Wheels4Life

After yesterday’s massive (record breaking for most) achievement we all woke up feeling a little sore and nervous for the day ahead - today was the day it became mind over matter! After a make shift breakfast of shakes, protein bars and bananas we headed onto the climb out of Harrismith. Today’s scenery just got better and better, our first visual feast being Sterkfontein dam. With the dam on our right with mountains shrouded in mist the cries of “I wish I was at the office” were few and far between. The lookout point across the dam was our first stop of the day and we feasted on Wimpy egg and bacon sandwiches and muffins. I feel I must mention that this was the sight of our second casualty. Tash, forgetting her feet were attached to her bike, elegantly bit the dust. Damaging ligaments in her wrist, it is now heavily bandaged but she still carrying on – Go Tash!

Next challenge was Oliviershoek pass. Steep descents, dozens of pot holes and trucks coming from both sides made the decent a break squealing affair for some. Others on the other hand i.e. Mr Jody Sheckter Forrester clocked 82km/h down the pass. Tendai not far behind on 77km/h pasted a very bewildered truck driver.

Some very tough climbs made us a very grateful bunch to arrive safe and sound in Winterton. We spent the afternoon swimming, braaing, playing 30 seconds and generally recovering. I know I speak for the whole team when I say thanks to the physios that spend hours massaging all of us – we couldn’t do it without you.

Hump day over, Mooi river here we come

Nats (Oats)

After a teary eyed send off by the B&B owner at Murphy’s in Petrus Steyn, we set off on the what we knew was to be the biggest day of the tour. Daniel and Jody colluded to tell the team of the 135km that lay ahead, knowing that the GPS had a ‘real’ distance of over 160km - a bit of salesmanship/physiological manipulation to egg the team on!

After a tough morning in the wind we had lunch in beautiful Kestel at The Shack, we had already been on the road for 4.5 hours and had done over 100km’s - the team was knackered but taking a well earned rest during the heat of the day turned out to be a massive blessing. Leaving Kestel we narrowly avoided a huge thunderstorm but meant that the weather cooled and the team was rejuvenated. Arriving at Pringles in Harrismith the team was completely overjoyed and somewhat astounded that most of us had shattered our personal longest day on a bike.

The back of the trip is broken and we all can’t wait to get into Natal!!

Tash

 

Well we are now in the thriving metropolis of Petrus Steyn at the end of our second day, and the team is holding up extremely well!!

Firstly big apologies that this is our first update, however 3G connectivity is fairly limited ‘op die platteland’. Tomorrow we are in Harrismith and promise to upload all our fantastic pics of the journey so far.

Day 1 send off from the Mugg & Bean was awesome, with plenty of friends, famliy, and well wishers to see us off. The early morning ride through JHB city was spectacular with the team coming to terms with riding in a bunch and navigating our way through traffic lights and stops. Very quickly we were on the outskirts and into a good rhythm. The excitement of our first day together carried everyone through the day, with the team still full of excitement on reaching the lunch stop at the Circus Tent near the Blockhouse. The final 30km push into Vereeniging saw us reaching our very plush B&B (The Weavers Nest) in great spirits with most taking a dive straight into the pool.

The physio’s from Rita Henn and Partners did a great job in getting everybody into great shape to take day 2 this morning. We left Vereeniging at 5:30 this morning. Today proved to be a far more challenging ride taking 5:45 hours for the 133km over rolling hills with a pretty tough head wind. Although the terrain was tough, the team dynamics have already kicked in with banter and a helping hand always close by. To give you a sense of the camaraderie, here is glimpse into the funny/interesting events of the last 2 days:

• the first minor tumble of the tour taking place on Katherine Drive - 4 kms in!! (Nadine)
• Craig being turned into a circus hay bailer after a cheeky comment
• John blaming his new gloves for some erratic driving
• Far too much chat from the team on the correct use of ‘chammy cream’
• Majority of the team jumping in the pool fully kitted at the end of Day 1
• The athletic Wheels4Life team each ordering 1 litre milkshakes with their brunch this morning!
• Bertus having legs of steel supporting Tendai through some serious hills
• Tendai and his guns powering through any obstacle, apparently thanks to his shaved armpits!
• An obstacle call from the front of the pack of ”Cabbage!!” - there really was a cabbage in the middle of the road!

As you can you see, there is plenty of fun being had along our journey - we continue to ride very safe and take good care of each other along the route.

Thanks for all the supportive phone calls, text messages, and guestbook posts - they really keep us going.

A proper blog with photos and videos will go up tomorrow night.

We truly are blessed to be taking part in such a fantastic adventure with such incredible people.

Chat soon

Jody

The tour has begun, follow the site for updates and pictures of the ride as we head down to Durban.

Click on the image below to get details of the Wheel4Life send off event happening on Sunday 30th from 7am in Woodmead:

Check out the clip below of the team practicing some high speed training outside of Joburg !!

What an experience!!!

For those who don’t know, the 94.7 cycle race was my first cycle race ever. I’d only bought a bike a month before the race that’s how much I’m a novice in cycling (It’s not black thing you see!!! ). I’m still figuring out how to operate the bike gears still (lol !!!!).

I have to say it was an AWESOME experience!!! Before the race I was a bit nervous, doubting if I can do it, in fact if I should be doing it at all,…those were thoughts going through my mind. The team spirit was great and the motivation from the guys was top notch: Hennie, Jody, Tash, Craig, Jonny, Nades and Liam (Thanks guys!!!!). Honestly seeing Tandai doing what he does, you honestly feel nothing is impossible the guy is such a great inspiration.

As for the actual race I had a great time, going through Johannesburg CBD was my highlight as I saw another side of Jozi.

