Depite being back at my desk, or perhaps because of it I am more than ready to get back on the bike for a good cause. I am just back in from San Jose, CA. and another hot 100 miles, a few of which were spent trailing Lance Armstrong who can still ride a bike with some alacrity despite somewhat feeble declarations to the contrary. San Jose was the second stop of the superbly orchestrated Livestrong Challenge series whereby cyclists, runners and walkers participate in their respective disciplines to raise money for the Lance Armstrong Foundation. On another, also rather hot day a couple weeks ago, $1.0M dollars was raised in Portland, OR. This weekend past $1.5M was raised in San Jose, CA. Next it is onto Philadelphia, PA in August. I have no doubt it will be just as hot there and that the dollars raised will continue to climb right along with the mercury. We will wrap the Challenges up in a still (hopefully) balmy Austin, TX. in October.
San Jose was not merely as hot as a wood fired pizza oven, it was about as smoky as one, courtesy of the states current incendiary properties. The hills on either side of the valley being barely visible though only a mile or two away. Sunday morning dawns fairly cool and some thirty five hundred plus participants are unleashed by the national anthem as trumpeted by a young dentist from New Orleans who proceeds to cycle the battered instrument around various refreshment stops jazzing up the exhausted or those on their way to being so. (more…)
