The first Lancaster-based team to participate in the Race Across America is preparing for its departure in preparation for the start of the epic cross-country race on June 7.
Team Cycle Smart RAAM, an outgrowth of Lancaster-based Dream Ride Projects, is a mixed-four person team - two men and two women - who will start in Oceanside, Calif. on June 7 and ride non-stop to Annapolis, Md.
The team will have a send-off party this Saturday, May 31, at Saturn of Lancaster, one of the team’s sponsors. The party is at 2 p.m. at the car dealership, at 1530 Manheim Pike. Everyone is invited. There will be grill there with hamburgers and hotdogs. Everyone attending is asked to bring a covered dish to share.
Dream Ride founder and RAAM team captain Mike Ridgeway said he and team members, Bob Ansell, of Greensburg, Denise Stone, of Long Valley, N.J., and Robin Smith, of Lancaster, have logged hundreds and hundreds of miles in recent months training for the race. They have practiced the team exchanges they will do at the 54 time stations along the course - when a pair of riders that has been riding will switch with the other two who have been resting. They have also been practising transitions - when the riding passes from one of the paired riders to the other.
The time stations occur about every 50-60 miles along the route, or every 4.5 and 3.5 hours, Ridgeway said. At those stations, crew members plan to leave gifts unique to Lancaster County, such as Wilbur chocolates, or potato chips, he said. Crew members are out now gathering “things that are Lancaster Countyish” to give to the station volunteers, he said.
Ridgeway has a soft spot for the volunteers. For several years, he and youth members of his Dream Ride Projects’ Cycle Smart team staffed the last manned time station on the route, in Georgetown, in Southern Lancaster County. That time station was moved for this year. Previously, RAAM riders finished the race in Atlantic City, N.J. This will be the first year the race will end in Annapolis. With that end point, the race will not enter Lancaster County.
The send-off party on Saturday will also serve as the opening ceremonies for all of Dream Ride Project’s activities for the summer and as a packing party for the recreational vehicle that will accompany the RAAM team across the country. Ridgeway and crew members Judy Flowers and Yvette Hess will be driving the RV to California in advance of the start of the race. They will be joined by Doug Levy, of the Quakertown area, and his supporters, to share the driving. Levy, who has done the Dream Ride Nightmare Tour and Longest Day rides, is competing in RAAM as a solo rider.
The Cycle Smart team had set a fund-raising goal of $180,000 for charity. Ridgeway said that goal has been largely reached, but he said the reality of soaring fuel prices have surpassed the amount budgeted. He budgeted conservatively several months ago for $3.25 per gallon, he said. With the price now at $3.80, Ridgeway said the team needs another $5,000 for the cross-country effort.
Ridgeway, who has been planning for the competition for several years, said he is excited to finally be doing RAAM with a Dream Ride team.
“I am on cloud nine,” Ridgeway said recently. ”I have people joining me for an adventure. We doing something that’s good for the community and we are pushing some people way out of their comfort zone,” he said of the challenge. “It’s almost profound what is happening to me.”
