MS Ride Wrap Up

I apologise for not getting this out sooner…but the MS Ride GB2L 2015 was a great success.  Other than a little bit of wind at the end of each day’s ride, the weather was warm and sunny.  I couldn’t have asked for much better.

As usual, we start out on the drag strip at the Grand Bend Motorplex.  The route to London isn’t closed to traffic so they let 100 or so riders go at a time.   We had a “team event” the evening before, so we were a little less than bright eyed and bushy tailed at the start line for 6 AM.  With 1500 riders total we had some time for pictures.  I looked at it as an opportunity to say hello to 700 or so riders as I passed them on the 82km trip to London.

The ride to London was pleasantly uneventful.  Beautiful weather, loads of rest stops, no mechanical incidents or accidents.  The first leg took us a little over 3.5 hours with a stop for lunch.

My fund raising goal was $5000 and if you’ve been following this blog you knew I was getting close.  Happily, on the day before my ride I hit my goal.  In the evening all the riders gathered in the hockey arena to hand out a few awards, learn about what the money raised was going to be doing for the MS Society and pat ourselves on the back for a job well done.  It turns out that everyone who raised more than $5k had to get up on stage, introduce ourselves, state where we were from and announce how much we raised.

Here is a pic from my perspective on the stage.  Thank you to everyone that helped me reach my fundraising goal. 🙂 I am looking forward to raising the same or more for the MS Ride 2016.

We got to bed at a more reasonable hour on Saturday so we were ready to go on Sunday.  Again more beautiful weather to get us out of London and once the fog cleared, my team captain Elaine Rankine and I pedaled our way back to Grand bend in almost exactly 3 hours with quick stops at every rest area to top up our bottles and bellies.

MS Ride 2015 now in the books, I have some gift cards to give away for everyone’s help in fund raising.  A couple of weeks ago I announced that everyone who contributed at least $50 would get in a draw for one $50 gift card to the Keg and everyone who contributed at least $100 would get in a draw for one $100 gift card to Petro Can.  I am happy to announce that Rob and Jan P won the $50 Keg card and Anand S won the $100 Petro Can card.  I will get in touch with each of you privately to arrange a drop off.

Again, thank you so much for your help in the fight against MS.  I look forward to doing this again next year.