TRYING TO DO THE RIGHT THING
Sometimes we like to give back, sometimes we like to pay it forward. Over the last couple of years, we’ve conducted several raffles, donating a bike or some kind of merchandise, letting the world know about it, then giving all the proceeds to the charity. The more that people hear about it, the more people will give. And 100% of every penny that comes in goes to the charity we choose to support.
Enter Elden Nelson. Elden is also known as Fatty or The Fat Cyclist. He’s been penning a wonderful blog for years. Despite having a full time job, a wife and four kids, Elden always found time to write his witty ramblings. Then his wife’s cancer came back. With a vengeance. It metastasized and attacked her body. Susan fought and fought. Elden chronicled her gruesome battle with this terrible disease. Susan kept fighting. Elden kept writing. Then he began to raise money to fight cancer. And a lot of people heeded his call. Susan passed away in the summer of 2009. Elden kept fighting. Despite working full time, and in addition to writing his blog, and despite caring for his wife and ultimately planning her funeral, and despite raising his 4 kids, Elden has raised over $750,000 in the first ten months of 2009 and given every penny to the Lance Armstrong Foundation. And he’s not stopping here.
We’ve had the honor to help Elden with a couple of these efforts.
October 2009 Raffle
The latest ended Tuesday, Oct 20th, 2009.
It was a raffle where the winner gets to choose any Ibis bike then gets a plane flight to just about anywhere and ride with our founder Scot “Chuck Ibis” Nicol, Andy Hampsten and Elden.
You can read about the raffle here. And here. And here, where we start to really get into what the winner will get.
On this raffle, the kind and generous donations raised $47,330 to fight cancer. Every penny of that total went to The Foundation.
Our winner is a nice guy named Kyle from Evergreen Colorado. He made a very nice donation to The Foundation. He’s going to get a Silk SL. We’re going to go for a bike ride together. Somewhere, maybe California.
Here’s a picture of our winner, on a nice old Moots YBB that he rides.
Congratulations to Kyle, and than all of you who entered!
April 2009 Raffle
In the Spring of 2009, we raffled off a Mojo with all the proceeds going to the Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship, a hard working group of folks who build trails in the Sierra around Downieville and Graeagle California.
DOWNIEVILLE RAFFLE RESULTS!
Of our raffle to win a fully decked out Ibis Mojo, with all the proceeds going to the Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship, ended Monday night April 27th, 2009.
The lucky winner was a guy named Adam Beguelin, who has not ridden Downieville but has done trail work there! We like that. Now Adam will have a nice new Mojo to ride when he goes over there. Here’s a picture of Adam working on the North Yuba Trail. I guess it would be more accurate to say here’s a picture of Adam taking a break from working on the North Yuba Trail.
THANKS TO EVERYONE WHO BOUGHT TICKETS, IT WAS A TREMENDOUS SUCCESS
THE RAFFLE BY THE NUMBERS:
- 3975 Tickets were sold
- You guys raised $19,875 for the Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship
- Did we say THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU?
- 1 person bought $250 worth of tickets
- 3 People bought $200 worth of tickets
- 17 People (including our winner) bought $100 worth of tickets
- 81 of you wonderful people bought $50 worth of tickets
And so on…
Again, thank you for your entries everyone, you all did a good thing.
2008 RAFFLE RESULTS:
1234 different people bought tickets
Total donations for the Lance Armstrong Foundation were an incredible $37,505.00.
Thanks to everyone who entered the raffle.
We’ll announce the winner soon. In the interest of privacy, we want to check with him (yes, it’s a him) to see if he wants his name out there.
who is battling her second bout with breast cancer
In conjunction with Fatty’s Triathlon
Drawing June 21, 2008
Ibis Cycles (with massive help from our good friends at Shimano) are donating this bike to help out our friends Susan and Elden Nelson. Susan was recently diagnosed with her second round of breast cancer, which has unfortunately metastasized to her brain. Her husband Elden is the guy who does the Fat Cyclist Blog that you may have read. If you haven’t then you need to know about it and get it on your reading list.
Susan has received a tremendous amount of support and guidance from the Lance Armstrong Foundation and wants to acknowledge that by holding this raffle. We thought we might be able to lend a hand and get those donations bumped up a bit.
So we’re donating a Silk SL for the cause.
100% of the money raised goes to the foundation. None of it gets filtered through our hands or Elden’s hand or anyone else’s. To donate, just head on over to this page and you’ll be instructed on how to do it.
As mentioned, Fatty is holding a triathlon with this event. You are invited to attend, if you find yourself anywhere near Alpine Utah on this year’s summer solstice. Alpine is near Salt Lake City.
This is not your normal Tri. The events are a mountain bike ride (not race), a water slide competition (on a natural waterfall) and a brat eating contest. I don’t know the vegan options, sorry. To find out more, simply head on over to Fatty’s site.
The bike is a fully pimped out Ibis Silk SL with full Shimano Dura-Ace group AND SWEET Dura-Ace SL wheels. Dang! We’re talking about a retail of $5,000 more or less.
