ANN ARBOR, MI-- Ann Arbor’s Nancy Eavy recalls gazing up a large hill and being unsure if she could ride her bike up it.
Then, she felt a gentle hand on her back about three-quarters of the way up.
“I looked to my left and it was a support rider,” Eavy said. “And he just said ‘I’m here to help you, you can do this. Let’s ride together.’”
And she rode to the top.
Eavy is now training for a 240-mile bike ride to help raise funds for cancer research. She is a breast cancer survivor herself and sees similarities between battling breast cancer and her bike training.
“Sometimes it’s just walk beside (a cancer patient). Be that support, put your hand on someone’s back (and) say a few words,” she said. “They don’t always need to hear multiple answers and opinions, sometimes it’s just the presence of being there to help them go through their journey.”
All the pieces of her life were coming together in 2008, Eavy said. She was pregnant with her first child and had a nurse -- the job of her life. Then, she had suspicious results from a routine mammogram.
Her official breast cancer diagnosis, after a biopsy, that year didn’t come until after her healthy daughter was born.
Today, Eavy is cancer free.
In September, she joins more than 200 other Bristol Meyers Squibb employees in Coast 2 Coast 4 Cancer, a cycling relay ride that spans the coast of Oregon to the coast of New Jersey. The ride raises donations for cancer research, and every dollar up to $500,000 is matched by Bristol Meyers Squibb.
The employees’ goal is to raise $1 million and each participant has a goal of $5,000 each. Eavy is currently at $2,470 of her $5,000 goal.
Eavy will ride 240 miles over three days beginning on Sept. 20. She will cycle about 60 to 80 miles per day from Denver, Colorado to Kansas City, Missouri before she passes the baton to a teammate.
Eavy said she loves her stationary bike, so on-the-road biking was a learning curve.
“Cancer took me out of my comfort zone (and) biking is taking me out of my comfort zone,” she said.
Training to take such a strenuous ride has left Eavy with her fair share of bumps and bruises. She said she’s wanted to give up along the way, adding that training left her saying “Oh my gosh, what did I sign up for? I think cancer is easier than this bike. Sometimes I really thought that,” she said.
But Eavy said she has the attitude of “you go and you do and you give it your all,” she said. Her maximum riding ability is at 60 miles currently.
Just like her cancer journey, training requires adapting, she said.
“In this training, I find that as I’m going down a road and I see a log, or a bump, or a twig from a storm in the way. I think about the journey,” Eavy said. “Like, oh my gosh, this is so much like the journey: You’re riding along, life’s going great, and all of a sudden there’s a bump in the road. And I don’t know what to do. And then you turn and you go another direction, or you have to stop and rethink and go. So, there’s a lot of those similarities in this whole training.”
While her personal journey has inspired her ride, she’s also riding for those who have been touched by cancer, either experiencing it personally or knowing someone who has.
Every dollar donated to the cross-country ride is given to the V Foundation for Cancer Research, Eavy said.
“I think that’s a beautiful thing and people can know that their money is going for a great cause,” she said.
To donate to Nancy’s cause, click here.
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