Posts Tagged ‘Ride for Mike’

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I want you to want to

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010

If you happen to follow LowCadence on Twitter, then you know that yesterday was an exciting day for the 2010 Ride for Mike. I had mentioned back before Christmas that plans were underway. Unfortunately there was a setback in my plans. That now is behind us and we’re getting into the 53×11 and rollin’!

The setback was that my desire to create a Waffle House cycling kit as an incentive fell through. My contact at Waffle House corporate was unable to move anything for me and the standard process for Waffle House involvement in fund raising requires you have a board and all kinds of stuff. I don’t have it, so I was kind of left wondering what to do.

The thing is I want you to want to give to the 2010 Ride for Mike. However, I understand that this year’s ride is more narrow in focus. While it fits wonderfully as a way to celebrate Mike’s life, it does not have as wide of an appeal. That is why I had the idea of incentives.

This year the funds will go to the Michael T. McCaskill Scholarship Fund that goes to ministerial students with financial needs.  See, Mike’s passion was serving the young people of his church as a youth minister. It was his calling. Cancer is what killed him. His ministry is for what he lived.

Knowing this I worked with his parents to set up the fund. The mechanism for giving to it (a tax-deductible gift) are being put in place. I want you to want to give.

Here is what is on the table.

My friend, Chris Hartzler, is designing a logo for LowCadence.com. We are going to use this to brand various items that will be available for people who donate at a particular level. The ball started rolling on all of these items yesterday. My hope is that by March we will be ready to start taking requests.

Your feedback is GREATLY appreciated. Now is when we need to know if you think they are good incentive items. If you have never commented on LowCadence.com, please consider giving your feedback today. You can also email me at jonathan@pait.org.

The incentives will include special LowCadence branded… cycling caps, t-shirts, coffee (a special blend just for LowCadence), and kits (jerseys and bibs may be ordered separately). If you have any other ideas, please pass them along. I want this to be the most successful Ride for Mike ever, but it won’t happen without your help.

I told Chris when we were talking about the design for the kit… “It has got to be so cool, that people will take a look at it and say, ‘I’ve got to have that!’” If anyone can do it, it will be Chris. I’ve chosen Hincapie Sportswear to produce the kits and they will be worthy of your body!

Finally, I have spots available on the kit for only two more corporate sponsors on the kit. Thanks to The Worthwhile Company, Best Loading, Hartzler Haus, and Hincapie Sportswear or stepping up to help with the expenses of the event. I have two more slots available. If you would like to have your company represented on the kit and receive recognition through Ride for Mike and LowCadence.com, then please contact me.

… and now back to our regularly scheduled broadcast.

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Ride for Mike 2010 planning continues

Wednesday, December 9th, 2009

Tomorrow I plan to write a more indepth review of the Garmin Edge 500. However, I do want to give an update on my plans for the 2010 Ride for Mike. You’ll be hearing more about the ride after the first of the year.

I have two plans to help make giving to the event fun for the contributors. One option is that donors giving a certain amount will receive a custom kit featuring a 24-hour restaurant dear to the hearts of cyclists. I’m working now to get approval from the company to design and produce it. Thanks to Hincapie Sportswear for agreeing to do the kits and Chris Hartzler for helping me design the graphics.

By the way, while I am hoping to have this one primary sponsor, there will be openings on the kit for secondary sponsors. If you have a company you would like have on the jersey and shorts, let me know and I can get you information on how to be included. There are limited spots available.

A second option I am considering is branding a LowCadence blend of coffee. This would be a special blend and packaging for this event. People who give another yet to be determined amount would receive a bag of the coffee.  The coffee would also be available for “sale” in local bicycle shops.

Chris and I will be getting together here over Christmas vacation to work out our plans. There will be a new website – perhaps even some t-shirts. We’ll definitely be taking some risks this time around, but that will make it fun!

Those of you following the progress of the event and praying for its success, please pray that I will get approval from the company to produce the custom kits. Once I can get that approval, we will be going in high gear – with a low cadence, of course.

