We woke up this morning far too early at 5:30 a.m. to roll out for our 90 mile day! Today I rode with Ashley, Dani, Eric, and Trent. Overall, the ride was pretty easy considering the distance as it was very flat and we had a small tail wind. We rode through miles of farm […]

The 2014 Texas 4000 team began our 70 day journey from Austin, TX to Anchorage, AK on May 31st and it has been quite the ride (pun intended) so far! The number of people I have met along with the relationships that are forming within the team are both amazing, humbling, and life changing! Day […]

Hi Texas 4000 Friends and Family, I’ve promised to send email updates during my cancer- fighting journey to Alaska. Here’s my 1st newsletter about what I am up to, where my team is, our impact, the scenery, etc! 20 (of 70) days have flown by since I left Austin, TX (1200 miles so far!); it’s […]

I have to admit I’ve been avoiding sending this update out… But first and foremost I want to reiterate that I’m okay. I’m more than okay, I’m with the team, not in the hospital, not in pain and not badly scraped up. Just chillinIt’s quite ironic that my last update was about dena and Dick […]

After cleaning up the theater where we slept, we had an awesome breakfast provided by Sense Corp and then some employees rode with us to the Gateway Arch. The ride was nine miles and took us through some scenic parts of St. Louis including Washington University, the city park, and downtown. It definitely ranks up […]

It feels like it’s been a century since my last post, but really it’s only been a few days. Within these last few days, a lot has happened. To start with, we biked from Trinidad to Pueblo, Pueblo to Colorado Springs, Co. Springs to Denver, Denver to Boulder, Boulder to Rocky Mountain National Park, and […]

One of the best parts of a rest day is of course getting to sleep in. We woke up at 8 a.m. (This is definitely the first time in my life that I consider 8 a.m. sleeping in) for a great breakfast and then to sort out clean laundry before going to REI. The entire […]

Despite the fact that it was really hot and we heard raccoon noises among sleep talk throughout the night, I slept really well and felt rested when the 7 a.m. wakeup time came around. Like Christmas, the morning was full of surprises as people found out what stuff the raccoons had gotten into or chewed […]

Day 18. June 17th, 2014. Murphys, California to South Lake Tahoe, California. Video by Jacob Schmelz. The video shows both climbing and descent down a couple of mountains as we made our way to South Lake Tahoe.   The life of a Texas 4000 rider is a unique experience that I will remember for the […]

I was supposed to wake up 15 minutes early (5:45 a.m.) this morning to start preparing the support vehicles but I might have accidentally slept in a little. After loading everyone’s bag Tetris style into one van, our hosts (the Dillon family and Waynesville United Methodist Church) cooked us some breakfast tacos and then saw […]