JDRF Charity Ride with Brothers Air & Heat

Brothers Air and Heat of Rock Hill, South Carolina held their 2nd annual Ride for Cure on April 4th to raise money and awareness for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) and I joined in for the ride.  The Brothers of Brothers Air and Heat are Duck and Roger Costner. Duck’s 12 year old daughter, Hannah, has juvenile diabetes.  This increasingly common disease unfortunately has no cure yet.  When I heard about the ride, I was more than happy to sign up, but once I got there and learned more about what having diabetes is like for her and other children like her, it really woke me up as to what the ride was all about.  I also found out afterwords that North Carolina, the state I live in, has the highest rate of diabetes in the USA.

To start the day out, our “gang” rode down to Rock Hill.  Me on my Moto Guzzi, Eric on his Big Dog, Toby on his Harley, Mark & Amy on their newly customized Victory, and Danny on his Victory custom. We left just as the sun was starting to feel good against the leather on a cool spring morning. After a few weeks of rain and clouds, it was great to hit the road on this nice clear day.

I had fun seeing so many of the good folks I met last fall at the DAV charity ride also held in Rock Hill. I noticed that I must have been the only one that has not added any thing to my bike since then. My friend Jimmy added some great sounding pipes and a custom mirror to his Honda cruiser that was pictured in my post about the DAV ride last fall.  We won’t say here why Jimmy only had one mirror, but I think he might need to visit Motorcycle Superstore or J&P to get more parts and accessories for Honda motorcycles.

After signing in, getting a t-shirt, and picking the first two cards, Duck and his wife, their daughter and her friend from school discussed the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and how they are actively involved to raise awareness that more research is needed to help find a cure for this disease. She will also be going to Washington DC to help try to get more federal support to go towards JDRF.  It felt good to be able to help raise funds for research, and I also thought about my own children and imagined what it would be like for them to have to test their blood so many times each day and night. We had a prayer lead by the “Packman” then hit the road to Chester, SC.

I enjoyed meeting different riders and checking out motorcycles as we gathered at each stop to draw cards for collecting our points.  Harley-Davidson motorcycles are by far the dominant brand on these rides, but there were some sport bikes, a few beautiful Gold Wings, a BMW sport touring, and several metric cruisers mixed in with our group.  It was a healthy mix of bikes.

We left Chester to reach our next stop, the Catawba Fish Camp. After picking two more cards at the Brothers Air and Heat trucks, we had time to hang out and enjoy looking at all the different bikes and meet some more people. It’s pretty easy to get started in conversations about each others motorcycles. It’s always fun for me when people ask about my Moto Guzzi. Most of the time they have never saw a Moto Guzzi before, so they ask me who makes it. I love that question!  I get it a lot, even though Guzzi has been around since 1921 and is still going strong.  In some ways I’m glad they are not as popular as the more common brands.

From the Catawba Fish Camp, we headed back to Brothers Air and Heat in Rock Hill to turn in our points sheets, have lunch, and see if we could win something in the raffle. Knowing that the money was all going to JDRF, it was good that so many people bought raffle tickets.  Duck, Roger and all the folks on the committee that helped put this ride together sure did a great job getting sponsors and donations for the raffle.  I don’t usually win anything in raffles, but I won a nice duffel bag that was donated from WBTV in Charlotte, along with a hat, t-shirt, mug, and other goodies inside it.  Towards the end of the raffle, after my buddy Eric had already won 2 different cell phones(!), I was pulling for Bill to win the final prize, a new chain saw. Unfortunately, he didn’t, but the riding season is just getting started and there will be plenty more chances this year.

The 2nd Annual Brothers Air and Heat Ride for a Cure is support of JDRF was good fun for a great cause. I hope to see all these great folks again at the 2nd Annual Firehouse Run charity ride with the Comnporium Pioneers on May 2nd in Rock Hill. That will be a good one too with stops at different volunteer firehouses around the county. If you’re interested, you can get in touch with me by leaving your comment below here on Motorcycle Information, or via my contact page.