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2010 Ride for Mike route

Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009

Not a long post today. Just want to put up the preliminary route for the 2010 Ride for Mike. Of course, it will change a bit as I take a look at the various directions and explore this “walking” route from Google Maps. My initial explorations and past experience with portions of this route, give me reason to believe this is pretty close.

Click image to go to Google Maps

Click image to go to Google Maps

The challenge is to cover the 700 – 730 mile distance in seven days.  That is what I want.  I don’t want to have a situation where it is a done deal before I ever start rolling.  It will only be fulfilling if I have to put out a great effort to accomplish the ride.

As I get farther into my planning stages, I will be breaking the route down into seven sections.  My initial overview of the route leads me to think that I should probably try to get as many miles in as possible in the first two stages.  Three through seven are going to be a bit tougher — especially the final four legs.

Anybody want to join me? :-)

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The seed has been planted

Monday, November 30th, 2009

I finished it! Not having a lot of time for reading for pleasure, it has taken me quite awhile to finish my latest read, Long Way Round. Finally, this weekend, I was able to complete it. With the end of the book comes the beginning of my plans for my own ride.

Long Way Round

Long Way Round

Long Way Round is a book (as well as a documentary) written by Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman. It chronicles their trip of 20,000 miles from London to New York — via Europe, Asia, and America. Their mode of trasportation was the BMW R 1150 Adventure. The book was a great read and now I want to see the documentary.

You can find out a little more about their adventure at the official website: LongWayRound.com.  You’ll find they also have completed a trip Long Way Down where they took their motorcycles from the tip of Scotland to the bottom of Africa.

So, what does this have to do with bicycles? Well, I do not claim to have come anywhere near completing a feat such as these two actors did.  However, I was amazed by how easily I could connect with the emotions they expressed in the book because they were very similar to some I experienced on my two trips to Austin with the cycling relay team the Palmetto Peloton Project Challenge to Conquer Cancer.

It brought back the memories, but also increased my desire to complete my own long distance ride. I’ve already made some steps in that direction, but now I am ready to put the rubber to the road. I’m now starting in earnest my plans for the 2010 Ride for Mike.  LowCadence.com will be the journal of my plans and my trip.

The first part of my plan is already underway. This next Ride for Mike will have me riding for what Mike lived for — rather than riding to fight what killed him. I definitely plan to do more cancer fund raising rides in the future, but this year I am taking a break to focus on raising money for a scholarship fund that is being finalized in Mike’s name. The money will go to help students studying to become ministers working with youth.

That was Mike’s passion and what he lived for. It is his love for his God, his family, and his youth group that defined him — not cancer. The 2010 Ride for Mike is my way of remembering that and allowing his memory to have a continued role in fulfilling his passion.

The ride will not be a trip around the world or even across America.  However, it will be a route that 1) has significance to the life of Michael T. McCaskill, and 2) will be the most challenging ride I have ever attempted.  It will be a ride that will have a higher potential for failure. That gives it a greater degree of challenge and reward.

Stay tuned…

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Getting in gear and picking it up

Tuesday, October 20th, 2009

It is a beautiful morning in Tupelo, Mississippi. Wow, I got seven hours of sleep and I’m not having to rush around to get my bags packed.  It’s going to be a good day!

To get things started on today’s blog, I’ll point you to the video for Day One.  You can read the report of the day here.  You can see a sampling of the day in the below video.

What about yesterday?  It was an eventful and fun ride.  It certainly exceeded my expectations.  Here is the report followed by some video from the day.

We started off waking up in Chattanooga, TN.  We had a really nice hotel that we got for $29 a room!  The breakfast was a nice warm buffet.  We got ourselves loaded up by 8:30 and we headed out to a cool coffee shop in the city.  Then it was time to climb into the KIA and go down the road.

Ahhhh, the KIA… it is an adventure in and of itself.  Those back seat benches are less comfortable than my bicycle seat!  Of course, we have seven people in this seven person mini-van along with food, gear, and all kinds of technological devices.  Oh, don’t forget Bo’s ukulele!

