4

About Gordy Ainsleigh

Except for education and military service, I have lived around Auburn, California all my life. I was born in Auburn, and soon moved to Nevada City, where I lived until age 14.


Then my family moved to a small farm in Midway Heights, a hilly area between Weimar and Eden Valley on one side, and Meadow Vista on the other, where I lived until my future wife, Paula, and I bought a home in Meadow Vista, where we have lived ever since.


Rock Climbing


I have become somewhat famous in the running world for originating the Western States 100-Mile Run and the sport of ultramarathon trail running.


Gordy & PaulaAfter trying out several vocations during my 20s, I found my calling, being a chiropractic doctor, in my 30s. I have been doing that for about 40 years, and have no plans of retiring. I love getting sick people well, and then getting them better than well. My favorite non-career activities are trail running, rock climbing, trail bicycling, gardening & landscaping, recreating in and beside our marvelous rivers, tree planting, and wine tasting and garden parties with my wife, Paula.


My Career


Chiro


My career is making people’s lives work better. As a chiropractic doctor, my job is to relieve pain, restore normal function, and help people be the best they can be (whatever that means to each person).


Helping people with their health problems involves many things: The findings of science take about 20 years to reach the public consumer, so I spend a lot of time scanning, and sometimes contributing to, the health science research literature that is available through our National Library of Medicine and Google Scholar, most frequently focused on Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, cancer and the multitude of vitamin D deficiency diseases (i.e. juvenile diabetes and multiple sclerosis).


I also instruct in outdoor skills (trail running & rock climbing), lead outdoor adventures (trail bicycling, trail running, river rafting), and conduct personal relationship coaching.


Board Member - Auburn Area Recreation & Park District (ARD)


Party in the Park


  • PUTTING ARD BACK ON TRACK: When Gordy was first elected in 2004, ARD had been a dysfunctional mess for about 10 years. Less than two years after Gordy’s election, ARD was completely turned around and on its way to thriving. The part Gordy played in that change was providing the swing vote to terminate the previous chief administrator, and then persuading the rest of the Board to abandon their approach of hiring each new administrator based on their glowing resumes and interviews—an approach that had produced four administrative disasters in a row—and instead pay a retired park administrator to train ARD’s honest, hard-working, talented young employee, Kahl Muscott, to lead the district.

  • PLANTING TREES IN ARD PARKS: More than 50 trees currently growing in ARD parks were planted by Gordy.

  • DE-FUSING RESISTANCE TO DOG PARK: When ARD was trying to site the dog park in Ashford Park, they faced +1,400 signatures on petitions asking them to not take that park away from the kids. Acting on personal requests from law enforcement officials to change the use of the park, Gordy de-fused the resistance by disclosing that the men’s bathroom at Ashford Park was a meeting place for sexual activity advertised on websites. This activity stopped when the dog park greatly increased use of Ashford Park by adults with cell phones. It is now safe for kids.

 

"The Original" (video)