‘225’: Recovery road

It’s 6:52 in the morning. Sunrise. Baton Rouge Beach. With a whir, Mike Bitton glides across the lot and aligns his white bike with my blue one. He sports a boyish grin. “Morning,” he says. The lilt of his native Canada rings out over the traffic. We’ve met, reporter and source, for a morning bike ride, not an interview. I leave my notebook in the car. It’s February, one of those gilded winter days: elixirs that balance out the choking humidity that fills much of our year in the Deep South. We chat about the weather. The miracle that Bitton is here at all—let alone on his bike—sits unspoken between us like a childhood secret. Two years ago this month, Bitton was nearly killed during a hit-and-run accident while cycling on River Road. Since the accident, Bitton has wowed doctors, first by surviving, then by riding his bike again. Last November, Bitton completed the Florida Ironman Triathlon: That’s a 2.4-mile ocean swim and a 112-mile bike ride topped off by a 26.2-mile run. Bitton jokes that he’s become the “poster boy of bicycling safety” around Baton Rouge. He’s been active in several bike safety campaigns in the past year. He has organized blood drives and races to raise awareness for first responders. Read the full story by Amy Alexander in the current issue of 225 here.