Hello and welcome to a special King of the Ride podcast.

This past week was anything but normal in the gravel cycling world.

I imagine by now you've caught wind of the wildfires that blew out of control that caused a cancellation of mid-south on Saturday.

And that whole can of worms, that ball of wax, is the crux of the

conversation today. Now, you see, I was going to reach out to Chase Wark independently of this

current conversation you're listening to and have them on my podcast, have them on again,

as he was recently on, I want to say just five episodes ago.

But then, JP of the stable cyclist reached out to both Chase and me at the same time, around the time I wanted to reach out to Chase.

And so the long story short is this conversation can also be found on the stable cyclist pod. Furthermore, you see, in the aftermath of the Mid-South cancellation,

both Chase and I independently and unknowingly of each other's pursuits,

had the plan to ride the 300-mile Mega Mid-South Ultra on Sunday,

the day after a traditional Mid-South, in the pursuit of an FKT, the fastest known time.

With a clear goal of fundraising for the United Way of Payne County, Chase and I made it into a fundraising competition in addition to a bike riding competition.

So as of this recording, ivory is $6,000 for the United Way.

Chase is doing a great job with something like something in the order of $4,000.

We are north of $10,000 at this point.

Now having ridden through the literal burn zones to have seen houses burn to their foundations,

it is helpful to know that you can be a third party watching from the sidelines, wanting

to help but not knowing how.

I know how to ride bikes.

On occasion, I know how to fundraise for some great causes.

I know how to get a benevolent word out into an eco chamber.

...