Brad Brown

Another Momentum 94.7 Cycle Challenge is done and dusted. As always it was a great day out I am not just saying that because I work for 94.7 but it is such a well organised event. The weather played its part on Sunday too. It was fairly cool and the wind wasn’t too bad (In patches it did get quite bad though).

My Mom would have been so proud of what we did on Sunday. A year ago we put together a team of nearly 200 cyclists riding in pink in support of the PinkDrive and breast cancer awareness. This year we doubled that with 400 cyclists riding for a cause in Pink on race day. For only our second year being involved I think Noelene, Sharon ,Cecile and all the other fab ladies at the PinkDrive did an amazing job raising funds and creating awareness out of this event. A huge debt of gratitude also needs to go out to the folks at Garmin for the ongoing support as well (Mich you are an absolute star!)

The PinkDrive Group About To Start

I decided a month or so ago that I wanted to do the double. And by the double I don’t mean Read more…

The Pink BlackBerry 8520

Ok, so here is the deal. I have been getting a few very strange looks over the last few days when people see what phone I am using. The handset in question is a pink BlackBerry Curve 8520. Why do I have a pink BlackBerry you may ask? This is my story and I’m sticking to it (actually it is the gospel truth).

Having lost my mom to breast cancer in May 2010 I have been staunch supporter of The PinkDrive and the great work that they do. When I was approached by Research in Motion (RIM) and asked if I wanted to be involved in this campaign I obviously said yes. Who wouldn’t want a new BlackBerry handset (and in my case even if it is pink!) right? As long as they’re not making me drink pink drinks, I am in!

You can get one too if you’d like. They are on offer exclusively through Vodacom at CNA and Edgars stores countrywide. Not only are they really cool smartphones but in getting yourself one you can support The PinkDrive as well. For every handset sold BlackBerry will donate R20 to The PinkDrive on your behalf. So it is win win for everyone involved. We are hoping to be able to raise R100 000 for The PinkDrive through this initiative and the only way we can do that is if you go get yourself one of these funky smartphones!

Another bonus of getting this handset at any CNA or Edgars store is that you stand in line to win one of ten specially designed Swarovski crystal back covers which are almost as cool as the pink BlackBerry.

I love simple but innovative ideas that make a difference in other people’s lives. You may or may not know about my involvement with the PinkDrive and my passion for raising money for their education and early detection programs through endurance events that I am taking part in like Ironman and the Comrades Marathon but I often feel like I am always begging my mates to open their wallets and support the next wacky event that I am taking part in. I came across an initiative this morning that I absolutely love and hence this post.

Roxy Burger

I follow Roxy Burger (Currently of Survivor Maldives fame) on Twitter and saw a couple of her tweets this morning with a hash tag that read #40daysofzams and it kind of aligned itself into the way I was thinking the last or two any way. Not being that religious I have never been one to get give up things for lent. Although at my dik former self it might have been said that I had given up my neck for a long long time. Listening to the radio yesterday afternoon in the car with my 8 year old son Ethan there was a conversation about lent and what people were going to give up. Ethan was asking a few questions about it and asked if he could give something up. I told him it had to be something he really liked, he thought about it for a while and then asked if he could give up school for 40 days. I nearly crashed my car. He definitely takes after his dad. I said to him we would find something we could do. Then I saw Roxy’s tweet this morning.

Ham & Cheese Zarmie

Forty days of zarmies. What a cool idea. The basic idea is this: Make a sandwich every day for 40 days, find someone who needs it and give it to them. It doesn’t have to be a gourmet zarmie, it can be as simple as a jam sandwich. It’s as easy as that! Honestly, such a simple concept but if we can get a thousand people to do it, we’ll be able to feed a thousand people a day. That is 40 000 sandwiches handed out in just over a month! Small idea, massive results! There are thousands of people roaming the streets of this beautiful country of ours that are hungry and I love that an idea this small can make such a big difference. By taking part you don’t need to fork out hundreds of bucks, you don’t need to spend hours of your time all you need to do is make one sarmie a day for forty days.

It is so easy to do. You might make yourself a lunch every day for work, just make an extra sandwich, whack it in a sandwich bag and on your way to work give it to the mother who is begging at the traffic light just around the corner from home. If you’re a mom who makes school lunches, make an extra one and get the kids involved. This is my challenge to you. Get involved. For forty days let’s see how many people we can feed. Post a comment at the end of this post to let me know if you’re in. If you’re on Twitter you can also drop Roxy or myself a tweet to let us know you’re in and how the #40daysofzams is going (don’t forget to use the hashtag in your tweets!). Share this post and challenge your mates to do the same!

Race weekend started early Thursday morning with the 960km drive to East London. I arrived at about 3pm, checked into the hotel and headed down to the beachfront for a short run to stretch the legs. It felt awesome to be down there and in good shape ready to race.

