The back-breaking labor was the easy part when Eagle Scout Taylor Countryman led a group of volunteers to install a bike rack.

The hard part, he said, came when he had to overcome his shyness and make the phone calls needed to organize all the help.

Countryman, a freshman at Kahuku High and Intermediate, led a group of 40 volunteers earlier this year in installing a bike rack at the entrance to the Brigham Young University-Hawai'i campus' athletic arena. His leadership earned him the rank of Eagle Scout at the age of 14 and recognition Sept. 1 from his fellow Scouts.

"I had to learn to deal with unexpected problems," Countryman said. "My troop and church volunteered. I had to make a lot of phone calls and I'm kind of shy."

To achieve the Eagle Scout rank, Countryman had to meet six requirements that ranged from being an active troop member to earning 21 merit badges and leading a service project.

Countryman is also a member of the Order of the Arrow, a Boy Scout honor society, and earlier this year was elected by other Scouts to be the Island Chief to represent them at a conference on Kaua'i.

Only about 3 percent of all Boy Scouts nationwide ever earn the rank of Eagle Scout — the highest rank in scouting. Famous Eagle Scouts include Willie Banks, a former world record holder in the triple jump and long jump; Dr. William DeVries, the surgeon who transplanted the first artificial heart; former President Gerald Ford; and astronauts Neil Armstrong and Ellison Onizuka.

"It all comes down to the resolve of the boy himself to finish the scouting requirements," said Wes Duke, a BYUH director of financial aid and charter unit organizational representative for Troop 310, of which Countryman is a member. "Most people get close and they regret that they never did finish it up."

Countryman and the BYUH director of the physical plant identified areas that would benefit from a service project. The bike rack was one.

When they got to the athletics complex, several bicycles were chained to sign poles, trees and each other. From that jumble of bikes, Countryman laid his plan.

He identified and sought out the volunteers and the specific manpower to lay a concrete foundation and then obtained a bike rack to be anchored into the concrete.

"The hardest part was the organizing," Countryman said. "Without the organizing, the labor couldn't be done. I've worked on other Eagle Scout projects, but nothing like this."

Typically the projects are smaller in scope, Duke said. Normally, they're fundraisers or blood drives — not organizing 40 volunteers over a period of seven weeks and obtaining donations from BYU-Hawai'i, Ace Hardware of La'ie and Foodland.

"Most of the time, it's the mom pushing the son," said Marty Countryman, Taylor's mother. "But Taylor has liked scouting ever since he was little. I'm one of the lucky ones. I didn't have to force him to do this."

Reach Suzanne Roig at sroig@honoluluadvertiser.com.