Motorcyclists are an interesting breed. Give them a reason to get together for a ride and they’ll jump at it. Make it for a worthy cause and they’ll throw everything they can into it.
I had a chat to one such guy this week. His name is Glenn Martin, he lives in Canberra and has decided to join together with around 50 other riders to ride around Australia raising funds for the Steven Walter Foundation.
Steven Walter was nineteen when he died after an eight year battle with cancer. His whole life revolved around motorcycles, and he was a former NSW Junior Enduro Champion and an Australian Four Day Silver medalist.
His story is inspirational, and he requested that money be raised for research and support of children with cancer “so that one day no other child would have to go through what he had been through.”
Each year the foundation runs The Snowy Ride in the Alpine Region of NSW.
This year they also threw out a challenge to riders to ride around the country, a challenge that Glenn took on.
The ride will start on the 4th October in Tenterfield, and will end 5 weeks later in Thredbo where the riders will link up with the Snowy Ride.
The trip will take the riders as far north in Queensland as Townsville, then over to Mt Isa, Tennant Creek in NT, across to Broome in Western Australia and then follow the coastline back around to Thredbo.
Each rider agrees to raise a minimum of two and a half thousand dollars for the foundation through sponsorships.
And the cost of the trip, probably up to $10,000, is also covered by the riders themselves. No money raised is used to offset those costs. That comes to a pretty big commitment from the riders.
Glenn is tackling the event on a Yamaha Road Star and is in the final stages of preparing the bike for the trip. All up, Glenn and his trusty bike will cover around 15,000 km.
A long trip like this is particularly demanding on a rider, both physically and mentally. You need to be fit and prepared for pretty much anything. The guys have broken the trip up so they cover about 550 km each day.
It’s also demanding on a bike, and Glenn has chosen a good machine to do the trip on. The Road Star is a 1600cc v-twin cruiser, with a belt drive, and a very comfortable bike to travel a long distance on.
An essential part of Glenn’s preparation includes getting together a stack of spare parts to be taken along. And that’s a good idea for anyone planning a long trip.
It should be an interesting adventure, and if you want to follow Glenn’s preparation and progress, or support the ride, there’s a website you can go to - www.metricrider.com.au.
And for more information on the foundation or the Snowy Ride, there’s www.stevenwalterfoundation.org.au
UPDATE: You can also hear this story podcast on “Behind the Wheel”, Australia’s favorite Radio Motoring Show, at http://behindthewheel.podomatic.com
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