Day 2 of the 200 km Ride to Conquer Cancer from Toronto to Niagra Fall is under way for over 4000 cyclists. They collectively raised 16.1 million for cancer research and prevention. I had the pleasure of performing yesterday in Hamilton at the mid station party, such a humbling but yet positive vibe.

I have now been on the road for 49 days, travelled 12311 km’s in my truck and trailer, presented/performed at 31 schools, performed at 10 bike shops, taught 3 yoga classes, did a mtb xc race, and of course last nights RTCC. After the show I drove up to Toronto, dropped my truck and trailer off, and am now waiting for my flight back home to BC. Yup, a mid tour trip home! A good friend at Norco is kindly driving my rig 3800 km’s back to Alberta where I’ll pick it up in 9 days to continue my adventures toward Whitehorse in the Yukon. I am again feeling so grateful for so many reasons, it’s almost overwhelming!

Peace!

Hello from the GTA, hanging out in Pickering right now, trying to get some serious ‘rest on’ so I’m ready for a show at one of the biggest shops in Ontario, Bay Cycle, tomorrow. (Noon sharp for anyone that is local)

Crashed during the last school show today, slipped out on the back wheel and landed on my now bruised sit bones. First proper bail of the tour, but I’m fine, finished the show, and might do some yoga to limber up…maybe I’ll play my didgeridoo partly to vibrate some healing blood flow to my low back and sit bones, but mainly to acknowledge my jealousy that Caryn is going to see Xavier Rudd play in Vancouver later on tonight!!!!

What a great week though! Yesterday, one of the police officers on the Pedal-For-Hope team came up with a skit for an elementary school. I pretended to be a photographer during their presentation, then he pretended to set up to jump over a couple staff members, making it sound legit, finally, the bike was taken away from him out of fear and they asked the audience if anyone else might be able to do it instead, I jumped in, pretended to be just a novice, and then leaped over them. We scared everyone because no one new I was going to be at that school! Good times!!

I watched at least 50 kids get their head shaved this week, many of them were girls! Lots of full locks to be made in to wigs.

I also put one of the cops on the spot and made him sing “listen to your heart” by Roxette in front of a thousand high schoolers because earlier he was joking around with me about one of my quotes in my presentation. He stepped up and busted out in song, it was great!

Nine schools in total this week, plus an awesome mountain bike ride with the Shimano crew in Peterborough. Gotta rest up!!

I feel so grateful to everyone I have met while on this tour, it has been epic in every way so far!

Ryan

I would love your support! Here are the details: http://bit.ly/9MVJsk

The Cops for Cancer crew in Peterborough, ON, are trying to raise a million bucks for pediatric cancer research and prevention. They are setting a healthy lifestyle example by riding their bikes on a ‘Pedal for Hope’ tour visiting various schools.

My contribution is to give my Trials of Life presentation to the top three fundraising schools. On top of that, I have agreed to have my head shaved by the Cops on June 1st at one of the schools…that is if I manage to raise $1000 toward this cause.

Are you willing to skip a haircut and put that money toward a great  cause?

I have set up a donation page through the Canadian Cancer Society, and set an example by donating $20, the money saved by skipping my last haircut; if you’d like to do the same, or just have some spare funds you’d like to give, please visit my page at:

http://bit.ly/9MVJsk

Here is a quick youtube blurb about I posted a couple days ago too:

Ride ON!

Ryan

Tired, my eyes are heavy, but I’m feeling good. Life is a good pace right now, a good mix of stuff, not too busy, not too quiet. Spending a lot of time on the computer, booking demos for the year. My Canadian Tour is coming along nicely, schools are starting to confirm, and there is a bike shop show almost every weekend. It sounds like I might be performing at the Toronto Ride to Conquer Cancer event too, which should be amazing.

I just taught a yoga class tonight. A one hour long vinyasa flow for the locals in our townhouse community. Teaching yoga feels right, it is so challenging, there is so much to learn, I am so exciting to keep progressing so I can offer more and more to the classes I am in front of.

Sitting next to my lovely wife in the office at our home. She is blasting a brand new Xavier Rudd song on her computer, can’t wait for the new album to come out. The song is called Time to Smile, check it out!

