And the Winner of the Inaugural Assisted Division of the Peachtree Road Race is...INCLUSION!

Ricardo and Matt win the Inaugural Assisted Division Peachtree Road Race.
PHOTO BY JORDAN D. HILL/JORDAN.HILL@AJC.COM

Hello K Peasey Nation...If you think the weather has been hot during the month of July, the Foundation schedule has been scalding. 

KPF started off the month on America's birthday with Atlanta's iconic race, The Peachtree Road Race, the largest 10k in the entire country with over 60,000 participants. That's a lot of athletes!

Peachtree even has a wheel chair division which was made up of 62 athletes this year. Brent and I have been working very hard along with the Atlanta Track Club and The Shepherd Center to create the first assisted division in the race's long and historic history. 

The inaugural assisted division was made up of five teams with the winners being Ricardo Aranda and Matt Shechtman who finished in a blistering time of just over 38 minutes. 

In an article published by the Atlanta Journal Constitution, Matt thanked Ricardo for his reassurance as "Schectman’s endurance weakened over time".

“Ricardo is an amazing lead and he keeps pushing me the whole way. He talked me off the ledge and kept me going. He’s an awesome puller.”

He continued, “The Peachtree is all about inclusion,” Schectman said. “Sixty thousand different people out here with 60,000 stories.”

It was a very historic Fourth of July with fire works all through the day and a perfect day to celebrate both independence and inclusion. What a perfect pair as in many ways the two travel hand in hand. 

Two days after Peachtree, Brent and I packed our suitcases and hit the road in the KPF RV with a final destination of Muncie, IN for the Muncie 70.3 1/2 Ironman.

It was great to see some familiar faces on the course each of which inspired us to a personal best of 33 minutes for the 1.2 mile swim. We followed that up with a great bike portion of 3:56 for the 56 miles ride and followed that up with a very solid 1/2 marathon for a personal record of 6:28:00.  

We can't thank KPF athletes Tina and Naomi Hicks enough as they made their way to IN to support us. 

Brent is participating in his own full Ironman race this weekend in Sonoma Valley, CA at Vineman. We will be rooting him on and encourage him to spend more time on the course than in the vineyards. 

We are getting ready for a very busy schedule with the Lekotek Fun Run on August 13, a local triathlon on August 27 and then the People's Marathon aka the Marine Corp Marathon on October 30th in the Nation's capitol just a few days before the presidential election.  

Don't forget to check out our site for information about Bowling with Kpeasey, The Jake Vinson Family Grant and of course, Camp Wheel a Way!

As always, Together We Wheel!

KPF Schedule Is As Pretty as a Peach (Tree)

It seems as though I start off each blog post with the same general sentiment and that is to say, "It's a busy time of year for the Kyle Pease Foundation and our calendar is filling up by the week." That's because it's a busy time of year for the Kyle Pease Foundation and our calendar is filling up by the week.

We had a record breaking turnout for the Virginia Highlands 5k and everybody seemed to have a great time including new and veteran athletes alike. Now we turn our attention to the largest 10K in the United States;  The Peachtree Road Race which just happens to be in our back yard of good ol' Atlanta, GA.  

We so excited that the Atlanta Track Club and the Shepard Center has allowed us to compete in the race with bibs for five teams. Just a couple years ago, Brent and I were dubbed as pioneers as the first assisted team to run this race and now thanks to these two organizations we have grown five-fold.

We have a whole weekend of happenings and this is one of our biggest fund raisers of the year. Greg and Christy Smith have graciously opened their home for an evening of fun that will highlight the Peachtree Road Race and The Kyle Pease Foundation. We are so grateful and excited to share the gift of inclusion with some amazing people. Thank you to the Smiths for opening their home to our foundation. 

Join us in our friendly bet where KPF Fans can wager to support their KPF favorite team at our website. This is a fun way to support KPF while cheering for your favorite KPF team.  

The Monday following the race, Brent and Kyle will hit the road for the 70.3 mile Half Ironman in Muncie, IN on Saturday, July 9.

