Day 1: Kickoff

All of the training, fundraising, and orientation led to this day. We woke up at 5:15 and headed to the Golden Gate Bridge for kickoff. It was cold, wet, rainy, and windy. Basically everything that made cold weather colder than usual was happening. After meeting with our families and saying goodbye, we rode across the bridge in one big pace line. After the bridge ride, we split up into pace lines of three. Derek Dedeker, Michael Walton and I decided to ride together for the kickoff ride. It was awesome to be together with my chapter brothers for the first ride.

We first rode through a small town called Sausalito, and it took us a while to get through it because of bumpy roads and traffic light stops. From Sausalito we headed to Napa, which was no cakewalk. We covered more than 6,000 feet of elevation the whole ride. For a while I was hurting pretty badly on the hills. Typically, you try to stay within 6 inches of the man in front of you in your pace line so that you can draft off of him and it makes it easier to pedal. Well, Michael Walton is a machine, ladies and gentlemen. A machine. He goes up hills about as fast as I go down them. It was pretty hard to keep up on some hills, but he was always kind enough to look back and slow down for me. Derek helped me out a lot with motivation as well. If it wasn't for those guys, I would have stepped off of the bike a few times. 

About 3/4 of the way through the trip we were going up a pretty sustaining hill. I looked down for about 5 seconds and when I looked up my tire was extremely close to the grass. Having learned from my first big crash I went ahead and took my tire into the grass and tried to clip out. Unfortunately, I was going too slowly to clip out and land, and I fell over. Luckily, since I was going so slowly, it didn't hurt. However, there was a pretty minimal shoulder on the road and I fell into the lane of the road. A car was behind me, but luckily I got up in time for it to pass me. It was a little freaky, but I survived. I caught up to Derek and Michael and we finished the ride together. It was tough, but so worth the trouble. Every mile we had an amazing view, and riding through vineyards was awesome. I have never pushed myself harder than I did today. 

After the ride we had a friendship visit at a banquet at a local park. Each year, a few families get together and hold an awards banquet for a few area sports teams for people with disabilities. Awards are given out, and people get really excited about it. The Journey of Hope has been attending this friendship visit for 14 years now, so some of the athletes know who we are. At the banquet, I made a lot of new friends. We played volleyball, danced, and just chatted it up with the athletes. I met a guy named Ian that had Down syndrome. He was extremely kind and loved talking to me. We talked about sports and movies for a long time, and he was extremely excited about the trophy that he got for playing baseball. 

When it came time to leave it was sad, but great to know that today was such a success. I couldn't be prouder of myself and the guys around me. It's not easy, but it sure is rewarding. 

Song of the blog:

Post 7: Full Schedule

Sorry about the delayed post! Wifi is pretty spotty here at the hotel. It only works when it wants to.

Yesterday was a lot of fun! We woke up at the usual 6:30 and headed to a shipyard for skills assessment. The view was pretty awesome...until security came. Apparently the day before crew had gotten the OK to practice there, but asked the wrong guy. We were told that we needed a permit to use the property, which we didn't have. We had to leave which was unfortunate because that was the site that the Mythbusters do a lot of filming at. It was cool to be at the place that I had seen on TV so many times.

We transferred to a parking lot at Alameda College, and ran through some basic skills and calls for the bike ride. Aferwards, we went to take this year's North route team picture near the Golden Gate Bridge. The view from the pier was awesome, but sub-zero temperatures seemed to be an understatement. The wind was furious and it only made the cold temperatures worse. After manning up and taking a few pictures, we headed over to Fisherman's Wharf to go to In & Out Burger and shop around.

At Fisherman's Wharf a few of my friends and I bought some socks with the San Francisco cityscape on them. They're pretty much the coolest socks I've ever bought - definitely an upgrade from Hanes.

My favorite part of the day came after that when we headed to the Clif headquarters. We got a tour from a Pi Alpha (someone who has completed Journey of Hope or Gear Up Florida) that rode the Journey of Hope in '99. The headquarters was awesome. Their building was lit almost completely by natural light, had ample ping pong tables, a cafe for workers, a gym for working out, a rock wall, and pets were even allowed to come to work with their owners. It was cool to see where 80% of my diet for the next 6 weeks is coming from. I had my first Clif bar today. It was pretty good, but that will probably change in a week or so.

At the end of the day a bunch of us guys went to a fair down the street and found a dock on the bay to sit and talk at. It was great to laugh with the guys and get to know them better.

Song of the blog:

Post 6: The First Friendship Visit

Today we woke up at about 6:30am to be at breakfast in the parking garage by 7. We packed our Thules (our luggage bag) and "practiced" loading them in the car. After that we gathered in the conference room and went over rules of the road and risk management. We practiced some basic maneuvers of biking in pace lines (on our feet). After a good couple hours of practice, we broke for lunch.

