Joe Moser
A powerful story of an amateur athlete’s gender transition and a love letter to Vermont, “Claim the Lane: Becoming Roxy” captivates most effectively when it goes beneath the surface of its subject’s devotion to her sport. The film engages with issues both timely and timeless: gender identity, aging, self-doubt, trauma, community, and healing.
“Claim the Lane” will play at the Savoy Theater in Montpelier on Wednesday, Oct. 8, at 6:30 p.m., followed by a Q and A with director Jesse Huffman and Roxy Bombardier, the subject of the film.
For Roxy, gravel cycling serves a therapeutic purpose, as it can make “the rest of the world fall away,” a notion that is instantly relatable for all kinds of athletes and hobbyists. Now in her late 50s, Roxy attests that she has known she was a transgender woman since her teenage years but was unable to begin the transition process until 2018 due to family and social repercussions.
Deployment to Iraq from 2005 to 2006 as part of 10 years of service in the National Guard is another traumatic experience that Roxy copes with through training and racing. A single gravel racing season is the main focus of the film, and this device anchors the narrative but also limits it in some respects.
While the film’s first half invests a few too many minutes in establishing Roxy’s reputation in the state’s gravel cycling scene and her meticulous race preparation, it also weaves in striking Vermont scenery, including of the Muddy Onion in Montpelier, as well as haunting sequences of Roxy revisiting her childhood home and revealing evocative family photos. We eventually learn that Roxy lost her older brother to a drug overdose, an experience that devastated the family and also led her mother to make a viciously homophobic statement that seared Roxy’s psyche.
The latter half of the film is more consistently poignant and nuanced, as we hear reflections from Roxy’s father about his struggle to accept his child’s transition and his determination to love Roxy for who she is. The scenes with this flawed but caring father and his daughter are some of the film’s most heartrending. On the other hand, Roxy recounts how both her mother and her then-wife were unable to come to terms with her transition. The documentary offers hard-won wisdom about acceptance but no easy solutions to the obstacles Roxy faces in her journey toward self-discovery and fulfillment.
As Roxy approaches the final and most daunting gravel race of her season, the Vermont Overland, her story takes unexpected turns that are richly satisfying and unconventional for a sport-centered film. Roxy’s account of mental preparation for her races is compelling as she discusses how her “self talk” has evolved to channel out negativity. Nonetheless, during her last race of the season, we see how harshly Roxy can judge herself, because completing the grueling contest is not achievement enough to meet her high standards. Like so many athletes, she is a perfectionist, a quality that motivates her but also saps her enjoyment of the sport at times.
The film’s final minutes emphasize both Roxy’s individuality and isolation, and in this way, “Claim the Lane” reminds me of the Oscar-winning docudrama “Nomadland.” Roxy reflects on how gravel cycling for her is “a combination of running from something and running to something,” and she offers an admirably honest and compassionate self-assessment: “I have been afraid my whole life, but I’ve done some brave things.” May we all have the grace and courage to face our fears as she has done.
