From the September 2010 issue of Our Moment, the UConn Foundation's e-newsletter.
By Michael Nocella, UConn Foundation
Are you nuts?
That’s how medical student Stacy White describes some of the looks he got after explaining to family and friends how he would spend his summer: traveling from San Francisco to Connecticut. By bike.
White, along with fellow first-year students of the UConn School of Medicine Loreen Fournier, Arturo Montano and Alex Ocampo, represent this year’s Coast to Coast for a Cure. For the fifth year running, students rode across the country to raise support for the Lea’s Foundation for Leukemia Research, a philanthropic supporter of the Lea’s Foundation Center for Hematologic Disorders at the UConn Health Center.
The trip began called for 4,000 miles over eight weeks. Starting out in San Francisco, the quartet finished strong at the UConn Health Center in Farmington.
“We felt great. It’s surprising how much your body can respond to,” Fournier says. She adds, “We stretched, we iced, we ate, we rested and we biked. Staying together helped make sure we kept an even pace and left no one behind.”
Fournier noted they were taken by the beautiful scenery and astonished by the support of strangers along the way giving spontaneous donations.
One of the highlights of the trip was their stay with Michael Wilkes, M.D. ’85. Wilkes has provided a pit stop for UConn Coast to Coast participants since the program started. Wilkes, a family friend of the founder of the program, Jeremiah Tracy, M.D. ’09, finds the experience rewarding on several levels.
“As vice dean of the medical school at UC Davis, I always enjoy meeting new students. There is no group of people more inspiring than medical students with passion,” says Wilkes. “Every year I get to meet some of the most devoted, intelligent students UConn has to offer. This year’s group was no different.”
Their conversations ranged from UConn professors and curriculum to the evolution of American medicine.
“He was awesome. We all had so much to discuss, as it was very nice to get a little taste of home all the way out here. The fact that he is an UConn alumnus was definitely an added bonus,” says Montano.
The students have raised approximately $20,000. Montano adds that they are still accepting donations: “We could definitely use more help. If people are interested in helping to contribute to support Lea's Foundation and the ride, they can visit www.leasfoundation.org and donate to Coast to Coast.”
You can read about the team’s trip on the students' blog at http://coasttocoastforacure2010.blogspot.com.
For more information about supporting the UConn Health Center, please contact the UConn Foundation's development department.
