With the arrival of 2015, that marks the close of the 6th annual Rappstar Charity Challenge for World Bicycle Relief. This year, we - and I want to emphasize that it is a collective effort by all of us - raised $84,424. In what I call "WBR Math," that's 630 bicycles into the field. And with the $-for-$ match at the end of the 2014, that's 1260 bicycles. Wow. Thank you! Every year, I'm always a bit daunted by the task of trying to do this, and every year people have come through in bigger and better ways to help me. Amazing. I cannot think of a better way to both end 2014 and start 2015.
Some of you may wonder what happens now. Well, it takes me about a week or so to build a spreadsheet of names and donation amounts that I use to make draw prizes from. It will be a bit of extra math this year with the boosts at 5 and 10 bikes in terms of extra chances, but I suppose I better use that engineering degree for something useful. After that, I use Random.org to generate random (really, random enough) numbers. Then I contact folks by email. If somehow I can't get through on email, I've used Twitter and Facebook in the past to hunt people down as well. So keep your eyes and ears open. I'll also be following up this year with everyone to alert them as to how to take advantage of the Raymond James and Associates offer if they want it.
One special thing we did this year was ask people to speak about what this fundraiser and/or World Bicycle meant to them. Those videos were amazing and really made me feel incredibly good about the work that I feel privileged to do every year with this. Here, turning the tables a bit, Katie Bolling and Claire Geiger of World Bicycle Relief talk about this fundraiser, which really means talking about all the incredible company and people who support it and me and enable it to happen.
2014 has been an incredible year for World Bicycle Relief, with over 54,000 bikes put into the field. But to think about the impact that you all have made, over 1% of those bikes have come just from this fundraiser. 1% is a lot. That the team at World Bicycle Relief can count on this effort - because of people like you - year after year, that is an incredible difference maker. In the six years that we have been doing this together, we've raised almost $400,000. Wow again!
There's another special anniversary of sorts right now. It's been 10 years since the Indian Ocean tsunami (December 26, 2004) that spurred FK Day to create World Bicycle Relief. In that 10 years, World Bicycle Relief has grown from an idea into one of the most impactful and efficient and well respected philanthropic organizations in the world. So that was a powerful reminder of both the need and the impact of these efforts. It's a reminder of the Power of Bicycles!
So that you for all that you have given. For what you all have the chance to get as thanks, or for those of you who want to see all of the prizes up for grabs, you can check that out at the Jackpot! page. Thank you again to all of those folks who chipped in (in alphabetical order): BoCo Gear, Compex, First Endurance, Ironman and the Ironman Foundation, Michellie Jones, NormaTec, Quarq, Raymond James and Associates, Rideye, Silca, Smith Optics, Specialized, SRAM, and Zipp.
Lastly, I'd also like to thank my colleagues at Slowtwitch, Dan Empfield and Herbert Krabel, who basically allow me to take over the site to leverage its reach and influence. Without the support of Slowtwitch, I wouldn't raise a fraction of what I do. So a big, big thank you to both of them.
And now, let's put a close on this year's fundraiser by looking ahead with the words of the poet Rainer Maria Rilke: And now we welcome the new year, full of things that have never been.
