David Hale Sylvester, more affectionately known as Big Dave for very obvious reasons (he’s 6’6″ tall and a muscular personal trainer from Philadelphia), has used his bicycle to challenge himself physically and mentally, much like the rest of us. But more than that, Big Dave saw it as a tool to reach people he would otherwise never meet. When the bike took him to those places, Big Dave wanted to make sure he had a plan for the moment.
As it turned out, the simplest plan has proven to be the most effective. Big Dave has spent two decades traversing the globe via bicycle, car, train, plane, boat, all to simply hug people. He knows how corny that sounds, too. It’s hard to reconcile the massive personal trainer with a penchant for curse words leaving his home in Philadelphia just to go hug people. But there’s no ulterior motive here; Big Dave deals in hug currency, and he’s the richest man on the planet.
Special thanks to Hunt Bike Wheels for supporting this episode of the SGFR podcast. Check out Hunt Wheels here.
Big Dave joins host Dan Cavallari on the Slow Guy on the Fast Ride podcast for reasons only tangentially related to the bicycle. This episode is part eulogy, part comedy, and part adventure log. But more importantly, Big Dave, the author of “One Hug at a Time,” gives us the truest sense of what human connection can, and should, be — simply by embracing the world, even the ugly parts, even the scariest parts.
Check out Big Dave’s book here.
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Theme music: “This Year” by Angela Sheik