July 31, 2010:
Dear Friends and Family, As many of you may already know, I am dog owner, advocate, and am involved in many fundraisers for different types of animal organizations. I'm also a huge cycling enthusiast and ride my bike for both fun and exercise.
This year I've challenged myself to ride my first Century (100 Miles) at the end of August. I'm actually planning to ride about 112 miles with a group of other cyclist. Our ride will take us through multiple towns in Connecticut. We'll be starting in Hebron and working our way down to Mystic then following the shoreline until we reach Clinton where we will head northwest to Durham to finish our ride. Initially, my goal was just to complete the 100 miles, but thinking about it, I thought that it would be great to do this for a bigger reason.
I wanted to ride for a reason close to my heart and for something that doesn't have a lot of exposure. So this is where my love for animals (Dogs) came into play.
Nine years ago I had the opportunity to own my first dog. After a lot of indecision on if I could actually keep a dog, my mind was made up and my first dog, Tanner, came into my life. Long story short, Tanner ended up being the best thing that could have ever happened to me and he also ended up being the smartest most loyal and well-behaved dog you could ever ask for. Unfortunately, in October of 2008, his life was cut short by Kidney Disease. A well known “human” disease but when it comes to animals, there are very few Veterinarians who know how to treat it.
Most people have heard of Kidney Disease and know that it is an incurable disease that will end in death if left untreated. In today's society, there are different medical treatments that can help a person maintain the disease and live a somewhat normal life. But in animals, particularly dogs, the prognosis is a grimmer, or so I was told. Tanner's situation allowed me to do extensive research on the Disease, and I learned that there are a lot of different options for dogs. I questioned multiple veterinarians and most knew little or nothing of the different options other than the one treatment they learned in medical school.
So on August 28 th 2010 (horrible weather date, September 4 th 2010) I will be riding 112 miles in memory of Tanner and more importantly for AWARENESS of a disease that can, in many cases, with the correct knowledge be treated. I will also be wearing a green bracelet to help spread Awareness and hopefully help prevent at least one un-timely death.
This email is meant to help spread Kidney Disease Awareness, but as with any Awareness campaign, there are organizations that need donations to continue to spread the word. After all my research, I found one organization that continually has ongoing research and training on Canine Kidney Disease. For my ride, I have selected The Cumming School of Veterinary Medicine Research Department at Tufts ( http://www.tufts.edu/vet/ ). All sponsorships and donations will go to the Kidney Disease research department at the school in memory of Tanner and in hopes to prevent similar situations for others.
So as I said, this is all for awareness, and my K9 K idney D isease A wareness R ide will be successful if just one person becomes more informed, but if you would like to make a donation, cash is always welcomed, just send me an email and I'll make all the
arrangements, but you can also make an electronic donation through Paypal (you don't need a Paypal account).
I thank you for your time and consideration and look forward to whatever support you can provide, monetary or moral. Please feel free to ask me any questions you may have and please feel free to pass this on to help spread the awareness.
Thank you for your support.
Russ
P.S. Don't forget to send me some motivation through email
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