We made it to Spencer, TN where we were supposed to make our transition.  Once again we made the switch off without a hitch.  Then it was time to hit the road.

It was then we realized our first issue of the day.  Nikki was unable to start with us because her bike was on the mechanic’s bus.  She had to get into Betsy’s support vehicle and they drove ahead to find them.

It was a little discouraging because we kept having to move over to the side of the road to let traffic by.  Then we missed a turn.  However, we were able to find an alternate route that got us back in gear.

Thirty minutes into the ride we were averaging 11 mph!  I was starting to get worried that the whole day would go this way.  It made me a little antsy, and I finally had to move to the back of the group so I wouldn’t gap everyone.

Then we hit the sweet spot!  The road changed and there was less traffic.  We were heading into Tennessee Walking Horse country.  Not only was it beautiful, the terrain was slightly rolling.  We all got in gear an started making up time.

First we started a pace line that put one rider on front for 30 seconds.  For a bunch of riders who had ridden together as a group for the first time one day earlier, we did pretty well.  Then we upped the ante and we started rolling with a rotating pace line.  Again, I was surprised by how well we worked together.  We were rolling along for sometime averaging 23 mph.

By the time we met up with Nikki an hour into the ride, we had our average back up to 16 mph.  We held that average until we reached our next transition in Columbia, Tennessee.  It was a great moment to roll in there knowing we had more than pulled our own weight… and that we had done it was a true team effort.

We did make one more wrong turn, but it wasn’t surprising.  The roads we were taking were pretty small and in some cases not marked at all!  One road in particular we sat there wondering if it was the right road until a local showed up to confirm it for us.

Other than that it was smooth sailing through some truly beautiful, rolling countryside.  You can get a small idea of it all in the video, but the tiny helmet cam simply doesn’t do it justice.  The majority of the ride was this way until we neared our finish where we had some wonderful pizza before heading on a several hour drive to our next stop.

It’s great to have Nikki back.  She is a real trooper.  You can see in one scene of the video where she is riding holding her arm gingerly.  Her shoulder might be hurt, but her legs aren’t!  Having her there — along with Arthur and Bob — was a major help in keeping each persons’ work load to a minimum.

Well, off to find some breakfast.  I’ll just finish by reporting that the experience is certainly different that last year, but both times are turning out to be just as enjoyable in different ways.  It’s going to be a good week.

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Crank it up!

Sunday, October 18th, 2009

This is one of the reasons why I am getting on my bike and joining my Palmetto Peloton Project teammates on a 1400 mile trip from Greenville, SC to Austin, TX.  I’m riding in memory of my friend Mike McCaskill, but I’m also riding for his daughter Grace.  “Little Grace, This one is for you and your mommy.”

Grace McCaskill

Grace McCaskill

My first day will go somewhat like this… I’ll be getting up and heading to my church, Suber Road Baptist Church in Greer, where I’ll teach my Sunday School class and attend the morning service.  Then I’ll be heading home to grab something to eat.

I’ll arrive at the launch point at the cancer center at the Greenville Hospital System around 1 PM.  We’ll make sure everything is packed up and we’ll have some pictures taken. Thankfully, Ron Jerina and crew have done a lot to get things ready a head of time.  They have really made this easy for us riders.

At 2 PM some of our family and friends will start arriving.  We’d love to have you come by and send us off.  There could be a good number of folks.  I’ve heard from many people who plan to be there.  It really means a lot – not just to us, but to the warriors and their families that we are representing.

Finally, at 3 PM we’ll mount our bikes and head out on a ceremonial ride all as one group.    Then we’ll stop while rest of the teams will load in their support vehicles to move forward to their next transition areas.  My team, the Green team, will keep riding until 6 PM before we get in our vehicle to head to our first stop.

The Green Team doesn’t ride again until Monday at noon.  That will be our first full 6 hour pull – noon to 6 PM.  On Tuesday we will ride from 6 PM to midnight.  Our final leg (at least we hope) will be midnight until 6 AM on Thursday.  That will be kind of neat because that means we can head on to Austin when we are done and have time to get organized for the weekend activities.

