The Two Hills Ride Update

An update on the "Give to Live" ride that starts in about ten days... Ottawa to Halifax; Parliament Hill to Citadel Hill; the Two Hills Ride with many, many hills in-between... for example, we go through Lake Placid, New York where the Winter Olympics were held... twice... 1932 and 1980. There are some serious hills around this area... as we ride through perhaps we will remind ourselves that in 1980 Canada was not in the top ten of the medal count... the USA was third to the Soviet Union and East Germany... my, my, how things have changed! In Vancouver, 2010, the USA had the most medals (37) and Canada had the most gold (14)

Back to the cycling... and especially the Fund Raising... I want to thank my friends and family for helping me get to my goal of $10,000 for the Dr. Ryan Rhodes research at UVic. It feels good to contribute and I am sure all of my contacts have had that experience this year, for my ride and/or many other activities. We all thank you for all you do.

I had been on a very good track with my riding... getting up over 300 km per week for a sustained period. I have been ready for this ride for over a month. However, several weeks ago I had to really back it down... first I had some GI Problems that slowed me down a little and then my left knee started acting up.

This is the knee on which I had ACL surgery (1999) and a second procedure to correct some problems in 2003. I backed off the mileage and things started feeling better... as of last weekend I was back into long mileage, but had night pain that was not really tolerable. I decided to work with an orthopedic zyto see what could be done and yesterday we injected a non-steroidal product called SynviscOne.I was totally blown away by the work-up by Dr. Arturo Rodriguez in Guadalajara, to diagnose my problem, and the readily available product from Genzyme that would lub my knee for up to 8 months. After the ride, we will attend to any issues... but other than some cartilage issues, the knee that was operated on in Colorado by Dr. Jim Reese, I believe the Two Hills ride is well within my range of comfort.

I will be leaving Guadalajara on Wednesday the 17th and staying in Ottawa for a couple of days prior to the start of the ride. We meet up on the 19th and start the ride on the morning of the 20th. I plan to write updates here along the way... and perhaps upload some pics. When we get to Truro, my home town, we will be having a party on the Friday night and then a good send off to Halifax on Saturday morning. I am hoping we will have lots of additional riders for the last leg... perhaps my friend Chad Robertson will ride with us... he was my cancer surgeon during my cancer days. I hope to see him and some more of my friends at the QEII on Saturday or during the week following.

I plan to stay in Truro at a B&B there called the Belgravia... a beautiful in that is about 300 meters from the home in which I grew up during my time in Truro... good memories.

That's it till I update... BR

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