Tomorrow is busy, so I have to keep this post brief, and un-edited. I have a meeting in Vancouver first thing in the morning for which I’ll be riding my bike most of the way, then I have a Trials of Life performance at a local school that I have to race back for. I am pumped on school presentation this year, and want to give it my all and start adjusting and modifying my message as my Canadian Tour approaches. After the presentation I have to drop my trailer off and get ready to teach another yoga class at Trailside Physio for some friends and their running group. Should be home by 10pm. A full day, and a challenging day. I’m looking forward to it.

Much gratitude and love,

Ryan

How are you this Sunday? Just thought I’d type a few words about my day instead of being a productive elf and making Christmas gifts. Only a few more days left for doing woodwork in the woodshop, I have to make a toy for my nephew, a shelf for my other nephew, and a few other little tidbits for my family. Time is tight, but yet, the computer sucked me in.

I was up early today, had some granola (home made from my Mum) wtih some pomagranite and bee pollen, and then put my super wet day riding clothes on and rode to Trailside Physio to instruct a morning yoga class from 8-9:30. I think I made them work too hard especially for a Sunday morning. My buddy Francisco took some time after class to assess an injury I’ve been nursing for the past week. Seems I have either a sprained rhomboid or a tweaked rib; it’s been causing me an ongoing aching pain, even when I’m sitting here typing. No good. We’ll see how it is in a week.

Rode home in the pouring rain, loved every minute of it, and it gave me time to think about and prepare mentally for a meeting I had at lunchtime which is part of a course I’m taking. Made a quick vita-mix lunch of almonds, cocoa, dates, hemp seed, rice milk, and banana, and was off again feeling powered up.

After my meeting I stopped by the grocery store and picked up some food, and listened to Xavier, loudly, on the rest of the drive home.

Had a glorious cup of tea with Caryn, a little chocolate to go with it. Warm cuppa on a wet day, good stuff. Off tonight to a family get together, and then we’re in to the flow of Monday. I think the week will be a busy one…Christmas Day will ‘present’ itself before we know it.

I hope you are having some joyous moments this Holiday Season. I hope the busiesness of it all isn’t carrying you along without time to catch your breath. I hope you can find time to get out in the fresh air and in the rain for a hike, or a ride, or a walk and to have  a warm cup of tea with a loved one.

Many blessing to you all, and much Peace,

Ryan

There has been a bit of a green theme to my week.

First off, I did some filming for a Norco Lifestyle video where I talked about riding my bike around town to do errends. It was pretty funny, at the grocery store parking lot, a fellow came up to me and asked about my Norco VFR bike, the typical questions like “ooh, is that an aluminum frame?”, then “how many gears does that have?” Anyway, as he was walking away, he looked back and said, “right on, I’ve gone green too”. I had a chuckle, I love this trend…Reminded me of this funny and somewhat truthful video:

Then I filmed a TV interview and segment showing me riding my bike to go teach yoga and to talk about project blue sky.

Alos, I’ve been grossing out Caryn by making green vegetable drinks, well experimenting with making them, I guess she was justified in her green gruesome feeling …I’m figuring it out though…

Then to cap it off, and this is the best part, I just watched my nephew’s school Christmas Play and it was titled “Santa Goes Green”, haaa! Awesome. Good positive ideas presented in a fun way. Children will be living with a whole new set of green standards and bringing their parents along with them.

Cheers Folks,

Ryan

Was up fairly early this morning, listening to the cold wind blow outside; decided I’d flow some words out on my neglected blog before I dug in to the days ‘to-do’ list.

My new demo trailer should be arriving shortly, but I don’t have anything to fill it with yet—though last week I was with my Dad and as usual, he came up with an incredibly unique demo obstacle design. See if I can describe it in words…Kind of like spokes in a wheel, I’d have a centre hub with six arms radiating outward, each about 8 feet long and at slightly different heights. Then my platforms and beams and railings would attach between each of the arms. Easy to set up, just open the arms outward and plonk platforms on top, and it would have a unique look. Whether it will work in real life and be stable, we’ll see, but  I’m pretty pumped on the possibilities.