You can keep up with my ride here at LowCadence.com.  I’ll also be contributing to the team’s blog, RideToAustin.com.  It can be a challenge getting things up-to-date, especially if you are wanting to upload video.  I’ll do my best.  I’m also hoping AT&T will have coverage that will allow me to Tweet.  You can find those posts in the column to the right here.

I keep forgetting that one of the objectives about this whole thing is to HAVE SOME FUN! It is true that we are riding for a very serious cause, but that doesn’t mean that we are supposed to pedal all the way to Austin in a somber mood.  Do I think that Mike would expect that? What do you think, Grace?  That’s what I thought!

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Bye, bye, $5000

Thursday, October 15th, 2009

I try to live a balanced life.  As a Christian I also try to follow the Biblical command to “be anxious for nothing… let your requests be made known to God.”  However, Christians aren’t perfect… I’m certainly not!  So I have to admit I was starting to get pretty anxious the last couple of days.  Once again though, God showed He is perfect in my weakness.

Fund raising is not my strength!  I’m one of those people who would much rather work to earn the money than to ask other people for it.  You might think that is admirable, but I think it is a weakness.  My pride that made me uncomfortable asking people to give to my Ride For Mike, robbed people of the opportunity to participate.

I’m thankful to announce that the goal of $5000 has been reached — and surpassed.  The amount we have been able to give to the Challenge to Conquer Cancer ride has reached $6430!  Much of that was through one gift that came in yesterday, but once that one came in several others followed.

Yes, I was anxious Wednesday morning.  Like most everyone else, things are tight for the Pait household now days.  I was committed to making sure that the $5000 goal would be reached, but I honestly wasn’t sure where in my wallet it was going to come from.

I finally gave in.  I told God that He was in control of this and if it was going to cost me then it was a sacrifice I was willing to make.  If He was not going to choose to supply on the front end, then I would trust Him to take care of me going forward.  I guess you could say I was resigned without much faith!

“Oh, me of little faith.”  God took my weak, mustard seed sized faith and once again reminded me of who He is.  I’m sure my agnostic and atheist friends will say it is just coincidence.  That is fine.  However, I don’t believe things just happen.  I also believe in a personal, great, and good God.  It just so happens that so often He uses people to do His work — He gives them an opportunity to participate in and enjoy His acts of mercy and grace.

I’m not apologizing for the sermon on a cycling site. :-)   I would be wrong not to express my thanks to God and to those who He moved to take part in this project.  Thank you to all of you.

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Momentum

Wednesday, October 14th, 2009

As the days pass and the Palmetto Peloton Project’s Challenge to Conquer Cancer ride gets closer, I can feel the momentum building within the team – and within me.  I can tell that the ride is starting to have the correct effect on me because of my maturing view of the ride.  This year’s event will be more meaningful than ever.

Last year I did have a desire to remember my friend Mike.  It was the first thing that moved me to attempt the ride.  However, another driving factor was simply the epic nature of the ride.  It was another one of those things that I could do to push myself on the bicycle.  It was another “notch in my belt”, so to speak.

This year as I draw near to the event, my mind spends much less time thinking about the actual riding and more than on the people for whom we are doing it.  This has been even more gripping in that we have lost two of our warriors within recent days.  It makes the ride seem so much more urgent.

The funny thing is that I almost feel as though somehow reaching Austin will bring an end to cancer.  It is as though we need to get on the road and make it to the finish line before someone else has to face the pain.  Of course, that isn’t how it works.  Yet, that is the spirit with which I find myself approaching these long hours in the saddle.

The desire to ride is driven by the hope that the money raised will be one of many drops in a bucket that will overflow and see a quenching of the fire – or at least a portion of the fire called cancer.  The more I think of that possibility, the more excited I become about the ride.  The more plans I finalize, the more I recall the awesome experience of lining up for the LiveSTRONG Challenge ride with so many survivors and warriors surrounding us.

I will remember those warriors we hoped would be with us and those who will.  One of those who will not be there was featured in a recent article in the Anderson Independent Mail.  I believe the article captured the spirit of our ride well.

