Reena Patel's blog

It's been 2 days since the end of the ride...and I am still not recovered. I am consistently hungry every 2 hours, tired, and still a litte sore. It took us 3 hours to clean out the vans and sort through the chaos so that next year's ride would have some clean, undamaged supplies to work with. We were reminiscing about the ride, which was a lot of fun to see everyone's view of the ride. The consensus has been that it was very successful.

Yesterday, we biked into DC. The ride started off on a rainy day and ended on an even rainier day! We biked 86 miles from Front Royal, VA into the Lincoln Memorial Monument followed by a thunderstorm. We huddled under a tree while the bikers rode in. It was really exciting to see the Washington Monument as we rode in on the Washington and Old Dominican bike trail. We could see the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial Monument as we biked over the Potomac River. At that point, the rain didn't matter nor the fact that we didn't have a place to stay for the night.

We made it to Columbus yesterday. We were joined by some portions riders. We left from a park in Loveland, Cincinnati. Almost the entire ride was on a beautiful shaded bike trail and the best part being that it was completely flat.  The ride was about 105 miles. Lisa's brother hosted us for an amazing BBQ dinner and of course we ate way too much again. Today is our Global Health Day at the OSU College of Medicine from 11am-1pm at Meiling Hall.

Today was an event day, which means every rider gets the day off. We were all looking forward to this day because we heard such great things about Telluride. The day before we rode 60 miles from Dolores, CO. It was one of the prettiest rides so far. We rode uphill for about 50 miles. At times, the mountains and valleys were playing tricks on me because I thought we were going downhill. However, riding along side the Dolores River and seeing the current move in the opposite direction confirmed that uphill was where we were going. We reached a max elevation of 10,400 feet.

We biked 25 miles in the cold rain to get to Stanley Oswold Elementary School in Walnut, CA. We gave our very first presentation to five 2nd grade classes on ways to be healthy. They were very well-behaved and very knowledgable about nutrition and exercise. We were very impressed! We were even fed a warm crockpot lunch at the school, which was exactly what we needed to start the 50-odd mile journey ahead of us. There was a 90% chance of rain and possible storms. Sure enough, not even 5 miles into the ride, the rain began. Follow that with winds, thunder, and lightning.

Today was our first official ride with 24 riders (19 national, 5 portions)! We began our ride from Torrey Pines State Beach, SD. It was a surreal moment for everyone, but especially for those who spent the last year preparing for this moment. Unfortnately it rained through the night until 6AM. It was cold, misty, and full of ocean breeze. We were all optimistic and very excited to start our journey that not even bad weather could bring our moods down. We lined our bikes up on the beach with our full uniforms on, ready to start the coast-to-coast ride.

With only 10 days before the 2012 R4WH Team departs for San Diego the team still has SO much to do. We are in the process of getting our vans packed, buying lots of food, fundraising, and of course training as much as possible. Our plan is to leave Friday, April 5th from Columbus, OH with our vans packed and biked loaded. The 40 hour non-stop journey will be long, but on the bright side it will be great bonding time.   We will spend three nights in SD getting to meet the whole team and going over the ride plans and expectations. Our ride will officially start with a Solidarity Ride to LA planned by our Events Chair, Blair Glasgo. Our send-off will be accompanied by local riders. We hope that you keep up with our ride!!

With only 10 days before the 2012 R4WH Team departs for San Diego the team still has SO much to do. We are in the process of getting our vans packed, buying lots of food, fundraising, and of course training as much as possible. Our plan is to leave Friday, April 5th from Columbus, OH with our vans packed and bikes loaded. The 40 hour non-stop journey will be long, but on the bright side it will be great bonding time.   We will spend three nights in SD getting to meet the whole team and going over the ride plans and expectations. Our ride will officially start with a Solidarity Ride to LA planned by our Events Chair, Blair Glasgo. Our send-off will be accompanied by local riders. We hope that you keep up with our ride!!