December 4, 2006 1:31 pm
New Fave Route… No Doubt
Posted by Will under biking
Following up on my post about Saturday’s awesome bike ridings, I went into Gmaps and charted the course of the loop around Dodger Stadium through Elysian Park. Turns out to be about a 10.2-mile course, like so:
Also viewable here: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=573201.
I had a job interview this morning that despite my self-critical nature went pretty well as job interviews go, and as such I’m torn between rewarding myself/burning the event’s stress off with either this route or a sunset/full moon ride up to the Observatory. Hey… Maybe I’ll do both!
December 5th, 2006 at 12:20 am
Hey Will,
Long time creeper of your blog. I do not know why I am drawn to a “strangers” blog, but I am. I have exchanged a few words with you before though. Anyways, I was wondering if you ever considered doing the AIDS/LifeCycle ride? If you are unfamiliar with it, http://www.aidslifecycle.org
It seems like something you would be interested in, but then again… what do I know.
Keep up the great writing,
Nick
December 5th, 2006 at 8:56 am
Hey there Nick,
Thanks for reading my stuff, man. If you’re the guy that was doing that report on bicycling… how’d it turn out?
Funny you should mention the AIDS/LifeCycle rides. I helped a former friend train and raise money for the 2001 California AIDS Ride with plans on participating in 2002 until all the crap fell out early in that year about the reasons why the ride’s beneficiaries broke their connection to it because of questions as to how much of the money raised actually goes to AIDS research and charities.
It got pretty ugly, and as you probably know the AIDS/LifeCycle rides are a spin off that was started in 2002 in objection to how the California AIDS Rides were being handled.
All the confusion and accusations and competing rides soured me and that former friend on the whole thing and so we skipped it that year and instead we organized our own ride in ‘03 to benefit an animal conservation organization. Together we raised more than $4000 and at the end of September 2003 the two of us (along with another friend serving as our SAG driver in a rented Buick) set out from the Golden Gate Bridge down the coast at the end of September 2003 and seven days and 475 miles later rolled across the finish line in Santa Clarita.
Having done such a grassroots ride where I covered my own expenses and every penny of the money raised went to our beneficiary I don’t know if I’d do an organized ride where a certain percentage of the money I raise goes to support the ride organizers. That’s not meant to imply anything negative, just a personal preference.
I have hopes of one day doing an even longer ride beginning at the Oregon/Cali border and going all the way down to the Baja to benefit the preservation of the California condor.