The swim course was open on Friday morning and I took the opportunity to get my first surf swim under my belt. It was an interesting experience to say the least. The first 5 minutes scared the living daylights out of me! The sea was quite rough and very cold (I’m really glad I bought a wetsuit the week before after considering not getting one for this race!). Once I got into my rhythm I settled and quite enjoyed it but those first 5 minutes made me realise I was in for a tough swim on Sunday. I registered and attended the race briefing on Friday night. I also forgot to mention that I had dyed my hair pink for the weekend in support of the PinkDrive who I was racing in support of.

The weather forecast for the weekend was heavy rain and for once the weatherman got it right. It rained all Friday night in East London. The weather was starting to make me very nervous. Saturday morning saw the first Irongirl South Africa run and the weather was superb. Not a breath of wind and the sun was shining. Everyone was secretly hoping this is what it would be like on Sunday morning. As soon as the race finished the wind picked up and it started raining. Again. In the space of 10 minutes the weather had gone from great Read more…

Another count down to another big race commences. This time in two weeks I will be at the 2011 Ironman 70.3 dinner in East London as a 70.3 finisher. Training this week has gone well. I managed to get a few really good sessions in and I’m feeling quite confident. This was my last big intense week before race day, this coming week will be a bit more chilled (although I’m still following the sub 11 Comrades programme) and then the week after is taper week.

This weeks training consisted of 5km of swimming, 213km on the bike and running 49km

If anything its my running distances that are concerning me the most. Not for 70.3 but I have decided to give a marathon a bash the week after at Johnson Crane. I have been looking at different marathons to try and qualify for Comrades and Johnson is it.

As far as kit goes for 70.3 I’m quite excited that I’m going to be rocking it for the PinkDrive again. So I’ll be kitted out in all pink, including my pink Oakley Radars that will be making their debut at 70.3. There are still two small kit issues I need to sort out. Ok they’re not so small. I need to have my KTM Strada 3000 serviced after the front derailer cable came loose on yesterdays ride and I need to get my hands on a wetsuit.

I’m also trying to figure out a way that I can have a map with live tracking on here on race day so that if you want to follow my progress you can, although I will be tweeting and facebooking throughout the day (except on the swim – haven’t figured out how to tweet underwater yet). So if you are a bit techie and know of a live tracking mapping solution I can use please comment on this post.

What an amazing day! I am humbled by what has happened and extremely grateful for all the kind words and encouragement at the Momentum 94.7 Cycle Challenge yesterday.

On the start line of the 2010 Momentum 94.7 Cycle Challenge

As far as the results go, it wasn’t the quickest race I’ve ridden this year but I didn’t set out to go fast. I wanted to experience the ride and this amazing city we live in. I took a whole bunch of Read more…

The Momentum 94.7 Cycle Challenge is happening tomorrow and I’m actually really looking forward to it. It’s been a long and stressful build up to this year’s race. We’ve managed to raise close on R250 000 for the PinkDrive, we have 200 cyclists riding in pink kit and I am extremely grateful to every who has contributed to make this initiative a success. Thank you. We didn’t raise the million rand I wanted to but if you don’t set lofty goals you will never get close to achieving anything big.

PinkDrive cycling kit for the Momentum 94.7 Cycle Challenge 2010

On the race itself, I have been in two minds about whether to race it and go for a decent time or have a social ride and see what happens on the day. I am super chuffed to have my dad and brother riding in pink with the rest of us tomorrow. My bro is a bit of a racing snake (Did Ironman this year and is hectically fit) and I’ve managed to do a few races with him this year already. To be dead honest I am super psyched to be able to ride with my dad tomorrow. He is in his 60’s and is in pretty good shape. He has 11 Comrades Marathons under his belt but hung up his running shoes after his last one in 1995. I’ve decided to ride with my dad tomorrow as I have never done anything like this with my dad before. I was able to do a bit of a ride with Dad on Tuesday morning out in the cradle. I was able to spend a couple of hours out on the road with him and had an absolute blast. If you’re riding tomorrow I hope you have a safe and enjoyable ride.

My Dad out in the Cradle on Tuesday

The Momentum 94.7 Cycle Challenge is approaching fast and I see more and more people out on the roads starting to get active. I hope your training is going well (if you’ve started) and if you haven’t, don’t stress too much about it, there is still time to build up nicely in order to have a great ride. My PinkDrive charity initiative is starting to pick up some momentum (excuse the pun) but we are nowhere near close to where we want it to be. So, if I can ask you a massive favour, please can you continue helping me getting the word out there that we, as a group, are trying to raise at least a million rand at this year’s cycle challenge. The money is going towards a great cause and if we can raise the million we will be able to buy another educational truck for the PinkDrive. If you can forward this link onto anyone and everyone you know who is riding the race, is thinking of riding the race or who has ever thought about riding it. In a nutshell it’s pretty easy to get involved. All you need to do is raise R3 000 for the PinkDrive. As a PinkDrive group we have an awesome start time, you’ll get cycling kit to show you’re part of the group and you’ll get to ride along side some South African celebs that have also committed to ride in support of breast cancer. All the details you need are here, Brad Brown’s Cycle Challenge Initiative and check out Race 4 Charity to see how easy it is to raise the required money for charity