her hands, just in time.

A month later, the article came out in a printed issue and we couldn't be happier! Cindy is so rad and I am so glad she reached out to us for this collab. In honor of Cindy, we're now offering a couple of Medium Teal Roll Tops on our website, just like Cindy's!