2011 Sports Toto National Charity Ride

Rented bikes for Sports Toto staff at the ride

Michelle and I at Berjaya Times Square, Kuala Lumpur

With Mr CS Wee, a fellow Dahon folding bike rider

Michelle, cruising along Jalan Pudu on her Dahon Curve D3

At Chinatown - pix courtesy of Malaysia Runners Network

Michelle and I weren't too sure about our schedule in April, so, we kinda sat and waited for things to fall in place.
Last Sunday, Sports ToTo, a betting company had organised a National Charity Ride in Kuala Lumpur's city centre.
Cycling in the city area with heavy traffic is dangerous, but since this was an escorted and planned ride, we kinda jumped into it last-minute.
I contacted Sports Toto's communications manager Emily Tan to get a clearer picture on how to join in the ride.
The first 300 participants who registered with the event organiser were given a Jersey and some freebies.
Since we weren't really interested in any of those, we just grabbed our bikes and jumped into the train to head towards the KL city centre.
Michelle and I rode from Masjid Jamek LRT station which was about 2.3km away from the event's starting point.
This reminded me a lot of those days when I cycled around KL on my Raleigh road bike.
During the ride, I encountered some problems with my rear brake line.
The Minoura space bar also gave me hell as it slipped down with the headlights.
I fixed the problem and our journey to Berjaya Times Square wasn't really a hassle.
Michelle did voice out her concern about cycling in heavy traffic, especially early in the morning.
At the venue, we met up with some old friends: Bil Choy, CS Wee, Ming, Wey, Ng Sek San, Yau Wai Leong and a long list of names.
The National Charity Ride is about 23km covering some main parts of the city area.
James Bak, the dude who put it together did a great job by caring for the cyclists of all levels of fitness.
It was a smooth ride for me and Michelle as we cruised the streets with our Dahon Curve D3 and Curve SL.
I found the SL to be really fast as I caught up with a cyclist from Thailand who was riding his Dahon Hammerhead mini Velo.
Later at the prize presentation ceremony, I was told by one of the organizers that folding bikes made up about 20% of the total number of bicycles taking part in the event.
On the whole, the 23km route was quite easy.
After we were done, Michelle and I rode with Bil, Wey, Jackie and Ming to a makan place and had a sumptous meal.
We took a train back the Taman Jaya LRT station in Petaling Jaya where we parked and called it a day..