Thursday, 6/5/97 Bicyclists journey across state in fund-raiser
Riders brave 525 miles of road to help raise money for research
By Monica Paknad Daily Bruin Contributor The fourth-annual
California AIDS ride, the largest fund-raiser nationwide to benefit
AIDS organizations, is well under way and scheduled to cruise into
its final destination, Los Angeles, on Saturday. Already into their
fifth day of the ride, approximately 2,600 bicyclists, each raising
a minimum of $2,500 dollars in pledges, are cycling through the
seven-day ride down the California coastline. Their 525-mile
journey began Sunday in San Francisco alongside the cheering and
applause of onlookers at their departure. Traveling an average of
82 miles per day, breaks are scarce and cyclers stop only to camp
in tents at night. According to Judy Scheer, volunteer coordinator
for the closing ceremonies at the Los Angeles branch of the
California AIDS Ride, this year’s event has raised $9.5 million
already, although the figure continues to grow. "Both California
AIDS Rides (in the last two years) were the single most profitable
AIDS fund-raisers on the planet," she said. The California AIDS
Ride is just one of the regional bicycle rides, chiefly sponsored
by the liquor company Tanqueray that raised $26 million in 1996 for
AIDS, the leading killer of people between the ages of 25 to 44 in
the United States. Locally, the event benefits the Los Angeles Gay
and Lesbian Center, which houses the Jeffrey Goodman Special Care
Clinic, the largest provider of HIV and AIDS care in the country.
Additionally, Scheer said, nearly half of the proceeds from the
event benefit the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, located in a city
where an estimated 1000 people will become infected with HIV this
year. The beneficiary AIDS service organizations use funds to
facilitate patients’ access to upcoming new treatment options.
Scheer points out that participants come from all walks of life and
"every person on the ride has a story. Many have lost family
members or friends." There are even HIV-positive riders whom Scheer
calls the "positive peddlers." San Franciscan participant Anna
Heath, who has survived her 11th year of being HIV positive,
credits her well-being to the kindness and generosity of the San
Francisco AIDS Foundation. A past participant in the ride herself,
Scheer rode two years ago in tribute to her "oldest and dearest
friend" who lost his battle with AIDS. She found it to be "the
first step in moving through the grief." Scheer described the event
as "one of the most deeply moving experiences you can have" and a
"catalyst for changing your life." This year’s event certainly was
a life-altering event for one participant, Christine Renner, a
23-year-old Oakland, Calif., resident who had never ridden a
bicycle before committing to train for the big event. "You’re there
to give, and what’s amazing is how much you get back in return,"
Scheer said. The UCLA Medical Center is one organization which has
donated support to the cause since the first ride in in 1994.
Sponsoring the largest portion of the medical care for the event,
the UCLA Medical Team travels amongst the 130 support vehicles,
making a "tremendous impact" on the event, according to Scheer. "We
just love them," she said. Why did the event coordinators select
cycling as the activity upon which to base this fundraiser? A
brainchild of Dan Pallotta, founder of a fund-raising consulting
firm that organized the five AIDS Rides in the United States, the
concept developed from cross-country bike trips with his Harvard
classmates he had organized to raise money for hunger relief. In
1994, he launched the first AIDS Ride with 478 cyclists riding from
San Francisco to Los Angeles in seven days, and the event has grown
even larger ever since. Scheer offers a personal opinion of why
cycling is an appropriate activity for the fundraising for AIDS:
"Bicycling is a beautiful metaphor for getting from one place to
another, better place – moving on." With reports from Daily Bruin
wire services.