When former world mountain bike champion Kate Courtney reached out to VANESSA HAUSWALD last fall about joining her burgeoning She Sends Foundation as its first dedicated employee, it felt like fate. Just two weeks before, Hauswald had arrived at her own conclusion that it was time to step back from her longtime role as director of the NorCal League of the National Interscholastic Cycling Association (NICA), a position she’d held for 15 years. She’d only told her husband, Yuri Hauswald, that she was thinking of making a change—and together they were brainstorming her next steps.
I kind of feel like a proud mom, seeing my little ducklings doing such a great job.
Vanessa Hauswald, a former teacher, was the first league director of NICA and saw the organization grow from one league to 32 with more than 25,000 athletes and 15,000 coaches. And the NorCal League skyrocketed during her tenure from 100 to 3,000 kids. She sensed it was on the edge of another evolution and thought someone with a fresh perspective and new ideas would be healthy for the organization.
Still, it was hard to think about stepping away from something she’d help build from scratch. Hauswald knew she wanted her next role to be as meaningful as NICA and to revolve around the development of female athletes. But beyond that the future was wide open. Then her phone rang.
“Kate called me and said, ‘I know you’re busy with the league, but I’m wondering if there’s any chance you’d be interested in running my foundation?’” Hauswald recalled. The two had known each other for years, as Courtney, an alumna of the NorCal League and among the most accomplished racers to emerge from NICA, had often reconnected with the league in between big training blocks to ride with high school girls. “I’m just stoked that our lives are in the same place at this time, even though we’re 20 years apart in age and on very different life paths, the timing was just wild.”
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