After lunch, we loaded up in our vans for the first friendship visit of the summer. We went to Pomeroy Recreation & Rehabilitation Center. It's a center for people with disabilities to come during the day and do anything from art class to swimming to music class. We arrived at the center to find some friendly faces waving at us and smiling. On the window of the front door of the PRRC were two signs. One sign read, "Welcome Push America and thank you!" It was great to know that we were so welcome already. Next to that sign was a flyer that read, "Tonight: Basketball Game - Push America vs. Pomeroy Wildcats." Well, basketball is really the only sport I never played, so I knew I'd be breaking barriers on a couple levels today.

We went into the gym and began talking it up and shooting around with the clients there. Clients included everyone from young girls to an 86 year old man. You wouldn't believe it, but that 86 year old man scored more baskets than me in warmup. Actually, you might not believe it, but I definitely do. That just puts my basketball skill into perspective for everyone.

Warmup ended and we began the game by lining the gym on two sides. Push America on one side, and the Pomeroy Clients on the other. First, we walked in a line around the gym high giving all of the clients, and then the clients of Pomeroy did the same to us. Some of the people there were beyond excited to get a high five, and it was very humbling.

One of the staff members at Pomeroy grabbed a microphone and commentated the entire game. Pomeroy started with the ball, and scored immediately. Almost all of the clients were able to make shots in the 10-foot goal, and if they weren't then a staff member set out a smaller goal for them to slam the ball into. Essentially, Pomeroy just took off on the scoreboard. They told us ahead of time that they were undefeated, and we now see why. It was ridiculous how well these people could play basketball. One guy was brave enough to shoot a few three pointers...he drained all of them. One man made a buzzer beater shot at the end of the game and ran to half court and laid down on his back pumping his fists because he was so proud.

Final score: Push America - 8, Pomeroy Wildcats - 68.

After the game we all shook hands and high fived and the clients went on their way. We took a tour of the facility, and saw that Push America and Pi Kappa Phi really had a history with this facility. All of the way back in 1991, Push America and Pi Kappa Phi built a playground for the PRRC (picture below). It was really cool to see a piece of Push America history with this particular facility.

Seeing the sheer joy on the faces of the clients today really got me excited for the summer. From high fives to scoring baskets, these people showed their abilities way more than their disabilities. It's amazing how much one can take just from an hour with these people. It got my psyched for the summer and now I can't wait to see what the rest has in store for me. Basketball might not be our game, but we have the whole summer to experience this joy.

Post 5: Always Bored

I woke up this morning at 5am to catch a 7am flight. Just like every other airport visit, I was extremely tired and irritable. After two long flights I finally landed in Oakland. I don't know why I feel inclined to share this but for some reason I do. I was standing about three feet from the baggage claim waiting for my bag to come out and a woman came and stood literally about an inch in front of me. This baffled me not only because of her complete disregard for personal space, but also because there were probably 200 other places she could have stood nearby with better access to the bags...but I digress.

After fetching my bike, the crew members for Push America picked two other cyclists and me up at the airport and drove us to the hotel. Upon arrival, we were given a list of what to do. The first item on the list was "Sign the thank you cards." Well, the thank you cards were in number - about 200 to be exact. A lot of signatures and a healthy serving of carpal tunnel later, I proceeded to the next item on the list, "Put your bike together."

"Hah. Yeah let me just put my bike together like it's a set of legos," I thought to myself. Luckily a fellow cyclist who knew what he was doing was there to help me get it together in about 40 minutes or so. After completing that, I picked up my biking gear (which is very cool, by the way) and checked into my room. There are two double beds in the room, and four guys per room. I guess this is their way of letting us get to know each other quickly. We all fit our bikes in the room, and it's quite the maze at the moment.

Once everyone showed up and completed their assigned tasks, our project manager talked to us about leadership, and gave us a small overview of what we'll be doing. After a dinner break, we regathered in the room and everyone had an opportunity to introduce themselves and explain why they were there. When it came to be my turn, I introduced myself as "the guy that always looks bored," which got a good laugh out of everyone. Hopefully I can change that pretty quickly here - I don't want that to actually be what everyone thinks about me.

Overall, everyone seems very cool. I know I'm going to get along with these guys and have a great summer. Tomorrow we have our first friendship visit and a very early morning, so I'm headed off to bed.

Post 4: "Officially" Ready

I put "officially" in quotation marks because that's to be taken loosely...very loosely. Basically I'm just as ready as I'll ever be. 

As far as training, I think I've hit the pinnacle of being prepared. I didn't train during finals week, so I lost all "shape" I was in prior to that. I've started riding every day since being home, and some days I throw in an Insanity workout. The hills here at Lake Lotawana are great for training, but I don't get as much distance in as I would like to. As for Insanity, insanity is an understatement. At least in my books. It's one thing to feel like a champion after making it through an entire workout, but it's another to feel like a champion just because I made it through the stretches without taking a water break. Oh well, I guess I'll get in shape pretty quickly during the first weeks of the ride.

