Fundraiser to help buy bikes for injured cyclists

Four of five Ottawa cyclists who were hit and seriously injured by a car on July 19 will attend a dinner Monday night that is expected to raise enough money to get them new bikes and cover some of their medical expenses.

"For a lot of folks including me, it's going to be a chance to finally meet them and kind of say, 'Hey, you know, you guys, we're thinking and praying about you,'" said Phil Marsh, regional manager of Running Room Ottawa, who is organizing the event. "It'll be a chance for them to see just how close this community is."

Marsh said Monday that between $10,000 and $20,000 is expected to be raised from the 500 people who will attend the sold-out dinner at the Arrow and Loon in the Glebe neighbourhood. A silent auction of items at the event will include one of Lance Armstrong's racing bibs from this year's Tour de France.

The five cyclists were riding along a stretch of March Road on July 19 when they were struck by a vehicle near Solandt Road, shortly before 8 a.m. All of the cyclists, who range in age from 27 to 45, were sent to hospital, where one remains in a medically induced coma. The other four are still relying on wheelchairs to get around, Marsh said.

Marsh said when he first heard about the collision, he first worried about whether anyone he knew was among the victims.

"It just really kind of struck home that this could have been anybody — it could have been any of us driving, it could have been any of us riding our bikes," he said.

Marsh, who runs an annual fundraising dinner for the Ottawa Hospital Foundation, wanted to do something, so he called a friend at the Arrow and Loon, as well as Tommy and Lefebvre vice-president Natalie Tommy. Marsh suggested he could raise $2,000 to $3,000 for new bikes for the injured cyclists, and Tommy agreed to match that amount.

Since then, Marsh said, "It's kind of snowballed."

100 items at silent auction

He has arranged for several guest speakers, including Master Cpl. Jody Mitic, a Canadian soldier who lost both feet to a landmine in Afghanistan in 2007 and is training for a half marathon in September.

The silent auction includes more than 100 donated items, including tickets to the sold-out Seinfeld show, a Montreal Canadiens jersey signed by Jean Béliveau, and Lance Armstrong's bib from the 11th stage of this year's Tour de France, framed with a page torn from his guidebook.

That was secured by Ottawa cyclist Anne Paliwal, who contacted Armstrong's manager by email after Armstrong expressed support for the injured cyclists in a video blog. It arrived at a friend's place last Thursday.

"When she got it she called me and her comment was 'The Eagle has landed,'" Paliwal recalled. "We both opened it together and we were just  ecstatic when we saw it."

Bidding for the bib will take place not just at the silent auction, but also on the internet so people all over the world have a chance at the item.