Oldsport

Hello all. I posted here a year ago about planning a x country trip to build moral and raise awareness of wounded warriors.

I spend 2.5 years at Walter Reed going through surgery and therapy. I am now medically retired from the US Army. For a while I didn't think I would ever by able to ride again, but through the help of Vet organizations like Ride 2 Recovery I have learned to ride again. Before riding I could almost close my hand over my right thigh. Now it is almost the same size as my left (I am 6'4" 210lb big boy).

Originally, I had planned on doing this ride solo, but through good fortune and World Team Sports we have built up a team of wounded warriors. Some of us are amputees or paralyzed from the waist down. These will be on hand cycles. We are well supported so if anyone needs to jump in a van for part of the ride they can.

We leave the Golden Gate Bridge May 22 and arrive at Virginia Beach, VA July 24. We are taking a very slow pace so that everyone can make it. The website should be up in a few days and I will post the route and updates for anyone to follow. If any of you feel like riding with us for a day or two that would be GREAT. Especially if you are a Vet or in anyway disabled. We would love to have you.

nancy sv

Wow! Sounds like a great ride. I am so happy you will be able to do it after all this time! enjoy!

Oldsport

Nancy,

Thank you for the reply. I have been following your and your families exploits for some time now. You guys are really an inspiration. I am living in DC now but my parents saw you in Northern CA. They called me up because they were so excited. They didn't know anything about your trip. They simply came across you on the road and then read about it in the paper.
Happy Mothers Day!

nancy sv

Wow - what a small world. We've been having a blast and I"m always happy to hear when others are heading out for a tour!

JoeMan

Good job man! I will be following your progress. We never forget a soldier.

truman

Oldsport, I've had the privilege of organizing tours in support of WWP over the last few years. I'll be coming cross country from TX to NorCal oln my own solo tour in June. With luck, we'll cross paths.

Have an amazing trip.

Oldsport

Truman, I remember you telling me about your WWP rides last year. It would be great to cross paths with you.

truman

I'll keep an eye out for your group. Luckily, handcycles are pretty easy to spot. If you get the chance, give us an idea of your routing.

Assuming you're traversing NV on US50 and the timing is right, it'll be hard to miss y'all.

BadKarma62

Oldsport, keep us posted of the website and your route.

As a NAVY vet, Full Steam Ahead!!!!!!

Oldsport

The website is now up. We will be updating it from the road, and I will try (the days that I have internet) and post here as well.
https://s2ssbikeride.org/

Oldsport

We are almost 1/2 way done with the trip! We went over Monarch Pass a few days ago, so it is all down hill from here (in theory).
If you want to see where we have been you can look here: https://connect.garmin.com/activities?cid=192448

benajah

Hey Oldsport,
I am another one of the wounded warriors. 173rd Airborne, I spent 14 months at Walter Reed, from August 2005 till Oct 2006. Lost my right leg in Paktika Province, Afghanistan. I hope you are doing good, and hope you see this message.
Have you ever heard of Challenged Athletes Foundation? If not, look them up. They have a program that basically helps support athletic ambitions of challenged athletes. I do a lot of triathlon races with them and they are really great.
The trip you are doing is inspirational. I wish you the best. I would love to be able to put somehting like this together myself. I live in a suburb of SF and if I had seen this message I would have come out and rode a couple of days with yall, but I didnt know.
Also, if you would like to try to organize some sort of annual Iraq/Afghanistan vet, Wounded Warrior ride, whether regional or cross country or something like that, let me know via PM. I am really interested in organizing something but have not run into anyone interested in the same thing since I have been out. I have been a little preoccpuied with career and things.

Oldsport

We finished the ride Saturday. What an experience it was.

You can watch a short video of the last day with the wheel dipping and some snippets of an interview with me at s2ssbikeride.org.

LeeG

holy crap, thx for the heads up. I'll check out the links.

spinnaker

They went right down the road about not even a mile from my house. They came through in the middle of the day. I had no idea they were coming through. I would have taken the day off and joined them for a day.

Congrats guys!!

Oldsport

Spinnaker,

Riding over the bridge into Pittsburgh was one of the highlights of the trip....Maybe not as great as making it over Monarch pass or over looking Zion national forest, but we all had a great time in your city.

We would have loved to have you ride with us.

spinnaker

I'm really glad you liked it. It really is a beautiful city as long as you don't look too close. I am a good launching point got the Great Allegheny Passage. From the map it looks like you did not take the trail?

If you ever want to return to the city and do the GAP just let me know. I will be glad to act as tour guide for part or all of the way and you also can have a place to stay here night before.