Friends,
Welcome to my personal Tour de Cure® page. I hope you will support me and Team Red in this important event.
In 2018, I visited the largest Tour de Cure® in the country, and I was inspired. I thought I'd try to do the 100k ride back home in Dallas, Texas. But, that presented some serious problems to me because I was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes just 2 years before (at age 60). Before that I had been fairly active in the outdoors and sports. So, when I fell ill, the doctors couldn't figure it out. While 3 of them tried, I suffered for almost three months, and I lost 32% of my body mass (no, I was not overweight). By the time they figured it out, I couldn't walk a 1/4 mile. Oh, and I had not put any mileage on a two-wheeler (without an engine, that is) since packing off to college in 1973 -- ouch.
So I got a bike and started training, like a man possessed. I rode less than a mile the first day (painful) but, with dedication, 41 miles after two months. Two weeks later, 63.6 miles - yeah! In 2019, I ended up riding in seven Tours de Cure® in just 11 months, including four 100k rides – what fun. In 2020, I rode eight Tours de Cure®. For 2021, I am going to ride ALL of them.
I joined the Tour de Cure because more than 34 million Americans, including me and some family members and friends, deal with the daily challenges of living with diabetes. Did you know diabetes is the leading cause of cardiovascular disease, blindness, kidney failure, and lower limb amputation? Plus:
• Diabetes claims the lives of over 200 people every day, more than AIDS and breast cancer combined.
• About every 21 seconds, someone gets the bad news, "you have diabetes".
• That's over 4,100 people newly diagnosed with diabetes every day.
When you donate:
• You spread awareness of the devastating effects of diabetes.
• You advocate for a child discriminated against in school because of diabetes.
• You fund life-saving research.
• You provide access to community programs and free resources that help those living with diabetes.
By participating in the Tour de Cure, I hope to inspire others to join me and raise money.
Thank you for making a generous donation to this cause that is so important to me.
Rick
[Catch me on Facebook: "Red Rick" -- https://www.facebook.com/rick.red.58555]
