Page 25 - Leadership Lessons of the White House Fellows

THE PROGRAM

PELOTON ONE: PEDALING WITH THE PRESIDENT
During my Fellowship year I worked hard, and yes, I got to play football
with quite a few White House insiders. I have lots of stories to tell about
the amazing year I spent in Washington, but it turns out that every Fellow
has stories to tell. Take Louis O’Neill (WHF 04–05) and Travis Matheson
(WHF 07–08) for example. Now, these guys have stories.

At least twice each year during his two terms in office, President George
W. Bush met with each White House Fellows class. “One of my favorite
activities as president is to meet with the White House Fellows,” Bush said.
“I love to sit down with the Fellows and answer their questions. It’s an
inspiring experience for me.” In fact, President Bush enjoyed his associa-
2
tion with the Fellows so much that he invited a few to join him in one of
his favorite pastimes: mountain biking. The first Fellow invited along for
the ride was O’Neill, who at that time was serving as a special assistant to
Secretary of State Colin Powell.
“At the end of one of our meetings with the president, we were all chat-
ting, and he mentioned he was going to ride his bike that weekend. He
asked if anyone rode, and somebody suggested he talk to me because I was
captain of Stanford’s cycling team,” O’Neill recalled. “And he said, ‘Oh,
really? Well, you’re coming with me.’” So it was that O’Neill became part
of President Bush’s riding group, Peloton One. He rode with the president
for over an hour at a time most weekends, nearly fifty times in all. O’Neill
was surprised at the president’s athleticism—and his mischievous nature.
“We rode in a pack, and he was always in front pushing the pace, and he
would routinely outrun some of the invitees and also some of the Secret
Service guys who were half his age. He took such pleasure in leaving peo-
ple behind. It was so much fun,” O’Neill said. Occasionally, the president
would stop the ride and organize everyone into a trail-clearing crew, hand-
ing out rakes, clippers, and cutters so that they could create a new path for
the next weekend’s ride.
Another Fellow who rode with the president most weekends during his
year in Washington was Travis Matheson, a lieutenant with the Washing-
ton State Patrol and a triathlete. “There were probably eight or ten of us

2 George W. Bush, remarks, White House Fellowship Fortieth Anniversary Gala Celebra-
tion (Washington D.C., 2005).

10