Posts
583
Joined
6/10/2008
Location
Houston, TX
US
Edited Date/Time
1/27/2012 7:58pm
Good evening everyone,
Last year when the economy decided to start running in reverse, it became harder for the few charity events our MX community does locally to raise money. So a few of us put our heads together to come up with a charity event that would benefit children, but would not require a lot of financial support. As a result, we held our first "Day to Play in the Dirt" event at Cornerstone MX Park in Hockley (Houston) Texas. (search vitalmx for our press releases).
Through the Big Brothers and Big Sisters of Greater Houston and related charities, we invited 75 inner city kids, ages 8 to 12, to spend a special day at one of our local tracks and treated them to their first ride on a dirtbike. With about 40 volunteers and 20 sponsors and about $600, we managed to create quite an event that gave our MX community a chance to give back and reach out and make a difference in the lives of some very special boys and girls.
I have set up "Day to Play in the Dirt" on Facebook so you can see the pictures I have just posted of our first event. Our next event is scheduled for March 27, 2010. We are looking for more sponsors to donate items for the kids goody bags (like stickers, posters, etc) and some riding equipment (like gloves and goggles).
As you can see on the Facebook page, we already have some great sponsors signed up (like Alessi Racing of course), but we can always use more! I understand times are tough, but tossing in a few posters here and a few stickers there really add up. My contact info is on the Facebook page, so please let me know if you would like to become an event sponsor and I will do whatever I can to make it easy on you.
Please check out my Facebook page pictures when you have a chance, and when you have a chance to reach out and make a difference in your community, I suggest you go for it, you will never regret it!
Thank you all!
This is one of my favorite pictures from the 2009 event. That's Kevin Johnson from Team Faith (and X-Games medalist in MX) helping out one of our young pilots.
This little boy kept falling over, so Kevin went to see if he could help. After several attempts, the boy finally admitted to Kevin that he had never had a chance to ride a bicycle, but he did not want to give up because he wanted to ride a real motorcycle. Kevin wanted this little boy to have the same positive experience the other kids had that could ride, so he held onto the back fender and ran behind this kid for two laps on our track so the young boy felt like he was really riding the dirt bike!
Our event is all about the kids, and seeing their smiiles and their sense of accomplishment when they took those helmets off reminded us time and time again that it was all worth it!
I sure hope you can keep this going,Time for the rest of the texas mx community to step up.
In all honesty, this is not that hard of an event to pull off. The MX community is all about family, so getting volunteers was the easy part. There are a few legal hurdles you will have to go through and you will have to find a track that has enough vision and heart to host an event like this, but the rewards are huge. The volunteers had as much fun as the kid did!
Run the idea by your club, and if y'all want more info, I would be glad to share with you everything I have learned.
A local dealer heard of it and contacted me with an offer to do a top and bottom end and supply new shroud graphic with their name on it. He got a 2nd in the local series here on that bike and made high honors each term in school.
All I did was keep the little green machine and maintain it for him. His mom has saved enough money and has gotten a used 2007 RM125 and the support offers are starting to come.
The Shop
One of our Vital MX members has generously offered to send us some used gear, and we really appreciate that! If you are also interested in making a donation we can issue you a tax deductable receipt for you to include the value of the items you donated so you can write the donation off your income taxes. In addition, you can deduct the shipping costs as well. So between the two tax deductions, your generousity should net you a little tax savings!
As I mentioned above last year we used mostly equipment borrowed from our volunteers and while that worked just fine, it was not easy to manage. So we have been collecting used gear to build up an inventory of equipment for our young pilots to use.
Thank you again and I appreciate your kind words and generousity!
Rance
Thank you for the kind words all! If I pick up a few more sponsors to help me accumulate more items (stickers, posters, caps, T-shirts, etc) for the kids goody bags, I will be in much better shape than I was this time last year! Last year a couple of our local pros, like Clayton Miller and Kyle Phoenix, donated several of their old used jerseys for the kids goody bags.
One of the teachers of one of the charter schools where some of our kids came from last year said they still wear those jerseys to school often! And they are still the envy of their classmates that did not get to come to the event.
Below is Sean Kirby (an x-pro that raced SX and AX in the mid 80's) helping an 8 year old find a way to keep from riding back into the bushes. This young pilot could go like the wind, but could not turn at first!:
Last year we had 75 challenged inner city youths get to spend their first day at a motocross park and even better, they got to ride a motorcycle for the very first time! Because of our limited amount of riding gear (borrowed from volunteers), we were limited to how long each of our young pilots could ride. By collecting donated riding gear, we can get the pilots out fitted faster. We hope this will allow us to let every kid go through the riding program twice of they want to (which most kids will).
So thank y'all again for your generous donations, and thank you for helping us reach out to make a difference with these kids!
Rance
(check my facebook page "Day to Play in the Dirt" for updates)
If you have any stickers laying around (renthal, FMF, etc.), please consider sticking them into an envelope and mailing them to us! Our kids love them and it helps them take away more than just memories of our event.
Thank those of y'all that sent us your boots, and gear! Check out the pictures after the event and you may see some of the kids riding around wearing it with huge smiles on their faces.
Day to Play in the Dirt on Facebook
(BobbyM, I posted the link to make it easier to keep up with my real identity)
Thank you all!
Rance
The paypal account is rancebuss@hotmail.com .
100% of all contributions and donations go to the event. This year we will have more amusements and they will get a better photo/action shot to take home from the event (many of these kids don't have access to the internet).
In addition to Big Brothers and Big Sisters, we will also be getting kids from a couple of inner city charter schools. Our goal is to invite these families that have put their kids in programs to enrich their lives out to the MX park for a day of fun!
Thank you all again and please let me know if you have any questions. I am off today and thanks to Jimmy Albertson's dad (who I met here on Vital), I am putting in about 15 new lens's from Scott in some awesome goggles they donated!
Rance
You can p.m. me for e-mail addy...etc.
Thanks
You can reach me at PlayInTheDirt@hotmail.com
I will PM you as well...
Rance
Pit Row
Can't think of anything better than putting a smile on a kids face.
And for those of you that would like to donate riding gear (helmets/boots/jerseys/gloves), I will be more than happy to paypal you your shipping costs.
Thank you all once again! I just picked up a couple of new sponsors from this post!
Rance
You did get the box I sent last month I hope.
Donn
We are pretty close to having all the riding equipment we need so we no longer have to borrow it. That was a real challenge. Thanks to people like you and a couple of successful equipment drives, we are just about there.
We run 10 kids at a time, so if we have enough gear to outfit 20 kids, we can run the groups back to back and each kid will have a chance to ride in the program twice.
So about 10 more pairs of boots and 10 more helmets and I am there!
Rance
PM me the address to send to.
I sent you my address, I really appreciate your kindness!
Rance
I got a couple of packages in the mail today with your donations and I want say thank you! We really appreciate it and everything gets used in our event.
In addition to having kids from the Big Brother and Big Sister program, we will also have 20+ kids coming from the Ripley House Charter school. The Ripley House has been serving the Houston inmner city community since 1940 and offers a variety of education and enrichment classes.
We are happy to have them join us this year and look forward to seeing thier smiling faces! Thank you again for your donations, the kids will really appreciate them and thats who this is all about........
Post a reply to: These riders still need sponsors too......