New bike... new target...

HELLO!

Thank you for reading the latest edition of The Arctic Rider blog. 

For those new to the blog, this summer I'll be riding ~5,000 miles in 2 weeks to across Canada and Alaska including 800 miles on the notorious Ice-road 'The Dalton Highway', deep inside the Arctic Circle... all to raise money for 2 charities, Tiny Lives Trust and Cerebra.

The first big news of this update is that.. I FINALLY HAVE A BIKE... pretty fundamental to a doing a charity motorbike ride right? After months of negotiations, I'm very happy to share that Suzuki Bikes UK have agreed to give me their brand new V-Strom 1000 XT to do the trip on. Its all gone a bit Ewan & Charley and it doesn't feel real that one of the biggest bike companies on the planet as agreed to give me a bike to do the trip on. The team at Suzuki have been really supportive of my challenges ever since my Arctic Ride 2014 and have really stepped up to support me in the biggest way possible. I feel very grateful and humble.

Its been a long road with discussions starting over a year ago, but finally getting this confirmed has been a huge relief and boost to the trip. The next steps are that the bike is currently being prepared in the workshop and should be available in 4-6 weeks. Then I will go and collect the bike from Suzuki UK HQ in Milton Keynes, do some promo and then ride the bike home. I'll have a few weeks to get used to the bike and I'm palling a 1,000 mile 2-day trip to Scotland to really get to grips with it and simulate the mileage and conditions of being in Canada & Alaska. Then the bike will be shipped over to Calgary where I'll meet it ready to start the trip.

Promo work for PuddleDucks charity week.

The second big news is that in the past few weeks my fundraising has gone through the roof and I've more than doubled the total raised since only the 13th of March. Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who has been able to support my ride and help 2 amazing charities in Tiny Lives Trust and Cerebra!

One of the biggest boosts has been the support of PuddleDucks North East. 3 times a year PuddleDucks hold a charity pyjama week for their swimmers and this term they chose to support The Arctic Ride and Tiny Lives Trust, and raised an amazing £1,500! Wow.

Also my little brother Robbie, who turned 21 last week and is the reason why I got involved with Fundrasing for Cerebra, decided to hold a raffle at his birthday party and raised an amazing £130! Well done Robbie and thanks for your support.

Alongside these two events, plus ticket sales from the Arctic Ride Alaska Raffle, and The Arctic Rider sticker sales, the total is going up and up. Due to this I have decided to increase my target from £3,000 to £4,000. Thank you so so much to everyone who has donated.

My current total and target

Thanks for reading! Next steps are getting my flights booked and sorting the shipping of the bike out. Look out for the next blog coming soon.

Ride safe,

Gordon