I have to admit though that on my last 5km, I did take strain, it was a bit of a mission…, but I persisted and I kept pushing and well to my surprise, I got through.

This was a great experience that I will cherish for the rest of my life and I am grateful to be part of our cycling team…

Now let’s head off to Durbs!!!

Bennie Mncono

Ok – the 94.7km cycle challenge is no longer as extreme as it was when I first took on this challenge three years. Take nothing away from it, the pre-race anxiety, exhilaration and excitement is unmatched. It is truly something I look forward to every year. The good news is that I (we) are slowly taming this race if the chunks of time I (we) have removing every year is anything to go by… an awesome 4hr 55mins this year compared to close to 6hrs last year….if you know what I’m sayin’!!

How we did we manage to do this - The power of the team (I beginning to sound like a broken record) and of-course decent preparation. I have been extremely fortunate in my short cycling career, to have met phenomenal human beings who are willing to come second in order to put other people first and in the lime light. I am one of those luck ones to be given the podium. These folks have sacrificed time with their families, friends and to greater degree their careers in order to take part of this race in prep for our big “Tour de Durban” (740km) on the 30th of November. Yes the 94.7 km cycle challenge was only practice run for us and we did it within a reasonable time…gloat! gloat!.

I am so tempted to want share the actual detail of our race including - pain, the not so prepared, the first timers, the quiet ones, the polite, the competitive ones, the super strong, the falls, the not so funny jokes and funny jokes, the attitudes and different personalities, the leader and the followers etc…you name it we had it all!!! I am happy to talk you through this on another day.

At the end of it all, the common cause kept it all together for us. The intent was to ride to raise the awareness that Disability ain’t not be Inability. We all knew our goal was to raise enough funds to buy 100 wheelchairs for the folks that can not afford to do so and give them a new lease to life. Now this is cause is big enough for any ego…including mine.

I am inviting to you to chat to us on line during our 740km ride to Durban. I will happily let you in our ups and downs of our race and how this cause is going to keep us all together and intact. See you on line!!

Tendai

On Friday the 14th November the Wheels4Life Team held a spinnathon event at the JHB Accenture offices to raise money.

The event was extremely well attended with teams from Accenture donating a fee for the use of the spinning bike for the 30min slot.

Over 60 people took part in the spinnathon, with countless others there in support and donating to the cause.

In total over R8 000 was raised !!!

Some pics from the event:

A huge thanks to following for helping pull the event together:

• Tash - for pulling the whole event together with an enthusiasm that has no bounds

• Jon – for your hard work and effort on lifting all the bikes, continued support and taking part in one of the teams

• Daniel – for being the funkiest MC ever, picking up the bikes from cycle lab and transporting them

• Hennie – for organising the trailer, picking up the bikes from cycle lab and transporting them

• Jody – for taking the bikes back to cycle lab and fighting Friday afternoon traffic taking the trailer back to centurion

• Gavin – for coming to support and for being such a sport

• Nades – for being the registration chick and doing such an awesome job of ensuring people pay up

• Tendai – for cycling for 1 full hour and always having that awesome smile on your face

• Liam – for the supply of most of the prizes

• Natalie – for organising that you were at Accenture to give me a helping hand participating and supporting

• Benny – for your continued support and taking some awesome pictures

• Accenture support services - for providing the facilities that kept the spinnathon pumping

• And finally, the most important link, Nicole – we could not have done this without you! Thanks for the use of the bikes, your amazing instructing skills and making everything so much fun

I believe in a people….. I believe in human kind and I believe WE CAN as a team. Let’s BUY 100 wheelchairs in 728 days. This sounds like an insurmountable task…but we CAN if we pull together

How did this initiative come about :

As a team our belief in people and their willingness to help without boundaries is unmatchable. We have all had personal experiences to support this notion. The key driver however behind the Wheels4Life campaign is about giving back some freedom, mobility and control of one’s destiny to the less fortunate paraplegic by donating a suitable wheelchair.

As paraplegic, my wheelchair is my back-bone. I am disabled without it.

This is a Short story that inspired our team to do the extraordinary in order to give a helping hand.

One of the things I enjoy is take the occasional casual wheelchair cruise in any neighborhood preferably in new environments. I am happy to talk you through the reasons why the “casual cruise in new environments”…but I think you take a guess.

On this particular day I was in Phiri, Soweto. Barely 100metres into my casual cruise, I noticed coming out of a modest home two young men one pushing the other in a wheelbarrow. On first site, I thought they were also “just cruising” and having fun although their faces suggested otherwise. Out of curiosity I wheeled myself towards them, and that’s when I noticed that this was not a joy ride. The one young man being pushed was at least a Para, by just looking at his legs (I would know after 6 years in Wheelchair). It didn’t take longer for us to engage since we shared a similar challenge. He had been shot by a stray bullet when he was in Grade 11. He never made it back to school for a number of reasons including the fact the wheelchair he got after rehab was beyond repair. His forms of transport for the past 5 years had been either in wheelbarrow; on someone’s back or drag him himself from point A to point B.

For a moment I felt really guilty for owning three wheelchairs, while this young man full of energy and lot of potential was at the mercy of other people to get anything done…including going to the bathroom. This guilt did not last long for I knew I could do something now (give him one of my chairs) and secondly that I did not know any better until that day.

I then wondered how many other people…young and old are in his situation that we don’t know about. We had to do something even if we touch only a fraction of the number. We can do something to improve and change the lives of these folks.

Now that you are reading this note… you can play your part by:

• Helping us buys 100 wheelchairs in 728 days (2years)

• looking out for those that need assistance and raising the awareness through wheels4life or other appropriate channels
• link us with those that share the view that “Disability is not Inability”

Be part of Change