Every year the Alpe d’huzes foundation organizes the Alpe d’HuZes, a cycling event where people will bike up the Alp d’Huez up to 6 times (hence the ‘zes’ (six in dutch) in the organisations name). By doing that they raise money for cancer research. The first time this event was held was back in 2006. That year 66 cyclists participated and raised over €370.000,- Every following edition the numbers kept growing, in participant as well as in money raised.
Yesterday was edition #7. This year 8000 people got on their bike and rode up that French Alp for 1 or more climbs. And they did awesome, they raised more than 28million euro (over 35million dollar)!!!
This edition was special to me. Why? One of my oldest (oldest in friendship years & in age years, we’ve been friends since birth) and dearest friends was one of the 8000 heroes . Together with her husband (who also climbed in ’11) & 2 good friends, she’s been training for months and getting ready for this major achievement. It has been a journey with blood, sweat and tears.
All day i’ve been glued to my laptop and my phone. I had to keep watching the live feed and checking the app to see how they were doing. And she did Great, all four of them did! My friend conquered that Alp twice! Her husband improved himself and made it 6(!!!) times and the other boys made it to 3 and 5 climbs!
I’m so impressed, in awe and filled with respect & filled with even more pride. Together with the other 7996 heroes they made a difference (yes i believe they did!) to so many people now & some many more the future. Honestly i don’t think i could have done what they did. Well not this time, but maybe someday…
* ‘Giving up is no option’ is the slogan for the Alp d’Huzes
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