24 Hours in the Sage

24 Hours in the Sage is 6 days away. I'm registered for the 12 hour solo category. Stoked. The longest I've been on a bike is 8 hours. We'll see how this goes.

Just got in from my first night ride in a while. Wanted to check lighting systems, placement, and batteries. It's always spooky out there at night for me. Tonight I saw porcupines, deer, and cows. It's what I don't see that freaks me out. I also got to witness a very beautiful moon-rise over Mount Crested Butte. Sweet.

I start racing at 12:00am on Sunday August 16 and ride through until 12:00pm of the same day. The event is a 24 hour race but I've chosen to race the 12 hour option. I'm not sure if I aspire to ride a full 24 hour event. I'll have a better idea at noon on Sunday.

I've also chosen to ride for the Episcopal Relief and Development Fund. If you're reading this, you likely received the details. I'm asking friends to choose an amount to donate for each 13 mile lap completed. ERDF is a very cool organization. I struggled about the decision to ask my friends to donate to a faith-based organization but I'm confident in ERDF's work and their goals are solid. You can check them out here:

www.er-d.org

Donate here:

www.er-d.org/donate-select.php

There are several funds you can donate to. They range from HIV/AIDS, specific regions, Women's Development, Clean Water, or Greatest Need. After you select the fund, you'll click through and enter your information. Please select the option to give in honor of someone and enter "Dave Dolph" in the boxes provided. This will help us keep track of how much money is raised from the race. After the race I'll post on this blog the number of completed laps.

24 Hours in the Sage isn't connected to ERDF. My fund raising is something I decided to do independently.

Please keep visiting the site for updated info. We're going to try to do live updates through the night and morning of the race...depending on how coherent Jake and John are in the pits. I'll try to write a few words between laps while we're switching batteries and water bottles. Thanks for your support.