Friday, June 11, 2010

Final preparations! And thanks to bike shops!

The school year is wrapping up, and we're tired after 10 months of our first year of medical school. However, in under a week, we're trading our mental exhaustion for that of the physical kind. Two days after our final exam, we're flying to San Francisco, and making our way back to Connecticut.

We've been spending a lot of time making sure that we have everything for our bike trip. Panniers, bike conmputers, bike racks, Camelbaks, panniers, lights, helmets, shoes, clipless pedals, chamois cream (look it up if you don't know what this is; it may be the most important thing that we take with us!), bike shorts, chains, wheels, tents, etc. Hopefully we're not forgetting anything!!

Here we'd like to give a shout out to some bike shops that generously donated to our cause.


Benidorm Bikes in Canton, CT, has been involved in Coast to Coast since the first ride 4 years ago. When we stopped by, we saw a newspaper cutout of the first-year riders, Ben and Jeremiah, posted on their wall. They gave us most of our supplies at a discount, and were a tremendous help by giving us advice on what we need on our trip.

The owner of Benidorm even showed us a broken bike helmet of a Coast to Coast biker two years ago. It had a huge crack along the sides, and just from looking at it, you can tell that the helmet saved her life. It shows how important it is for everyone to wear helmets while biking!!!







Zanes Cycles in Branford, CT, has donated bike shorts, bike computers, air pumps, and Camelbaks. Thanks to our amazing classmate Kate Dannheim who contacted the store and got us these donations! Kate was also one of the captains of our fundraising teams, so we can't thank her enough!


Biker's Edge in Bristol gave us helmets and bike shorts. It's a really nice bike shop right on Route 6.


The Bike Shop in Manchester, CT, gave us tubes, water bottle holders, and presta valve converters so that we can fill our tires at gas stations. The owner, Mr. Johnson, has a wife who works at the Health Center, and his daughter is a 3rd year medical student.
We're almost there! (And by "there," I mean "starting the journey.") We've spent a lot of time preparing, and we would be ill-prepared without the help we received from bike shops. Thank you guys so much for helping our cause!

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