Dammitall

My lady and I are signed up for our second year in the LiveStrong Challenge this summer. We're both doing the 100 mile bike ride this time and have upped our fundraising goals considerably.

I plan to formally kick off my fundraising efforts on February 1st, a nice clean date that will give me a little over six months before the ride in August to reach my goal (in comparison to the two months I had last year). I know it's going to be tougher this year to raise more in the current economic environment, where people will be less willing to part with their cash for charity than they might otherwise be. Because of this I'll be investing much more time and effort this time around and am trying to come up with some good tactics beyond the mass email and Facebook solicitations I made to friends and family last year. My ideas so far include performing in a solo recital and auctioning or raffling off the bike jerseys that I will be designing for us to ride in.

Anyone have any personal charity fundraising experiences and/or suggestions they would like to share? I'm all ears.

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If one million people replaced a two mile car trip once a week with a bike ride, carbon dioxide emissions would be reduced by 50,000 tons per year. If one out of ten car commuters switched to a bike, carbon dioxide emissions would be reduced by 25.4 million tons per year. [2milechallenge.com]