Capitol to Capitol
28 Day Bike Ride To Benefit Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Center
Photo available for download. Captions available at end of release.
(Washington, DC to Baton Rouge) - On July 10, four riders, ages 20-25, will embark on a 28 day, 1,800 mile journey to promote cancer awareness and raise funds to support Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Center’s CARE Network.
The journey will begin in Washington DC where the riders will lobby the Louisiana delegation for current and future bills to provide funds for cancer research. They will then ride back to the Louisiana State Capitol, with a van following for support. To track their progress or to make a donation visit www.capitoltocapitolride.blogspot.com or www.capitoltocapitolride.org.
Who: Four riders from age 20 to 25 who have family or friends fighting the battle against cancer
What: 1,800 mile van-supported bicycle ride
When: July 10-August 9, 2007
Where: Washington, D.C. to Baton Rouge, LA
Why: To raise cancer awareness and funds for Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Center’s CARE Network. The CARE Network was established in 2002 to reduce cancer incidence and mortality in southeast Louisiana and to improve the quality of life for those affected by cancer.
How you can help: We will gladly and gratefully accept any support you can give us, or you can select from the levels of sponsorship below.
Underwriting Sponsor: Sponsor two riders for the entire trip: $5000
Platinum Sponsor: Sponsor one rider for the entire trip: $2500
Gold Sponsor: support one rider for 12 days: $1000
Silver Sponsor: support one rider for 6 days: $500
Bronze Sponsor: support one rider for 3 days: $250
The Plan: We are four friends who enjoy cycling and who have family or friends who are fighting or have fought cancer. On this trip, we hope to raise enough money to make a significant impact in the fight against this disease. Here is a brief synopsis of our plan:
We will drive to Washington to lobby the Louisiana delegation for current and future bills which provide funds for our cause, then begin our ride back to the Louisiana State Capitol, with the van following for support and gear. Switching drivers in such a way to give a rest day every fourth day to each rider, we will ride roughly 75 miles per day. The total distance is approximately 1800 miles and should take us (with weather days built in) around 28 days. Concerning transportation, we have budgeted $800 for fuel costs.
We’re ready for anything and want to raise the maximum amount of money for our cause, so we’ve planned to camp out to conserve our resources. However, riding for such extended distances daily leaves us smelling ripe and in need of a good night’s sleep in a real bed, so we will stay in a motel every other night. While we are intrepid adventurers, we don’t mind doing what we can to stay indoors, such as registering with groups like WarmShowers.com and contacting churches and schools to locate under-roof accommodations, even if we have a motel scheduled for that night, as we are always mindful of the bottom line. We want as much money as possible to go directly to the C.A.R.E. Network’s programs of awareness, education, early detection, and research. Though we hope to spend less, concerning lodging, we have budgeted $1175 for lodging costs.
Professional cyclists can burn nearly 8,000 calories on a tough race day. While we are decidedly less talented than Lance, we will be burning around 4,000 per day-that’s twice the amount of food we’d eat on a normal day. We’ll pack a cooler, hit the supermarket, and make sandwiches and pasta ourselves in order to keep the overhead low; but since we’ll need to eat so much, we anticipate food to cost us around $2400.
You know that guy Murphy, the guy who’s always around when things go wrong? Well, in addition to paying for laundry, chain lube, campsite fees, and other odds and ends, we’ll need some extra cash for flats, crashes, and the like. We don’t anticipate anything serious, but nobody ever really invites ol’ Murphy, do they? To protect against such mishaps, we’ve allocated $700 for maintenance and incidentals.
Now, our goal is not only to raise money for cancer research, but to educate folks we meet about what they can do. In order to gain attention and recognize our sponsors, we are having jerseys made so we’ll look like we mean business--because we do. As always, we’ve done our best to find the best value and as a result, we’ve designated $650 for uniforms.
We aim to raise $50,000, using 15% or less of the total for overhead, including unused portions of the budget with the amount donated.