For a while I was worried that I wouldn't hit my minimum fundraising goal of $5,500. Just a week ago I had less than $4,000 raised and less than 20 days to go. In a last ditch effort, I sent a batch of emails out to ask for donations and some very generous people helped me to reach the minimum! It feels great to have that off of my shoulders. The fundraising won't stop here though. I'm going to try to reach $6,000 before the ride. 

While on the topic of fundraising, I want to send a sincere thank you to all that have donated so far.  I can't put into words how much your generosity means to me. While I don't quite know what amazing things are in store for me, I do know that the people that have donated are making them possible. More importantly, your donations are going to an amazing cause. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

The time draws near! Next Wednesday I depart for Oakland to begin orientation. On the 8th, the ride begins. I plan to write again before then, so check back in soon! 

This is a picture I took on the dam of Lake Lotawana while riding a little later at night.

Post 3: A Belated Update

It's been over a month since my last post, but I'm back. I don't think there's too many people reading at this point anyways, so I'm not too worried. This is a long one folks, so be warned.

I took my first ride about 4 weeks ago. It was interesting, to say the least. I rode with one of the two other guys from my chapter participating in JOH this summer, Michael Walton. He met me out front of my dorm to teach me how to clip in to the bike. Unfortunately, once I learned how to clip in, it took me all of half of a second to realize that I didn't know how to clip out. I hadn't even moved yet and immediately fell over - foot still clipped into the bike. Strike one, and Blake falls for the first time. 

When I finally learned both how to get on and off of the bike, Michael and I rode about one block and came to a stop sign. Michael stopped, I unclipped one foot to lean on, and slowed down to come to a stop next to him. When I did so, I leaned the wrong way and fell right into him, knocking both of us off of our bikes at a whopping 0 mph. Just my luck - two guys are driving by with the windows down laughing at us as I stumble around cramping Michael's style. Strike two, and Blake falls for the second time.

We rode down to the Trinity River, which has a path that's about 18 miles long. On the way back from our halfway point, I tried to pass two girls that were walking in front of me - without telling them that I was about to pass. Just as I had the clearance to pass them, I hesitated and my front wheel went off of the sidewalk and into the grass. When I tried to bring the wheel back onto the sidewalk, it caught on the lip of the path and sent me flying forward, bike and all. I hit the ground pretty hard and skidded a few feet before coming to a stop. I quickly bounced up to my feet and assessed the damage as the two girls came running over to see if I was OK. Huge gash on the elbow, bleeding hip, healthy chunk of skin hanging off of my thumb, hands scraped and bleeding, composure intact (miraculously). My helmet definitely saved me from further damage. (Alright mom, it took like 14 years for me to admit this, but you were right.) Michael and I rode about 5 more miles back to campus and I patched myself up. 

Currently scarred (literally), but fully recovered. Last week I participated in the Journey of Hope Regional Team Training in Austin, TX. We stayed the weekend at Down Home Ranch, a place for people with disabilities to live and work. On the first day, we rode 40 miles in nothing but hills and headwind. It was tough, but a good glimpse at what the summer will be like. After our ride we got to visit with residents of the ranch. We made valentines and cleaned the bikes that they use to get around. During our time with them I met some real characters. Not a single person failed to put a smile on my face. 

The second day we rode about 30 more miles in more gradual hills, but stronger headwind. Talk about a never-ending hill. At the end of the day everyone was in bed by 9pm. That's a stark opposite from the late nights back at school. All in all, the experience was amazing, and now I can't wait for the summer!

Post 2: The Phone Call

Mr. Matznick called a few hours ago to let me know that he wanted to get me set up for JOH tomorrow. That means no more wait list - I'm going to get to ride after all. I couldn't be more excited to really get going on the process!

I had started riding the bike at the gym before winter break, and now I'm ready to get going again. However, now is when the fundraising really becomes my main focus. I'm going to have to raise $5,500 in five months, but I know that I can do it. When I was on the wait list, I was more hesitant to send out letters in fear that I'd receive donations and not end up riding this summer. That being said, I knew that being in this position was a distinct possibility. But hey, I'd rather be in this position than not riding at all.

I posted a status on Facebook to let my friends know that I was going to have the opportunity to ride, and a fraternity brother of mine immediately responded. He told me that he had a question for me, so I texted him asking what was up. I figured the question might not even be related to JOH, or if it was, that it'd be something about the ride. Instead, he asked if I'd like to accept a donation on behalf his grandmother to count towards my fundraising. I gladly accepted, and I cannot thank him enough for contacting me. It's that kindness that I'm looking forward to so much throughout this process, and something tells me that I haven't seen the last of it. Fundraising won't be easy, and neither will the training, but if there's one thing I know, it's that I'm going to make it work.

I often tell people that I live by what I want to be able to look back on and be proud of. I can't fathom how fulfilling this experience may turn out to be, but I'm sure I won't look back and regret anything.