So as stated earlier, it is a busy few weeks.  As always don't forget to apply for the Jake Vincent Family Grant and to sign up for Camp Wheel Away.

And do not forget, Together We Wheel. 

Spreading the Message of the Kyle Pease Foundation from Coast to Coast

It's been quite a stretch for the Kyle Pease Foundation as we have done everything from speaking at SAP Financial in the City of Brotherly of Love to traveling to Montgomery, AL for another speaking engagement. We then flew to the west coast for the Bay to Breakers Race with our main man, Curtis Ward to cap off an incredible two weeks. 

Curtis and I have had a very special relationship for the longest time as we played adaptive sports together several years ago and now he shares the road with me as a member of Walking with KPeasey. It is a true honor that our paths crossed again.

Curtis shared his thoughts about our trip together following the race, "My experience in San Francisco was perhaps the best race I have competed in so far. The Bay to Breakers was an interesting event as the racers threw soft shell tacos into the crowd along with marshmallows. Though that was interesting the highlight of the race was running with my friends."

There were two fundraisers held in CA for us. One was put on by

Brent's very good friend, Jeremy Carter, who also pushed Curtis. Jeremy works in Napa in wine country. The event was a Low Country Boil where they served sausage, corn, shrimp and wine. It was a great event and a wonderful time was had by all. 

One of my very first caretakers from Emory University was Suzanne Becker. She threw a fundraiser for us at a local bar. It was great to see her and her husband, as well as, seeing my former caregiver Anna Shields. 

It was great to spread the mission and to make more people aware of what we do. 

As always it was great to hang out with my brother, Brent and to spend some quality bro-time. 

Don't forget about submitting your application for the Jake Vinson Family Grant and until next time, Together We Wheel. 

Kyle Pease Foundation: We're On The Road Again

Though Willie made it famous, Kpeasey is putting it into practice over the next couple weeks, taking the Kyle Pease Foundation on the road.

 

As I'm writing this, we are in the midst of the "Boston Sweet Tea Pahty", with our own Atlanta Hawks tossing the Celtics into Boston "Hahbah", while the Braves scalped the "Sahx" in the final game of their four game set. How good it feels to rub it in the face of our social media director "Tahd" who makes the "Bahston" area his home.

 

Now that that's out of the way, we have a busy couple weeks on both the speaking and the racing circuit that will take us from coast to coast. At the end of April, Kpeasey was all over the state of Georgia, enjoying races in Augusta and Atlanta.

Little Miss Naomi has been on a roll, racing  every weekend throughout the month of April. We are so proud of her and thrilled that fans think of the Kyle Pease Foundation whenever they see her race. She is becoming one of the many familiar faces of KPF.

Brent and I, along with Michael Ragan and Naomi, joined Greg Smith and Marin, at the Pace Academy 5K (Marin's school) last week. We were also joined by Jim Balckburn, Tina Marie Hicks, Cary Liner and Joltin' John Pulliam. Well represented team of KPF blue.

 

We are so excited and honored to be speaking next week at SAP Financial in Philadelphia. How fitting that Brent and I get to speak in the "City of Brotherly Love".

 

We will be following that up with a trip to the left coast where Zappos.com Bay to Breakers 12K on May 15th.  Curtis Ward will be joining us in San Francisco and enjoying the beautiful sites the city has to offer. We will also be speaking at two locations in "The Golden Gate City" while raising funds for KPF.

Don't forget to sign up for the Jake Vinson Family Grant. You can visit our website to apply.

Getting ready to pack the suitcase, blast some Willie and get on the road....again. Remember, Where there's a wheel there's a way.

KPF is Hitting the Pavement Running in 2016

Before we begin our regularly scheduled blog post, Brent and I, as well as the rest of the Kyle Pease Foundation, would like to take a moment to offer our sincerest sympathies to Major Kim "Rooster" Rossiter, his family and the entire Ainsley's Angels of America family following the loss of their daughter and inspiration to so many, Ainsley. Ainsley left us all earlier this week and will be forever missed. Please take a moment and think of this incredible little girl and then go hug your child and all those close to you. Life is fleeting and we need to experience the joy brought to us at every possible moment. RIP, Little Angel.

