As many of you already know, on Saturday, September 18th Grassroots Bikes (GRB) is holding its grand opening. You may ask yourself, what is GRB and what does it have to do with roller derby? Grassroots Bikes is the bike shop of the local non-profit, Trips For Kids – Triangle (TFKT), and all net profits from the bike shop go back to TFKT. And here is the connection, wait for it, wait for it…one of your derby girls is a co-founder and über volunteer of TFKT! TFKT was founded back in 2008 by Andrea Hundredmark and Tristan Fuierer (known as Sue Yu to some of you) and the mission is to take “at risk” youth on mountain bike rides. Andrea, a teacher in Durham Public Schools, identifies those kids with behavior, attendance and/or academic problems and rather than suspending them, chooses instead to “punish” the kids by taking them on a mountain bike ride on a Saturday morning. Once the kids have been on a ride, they are hooked and the prospect of another bike ride is the incentive for them to stay on track.
If any of the CRG faithful are interested in getting involved with the kids and joining TFKT on a mountain bike ride (this is a straight-up, in the woods on single track type of mountain bike ride), please do not hesitate to contact TFKT and join us. I promise you will adapt to being on only two wheels instead of eight. In the meantime, please try to carve out some time this Saturday afternoon to come to our grand opening and see the bike shop and some of the kids impacted by TFKT. GRB is located at 506 N. Mangum Street in downtown Durham and the celebration is from 12:00-3:00 PM. Local Yogurt will be there selling their “grassroots” flavor, with a percentage of the sales going back to GRB. So, come on out and support GRB and TFKT!
And please don’t be remiss if you can’t make it on Saturday, September 18th. There is another opportunity to help out on October 5th, 2010 from 7-9 PM when Revolution in the Bull City holds an event with proceeds going to TFKT. The guys from Wine Authorities will be guest bartending and a portion of the profits will be donated back to TFKT. For directions, check here.
Contributed by Sue Yu
Man you guys are just quite awesome! Thanks so much to CRG for the love and support of TFKT & GRB.