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California AIDS Ride 8
Day Zero -- June 2nd, 2001
Day Zero is a crazy, frenetic, tiring day. This is the day riders & crew complete all the last minute details before beginning the AIDS Ride. Last year, about half way through the day, I sat down on the sidewalk at Ft. Mason and cried my eyes out. This year, I decided I was going to do a better job of managing the day. And above all, I was going to have FUN!

breakfast of champions My Schwab teammate, Mike Schmitt, picked me up bright and early (so early, that the photo of him loading the bikes on the car came out really dark). We were headed to San Francisco early to meet Team Schwab for a great breakfast at IHOP (lots of energy to start the day). It was so exciting to see everyone on the Team and finally be Mike Schmitt, Lorri, and Thomas Lister
reunited with our Southern California riders, some of whom we hadn't seen since the AIDS Ride last year.

After breakfast, we all headed over to Ft. Mason to drop off our bikes and begin the day. Lines, lines, lines. Everywhere we had to go there were long lines. But this year I was prepared. I brought about 500 lollipops in my backpack, and everytime I saw someone who needed a pick-me-up, I gave them a lollipop. In retrospect, I should've brought more!

So, the day progressed (slowly). First bike parking, then rider registration, then pledge line, medical, safety video, and finally tent assignments. Oh, but there was a brand new line this year, and I wasn't complaining about this one -- TOWEL SERVICE! For the meager sum of $24, you could get a clean (notice I didn't say fluffy) towel everyday at camp. Sign me up! Lissa and Phoebe, the towel girls

dinner at John's Whew! Finally, we're finished, and it's still daylight. Thank goodness I did most of my packing ahead of time. Just enough time now to get home, hop in the shower (my last real shower for a week), and drive back to the city to my Schwab friend John Metallic's house.

John was gracious enough to invite me to stay at his house Saturday night (since we had to be back at Ft. Mason at 5:30am). What a blast! Thank you, John. Not only was I staying, but so were a bunch of other riders, none of whom I'd ever met. John & his partner Ted had an awesome dinner for us and then we finally crashed. Gosh! Will I ever get to sleep......

See all my photos from Day Zero (in real size!)
Just click on the film to go there now!
View them as a slide show for best results.


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Created on June 30th, 2001 by Lorri Lee Lown
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