ANDERSON — Cyclists participating in the Challenge to Conquer Cancer relay will honor a late Anderson man by taking his bike along with them on a trip to raise money for cancer research.

Scott Shuey, who died of lymphoma on Oct. 5, was a physical therapist for Shuey Physical Therapy in Anderson. His wife, Kim, said he had been looking forward to participating in the second annual relay, which begins on Oct. 18 and is sponsored by the Palmetto Peloton Project in Greenville.

Kim Shuey said her husband’s lymphoma was diagnosed on Sept. 11, 2008. She said that thinking about the gesture to take his bike along brings her to tears.  Read More…

Here is the update on my fundraising.  I am now up to $2100!  I am so appreciative of those who have given — especially Lora McCaskill, the wife and best friend of my buddy Mike.  I’m not only riding for him.  I’m riding for her and little Grace.

Here’s hoping this ride as it begins and finishes will be part of the momentum to a new phase of success in fighting this disease.

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ScottSTRONG

Monday, October 5th, 2009

One of the incredible things I benefited from by participating in last year’s Palmetto Peloton Project’s Challenge to Conquer Cancer ride was to hear the stories of many surviors who have fought cancer and won.  It was also an exercise of my compassion as we would stop at various restaurants and gas stations along the way and have total strangers open up to their own battles once they learned of our mission.  Certainly, while we ride there are people on our hearts for whom we ride.

One of those warriors we as a group had decided to encourage was Scott Shuey.  It looked early on as though Scott would be able to join us on our trip to Texas.  His CaringBridge site was even entitled ScottStrong – a play off the LiveStrong name.  However, it was not to be and Scott was fighting for his life these last months.

Today we learned that Scott passed away.  I received the following email from our leader, Ron.  I never met Scott in person – only through the Internet.  Still my heart aches this morning for his family.

Scott passed away peacefully this morning at 2:15 with his wife and mom by his side in his home.  Scott was able to go to Kentucky over the weekend and be the best man in his brother’s wedding.  It was such a happy weekend for him and his family.  Please continue to pray for his family during this very difficult time.

ScottStrong – This ride is for you.

It seems that the number grows each day of those I learn who are fighting this disease.  Kim, Juanita, and more…  Certainly this is a battle worth us joining to fight… and so, I ride for Mike, and Scott, and Kim, and Jennifer, and Tim…

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Riding for Mike and more

Tuesday, September 29th, 2009

Cancer wasn’t something that touched my life very specifically growing up.  For the most part, my extended family was free of the disease.  None of my immediate family members had to face it.  It was something that happened to people farther outside my sphere of relationships.

Then, in 2006 that changed.  My friend, Mike McCaskill – who was a decade younger than I, was diagnosed with a brain cancer.  My bubble of immunity was shattered.

Mike’s friends joined in the battle with him.  My part was to determine to engage in a charity ride in his honor.  My plan was to raise money for the fight and then present him with a special jersey I had made.  It was my hope to be an encouragement and do something substantive at the same time.

I never had a chance to present the jersey.  Mike died before I participated in the 2007 ride.  My participation in that Palmetto Peloton Project ride was in Mike’s memory – not to honor his continuing fight.

It was at that time I determined to attempt a significant charity ride in memory of Mike each year.  That led me to participate in the first ever Palmetto Peloton Project Challenge to Conquer Cancer ride in 2008.  It was my way to keep Mike’s memory alive and keep me motivated to be aware of others who are fighting against this killer called cancer.

Since that time, I have come upon many other friends – and now extended family members – who have been pulled into this fight they did not choose.  My fund raising alone  probably has done very little to help them.  However, participating in the Challenge to Conquer Cancer ride has changed forever the way I see cancer and those fighting it.

My short ride across the country is an insufficient way to show my love and concern for those friends and family members facing these battles – or living each day supporting a warrior or missing a loved one whose battle has ended.  I ride for Mike… and so much more.  www.rideformike.com

3 days left to help me raise $5000.
$1185 raised so far to fight cancer.
Give to my fight today!

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