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Last week Brent and I kicked off our 2016 season in Augusta, GA at the Dr. Seuss is on the Loose 5 and 10 K. This of course makes me want to do the next part of the blog in Dr. Seuss type rhyming.

 

Six K-Peasey athletes ran and ran,

But did not eat Green Eggs or Ham.

They participated in the Seuss 10K

We'll save this rhyme for another day.

 

Our Augusta family really loved the fact that we traveled down there and they were absolutely the hostess with the mostest.  It was great to get our wheels back on the pavement after a couple winter months of hibernation. 

 

Next, we are gearing up for Charles Harris 10K this weekend in Atlanta, followed by one of my favorites, The Publix Half Marathon.  We have more than twenty athletes signed up so far and there is still time to get involved both either as an athlete or as a pusher.

 

This is the five year anniversary of the Kyle Pease Foundation so we have a lot of things planned for the foundation, personally and for all KPeasey athletes. We are VERY excited about everything that is going on.

 

Please let us know about races in tour area as the foundation can travel and support races around Georgia and the southern region. Where There's a Wheel;  There's a Way, I've been know to say. This helps us to involve athletes from all over and to share our message with a wider audience. We are also able to speak to schools, businesses and civic organizations, so please let us know if you have a contact we can connect with.

 

Earlier this month, Brent and I were honored at the Georgia House of Representatives by Representative Pat Gardner. The House gave us a resolution for all of our hard work with the disabled in the Atlanta area. Representative Gardner purchased a book for every member of the house. We received a standing ovation from members of the House. Quite a moment.

March is Disability Awareness month so many local schools are doing programs in March surrounding the event. As I said earlier, if your school is planning something, please let's discuss bringing Brent and I to the school.

Lastly, don't wait to sign up for the Jake Vinson Family Grant. The application can be found on our newly designed website at www.kylepeasefoundation.org.

KPF Hitting the Ground Running in 2016

Happy New Year and welcome to the 2016 kickoff of the Kyle Pease blog. We have so many incredibly exciting things on tap this year that I'm not even sure where to begin. 

We will be hitting the ground running this week as Brent and I will be speaking in Atlantic City, NJ and will be making a couple stops in the Philly area. Seems only fitting that the Pease Brothers speak in the City of Brotherly Love.  Our speaking topic will be New Beginnings focusing on the NY City Marathon and how we were forced to change our game plan and execute a new plan from scratch. In sport, business or every day life this is a valuable lesson to learn from. 

We are also gearing up for another speech on my birthday..February 19  speaking at a local organization. Nothing is a better birthday gift for me than sharing our message to new audiences. In fact, if you would like us to speak at your business, school or civic organization, please let us know. 

We recently spoke and signed our book at TriCoach Georgia in Athens and had an incredible visit. Check out the story and more photos in this link. I'm the good looking guy with my cap on crooked.

On the race circuit, we are gearing up for the Publix Half Marathon to be held on March 20th where our goal is to gather the largest group of KPF runners ever...to date our largest contingent of KPF athletes has been 22 in chairs being pushed by 72 volunteers. Whether or not you have competed with us before this is your opportunity to participate. The application is on our "newly designed" website. We will match you up with a three person team of your relative speed so there is nothing to stop you from joining us. 

NOTES OF KPF INTEREST 

• It's not too early to sign up for the 2016 Jake Vinson Family Grant. 
• We will be blogging consistently this year  on the blog...once per month so stay tuned. 
• See our new website and share on social media 

Our book, "Where There's a Wheel, There's a Way" continues to

get some superior reviews on Amazon. Please take a moment and post yours there as it really helps others make a purchasing decision. We would also love your creative photos of you and the book for our Facebook Wall of Fame. 

If you haven't purchased your copy yet, we urge you to do so. All proceeds go to help the foundation so your purchase is a Win-win. 

Until next time, Together We Wheel, 

Kyle