As we are less than a month away until we begin our journey to Tucson, Arizona, we are excited to announce that we are very close to our fundraising goal.

Due to some scheduling conflicts and a torn ACL, our original seven-member team has been cut to five, setting our goal at $20,000.

To recap from my first post, five brothers of the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity at the University of Maryland will be traveling to Tucson in November to participate in the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation charity bike ride.

Over the weekend, AEPi held an extremely successful philanthropy event at our chapter house. Along with hosting a BBQ and selling tank tops, our brotherhood collectively rode two stationary bikes for eight straight hours throughout the day. Turns out 80+ frat guys having sore butts really brings a brotherhood together.

It was truly phenomenal to see so much support from the University of Maryland community as well as friends and family of our chapter. We are proud to say we have currently raised over $15,000 for Type 1 diabetes research.

As we make our final push before the Tour de Tucson, we would love to have the support of the bikers, skiers, boarders, climbers and overall rad people that comprise the Spread Stoke community. Every little donation goes a long way!

If you’d like to donate, please follow this link:  ttp://www2.jdrf.org/site/TR?px=9109098&fr_id=3432&pg=personal

“I’ve come to the conclusion that a man without a cause is nothing. He has nothing to look forward to, he has nothing to work toward; he is as a man lost, wandering in the darkest part of his heart to find a deeper, better purpose in his life.”

-Hazel West, author

This November I will be traveling to Tucson with six of my Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity brothers from the University of Maryland to participate in the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation charity bike ride.

The goal of JDRF is to “progressively remove the impact of T1D (type 1 diabetes) from people’s lives until we achieve a world without T1D.”

Although the majority of our seven-member team has no bike riding experience, when the opportunity arose, our team quickly formed.

We came together to support our chapter president who has type 1 diabetes.

When something hits close to home, like a disease that affects a fraternity brother, it was easy for us to rally around it. Our goal is to make it just as easy for everyone else. We are taking something we are passionate about and combining it with a new found passion—bike riding.

As we are reaching out to our family, friends and University of Maryland community, we saw it as the perfect opportunity to reach out to the biking community to help us reach our fundraising goal of $28,000.

Just like the motivational boost you get from your buddy or an on-looker from the chair that gives you the confidence to send a cliff, Team AEPi needs that to reach our goal.

I know I speak on behalf of Team AEPi and JDRF when I emphasize the importance of using your passion for a good cause and taking a small step to help change the world.  Please take a look at our donation page and consider helping us reach our goal. Find a deeper, better purpose and help impact Type 1 Diabetes:

Ride to CURE Diabetes: Click here to donate!

“Most people work fifty weeks a year so they can do this the other two. Well the smart ones live in a ski resort, where the boss lets them have powder snow days off.  And almost forty feet of snow falls every winter, that’s a lot of days off.  A lot of doing what you moved here to do.  Most major ski resorts are now so big that regardless of what kind of job you have in a city, there’s probably a job almost exactly like yours in a ski resort like this.  So quit your job and rent that U-haul trailer now so next winter this can be you.  Not you just sitting there watching this and wishing that this was you.” -Warren Miller

I’m a regular college student at the University of Maryland. While most of my business-major-friends can’t wait to retire in West Palm Beach and play 100 holes of golf, I would do anything to ski 100 days a year in some ski town.

My brother and I just spent a month of our winter break bumming around Park City, a lifestyle most of my friends don’t understand. They frequently asked me, “don’t you get bored skiing everyday?” (WHAT?!?!). Of course not. And on my one-month escapade, I came across many people who would share the same response. All people seeking refuge in a ski town.

Ex-nurses now working one job or another on the mountain. Lifetime ski patrollers. A ski bum with a real estate license. Just a regular ski bum. Wounded warriors. Retired pro skiers. Retired pro surfers. Retired doctors. Australians, Frenchmen, Canadians.

People from all walks of life, all in a ski town, permanently or temporarily (some permanent but they just don’t know it yet), for one reason or another.

Even on my flight from BWI to SLC, I sat next to a young mother with a beautiful, yet screaming baby girl. Although she was definitely one of those mothers that was eager to start a family, she was quick to tell me of the year she spent after college selling lift tickets at Jackson Hole, and encouraged me to do the same.

I have witnessed the “ski town effect” first-hand. As a family, we have traveled to ski towns from Ludlow, Vermont to Truckee, California. As soon as we vacationed to Park City one summer, my parents were hooked. We are now proud owners of a townhouse and proud to call Park City our second home. While my parents are more than happy as practicing dentists in Carroll County, Maryland, it’s no mistake they are in Park City for a long weekend about once a month, no matter the season.

If you do not know what your future holds for you, then follow the wise words of Warren Miller. Even if your job requires you to sit at a desk all day, I bet you would rather be sitting at a desk near a mountain than at a desk near the Empire State Building.