Wounded Warrior Soldier Ride - DFW Saturday, March 27
 

Not the longest ride, but the most inspiring one.

Join the Wounded Warriors in a 40-mile ride from Dallas to Ft Worth. All proceeds go to the Wounded Warriors Project.

http://sr.kintera.org/texaschallenge2010

New member... new event... a mention of an "important event that brings together wounded veterans, cyclists, families, volunteers, and people from all over South Texas" when Dallas is clearly in North Texas. The proceeds supposedly go to The Wounded Warrior Project, but this ride does not show up on their schedule of charity events.

Ummmm..... I'm a little suspicious here.

E-Mail reply from a Wounded Warrior:

Thank you for bringing this to our (War Wounded, Veterans & the cycling community) attention. This allows me to clear the issue and provide some much needed support for our Nations Veterans and, specifically, our War Wounded. Please post this reply on your forum. I've also included a pic of Latseen & Joe, a couple of our War Wounded whom I ride with regularly. Thanks again for your support.

The WWP has Soldier Ride. This is a ride for Wounded Warriors to provide networking, hope, a chance to get out-of-doors & camaraderie and to bring and/or keep the plight of our War Wounded in focus within the communities through which the ride passes; "The worst casualty is being forgotten."

Soldier Ride takes place regionally. This year's Soldier Ride Texas is from San Antonio to Dallas. Local clubs and bike shops in communities where Soldier Ride stops for the day will host a community ride, like the one referred to in the forum. These rides are generally short in duration but give the community a chance to come out and demonstrate their support for our War Wounded. Sometimes they are huge, organized, full-blown t-shirt rides like the Lone Star Challenge in Corpus Christi, or, the Mellow Johnny's Soldier Ride in Austin with hundreds of riders. Sometimes they are just small club rides with a few dozen riders. Regardless, ALL PROCEEDS FROM THESE RIDES GO DIRECTLY TO WWP SOLDIER RIDE.

This year marks the first year that Soldier Ride is changing direction and going North to the "Big D" instead of South to Corpus Christi. Therefore, the ride mentioned in the forum is probably a new-to-the-cycling-community ride, and, depending on their backing and organization, could come off as a huge event or a small club ride. Personally, I would like to see the former rather than the latter. So, let us all pitch in to help make this a huge Big D...FW welcome for our War Wounded! Let us be the first to take steps to make sure this ride gets the attention it deserves. ESSAYONS!

The TXPeddler