Yoga has been a theme lately, as it has for much of the year. I am teaching three times a week. Twice at Norco’s head office during lunch, and once on Sunday morning at Trailside Physio. Teaching yoga has been more challenging than I anticipated, and I think that is part of the draw for me and why I’m having so much fun with it. I usually pratice personally three or four times a week, so the amount of personal practice seems to have gone down since teaching frequency went up; I guess partly that is because I still teach mostly from the mat while doing the practice instead of walking around just using words to teach. Starting to mix it up a bit, but I really like to connect with how it feels personally in order to express an accurate description of each posture. I recently got a little deeper in to the why’s of teaching yoga during an interview with NSMB.com, that should be posted shortly.

I got a vita-mix recently. That was exciting. The thing has a 2hp motor, same company that makes the blenders at juice and smoothie bars.

Been riding my Norco VFR a lot recently, I love the riding lifestyle. Nothing beats having to whip down to the store on a bike to get dinner ingredients while passing all the rush hour traffic. I just starting shooting a little online video with Alex Lavigne about the riding lifestyle. While the trials bike may lay idle this time of year, my commuter bike is getting loads of action.

Well, best I get to doing some work. Have an awesome Monday folks!

Earlier this Summer, I spent a day filming to help out with some promotion for the new Sea to Sky Trail. This multi-use trail is already open in sections and will ultimately run from Squamish to Whistler to Pemberton, and on to D’Arcy. Pretty sweet! Working with Jack Christie is always a delight, and getting to hold a boom mic for Dr. David Suzuki was an honor The team that put this promotional film together did a fantastic job. The purpose of this film is to generate interest and support for the completion of this important project; so please check it out, and picture yourself exploring by foot, bike, wheelchair, or even unicycle,  this spectacular part of the world.

Yesterday, Caryn and I spent the afternoon building a wooden, tech-deck sized, halfpipe for our two nephews. If you don’t know what a tech-deck is, it is those tiny skateboards that you use with your fingers. (I need to find a BMX version!) Our four and six old nephews are all about their tech-decks right now, so instead of those plastic props you can buy at the store, we thought we’d “quickly” make a wooden prop from old wood bits in the shop. Eight hours later Caryn was testing it out…

It turns out that we like it just as much as the kids! Of course I had to do a youtube search to find out what is possible these days, and was blown away by this video, not only from the skill of the tricks, but of the cinematography too.

September whizzed by, and Fall, is well, already fall’ing away, in a great way though. The leaves are starting to turn, the air is clean and crisp, the weather is unpredictable, and the light is shining through in ways that make photographers and nature lovers really excited.

Caryn went off with the family to the apple barn, I took the day to get some work done, and thought I’d pause to write a quick blog post. I have a lovely cup of cream earl gray tea, and I hope to post this blurb by the time it’s done.

A few projects on the go right now. One is some preparatory work on another Canadian Trials-of-Life school tour in the Spring of 2010. It’s the kind of thing to get on top of right way, because 2010 will be here before we know it. I really can’t seem to come up with any project that feels ‘as-right’ as doing another school tour. I have a limited amount of time where I can engage students through the skills I have on the bike, so I better take advantage of that with some skillful words of advice and of course have some fun along the way.

I am taking a coaching course that starts in November through Integral Coaching Canada. I’m really excited about it, and so I have been doing some pre-course homework and reading.

Then there is yoga, I’m trying to arrange as many yoga classes as I can to build experience, it’s a long an exciting journey of learning that will never end, I think that’s why I’m so drawn to it. Today though, I took 90 minutes outside on my back deck to practice solo. Just me, the fresh air, the sunshine, the falling helicopter maple tree seeds, and a glorious savasana with a well worked body. The feeling is hard to convey, but it is precisely the one I want to share by becoming a yoga instructor.

I rode to the store today as we’re having a friend and some family over for dinner; picked up some corn, some BC wine, and some beautiful looking fresh BC spring salmon. Yummy.

Hmm, my tea is already getting low, probably something to do with me gulping it down

I hope the weekend is treating you well. Have fun!