When I started with Team in Training (TNT) in 2012, I didn't have a 'connection to the cause'. I didn't even know what 'connection to the cause' meant. I also wasn't aware of how many people are affected by the different forms of cancer (or that there were SO MANY different forms of cancer out there) until I became their acquaintance, teammate, mentor or friend.

I'm rolling in to my seventh year of experience with TNT and heading towards my fifth ride around Lake Tahoe for America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride (AMBBR), coming up in June, 2018.

Every season has been special. This season, though, will be more so. My teammate and friend, Mary Caulder, lost her father in April, 2017 to cancer. For almost thirty years, Jack Caulder was forced to fight the disease on at least six different occasions in as many areas of his body. Though he lost his final battle, he did beat cancer every other time it attacked. The treatments that allowed him to survive, however, had many lingering side effects that helped weaken his immune system and likely made it less effective when it came time to fight again.

I joined forces with Mary and another good friend and teammate, Valerie Antkowiak, who lost her father to non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma eleven years earlier.

Along with Valerie's husband, Mark Pallone, the four of us formed the Ride for Dads team. Our team is raising funds to benefit The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS) and their ground breaking research agenda, which is focused on finding cures for blood cancers. LLS also provides blood cancer information, education and support for patients, survivors, families and healthcare professionals.

The Ride for Dads team captains have a combined total of over 30 years of TNT cycling and fundraising experience. Our goal is to raise $200,000 for LLS. In doing so, our team will name two research grants from LLS in Jack Caulder and Jerry Antkowiak's name.

Here are some other reasons we ride:
Nearly 1.2 million people in North America are living with, or are in remission from, leukemia, Hodgkin lymphoma, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, myeloma and myelodysplastic syndromes. Approximately every three minutes, someone new is diagnosed with blood cancer. Approximately every 10 minutes, someone dies.

Today, LLS is the world's largest voluntary health agency dedicated to finding cures for leukemia, lymphoma, myeloma and other blood cancers. Thanks to research, survival rates for patients with many blood cancers have doubled, tripled and even quadrupled since the early 1960s.

Despite these advances, about one third of patients with a blood cancer still do not survive even five years after their diagnosis, which is why more funding is needed to bring better therapies to patients faster.

Here's how you can help!
Join me and the Ride for Dads team in our efforts to fight these terrible diseases by making a donation in support of our endeavors with LLS and TNT.

Every one of us has the opportunity to have an impact and make a difference. Give all you can and know you are changing lives "one mile at a time." Take comfort in know you are giving directly to the LLS mission in our area and 100% of your gift is tax deductible.