Happy Sun­day everyone!

My day started early, with the alarm going off at 5:45am. I know, it sounds bru­tal but I was excited to get up and get on my way to an indoor char­ity ride for a friend of mine, Eon D’Ornellas. Eon is a 4X olympian and 2X Cana­dian national road bike cham­pion. He also owns the best bike shop in the city, D’Ornellas. No one knows cycling or has as great a pas­sion for it like Eon. If you’re in the mar­ket for new wheels, he’s the man you need to see. His story though, is truly inspi­ra­tional and is the rea­son why I got my butt (and my hubby’s) out of bed so early on a Sun­day morning.

About a year ago, Eon was out on a ride with a group and noticed that he was rid­ing much slower than usual and feel­ing unusu­ally fatigued on a ride that he had done with ease, many times before. He pulled off the road and thank­fully, one of the rid­ers hap­pened to be a fire­fighter, who instantly rec­og­nized the signs of a stroke. A call to 911 went out and within a few min­utes he was in an ambu­lance, on his way to the near­est hos­pi­tal, Macken­zie Rich­mond Hill. Thank­fully, he has made a full recov­ery, cycling like an ani­mal and enjoy­ing his sport once again.

The ride today was to help raise funds for Macken­zie Health, who took such won­der­ful care of him, as well as an oppor­tu­nity for all of the rid­ers to acknowl­edge and be grate­ful for the gift of health and fitness.

The 3 hr ride, which was done on our own road bikes (yay!), on train­ers (sim­i­lar feel to rid­ing on the road), was led by another amaz­ing indi­vid­ual, Lisa Bent­ley, who is an 11X Iron­man cham­pion and who remark­ably, is also stricken with cys­tic fibro­sis, a crip­pling lung dis­ease. Through­out the ride, she inspired us with her pos­i­tive energy, in addi­tion to her unwa­ver­ing phys­i­cal strength. She ended the ride by encour­ag­ing us all to reach for the stars (and no, it doesn’t have to be an iron­man!), because no mat­ter what that goal might look like, the only thing that’s stop­ping u from achiev­ing it, is OURSELVES!

Please take the time to give thanks today for your good health, because with­out it, life truly isn’t worth all that much!