BLOOMINGTON PANTAGRAPH, JANUARY 14, 2007
www.pantagraph.com
Some people inspire others by doing great things. Take Michelle Thompson, for instance.
Pantagraph readers met her in October as she pedaled through the Twin Cities on her way to California. At 35, the self-described non-cyclist planned to ride the length of Route 66 on a bicycle to raise cancer awareness and raise money for her brother, John, who is battling the disease in California.
Before her trip, she’d ridden just a little more than 100 miles in all of 2006. Her late start meant she was surely going to hit bad weather. But she was driven to help after witnessing her sibling’s struggle with oral cancer, which claims 8,000 lives each year. About 30,000 cases are diagnosed annually.
The bike ride from the Midwest to the Pacific Ocean was to focus attention on her Web site, www.route2outsmartcancer.com and to attract the notice of reporters like me along the way. Her goal was to get information about oral cancer into the pages of newspapers and on television screens from along the way.
Cameras from KABC in Los Angeles were there to record the moment when Thompson, a manufacturing consultant, rolled into her brother’s driveway in Costa Mesa, Calif., on Christmas Day.
Total distance: 2,441.3 miles.
“Don’t forget the .3,” she said, laughing.
Total time: nine weeks, two days.
Total money raised: $10,200.
Total number of flats: “Nine or 10,” she said.
Add to that two falls that cracked her bike helmets, several nights spent in laundry rooms at campgrounds to escape frigid temperatures and countless “road angels” who helped lighten her load along the way. The angels were people she met who took her single-wheeled trailer, a bob, ahead so she didn’t have to pull it so far.
Thompson also crossed paths with people like Bob and Ramona Lehman, who run a motel on Route 66. They put her up for free for two nights during an ice storm and introduced her to Jim Conkle, who publishes the Route 66 Pulse, a newspaper that carries the news along the Mother Road.
Conkle dubbed her “the Bike Lady” and posted her story on the Internet where the Route 66 crowd could see it. They opened their doors to her along the way.
Once, after her bike had shifting problems in Amarillo, Texas, she spent a night in a laundry room. After hearing about her trouble, a Route 66 tourism promoter arranged for a limo with big horns on the hood to pick her up and take her to the Big Texan motel and restaurant.
The Big Texan is famous in Route 66 lore for its offer to feed customers a 72-ounce steak free of charge if they eat the whole thing within a time limit. Thompson spent the night there free. She skipped the steak.
Another couple drove 30 miles to pick her up, take her to dinner and offer her a room in their home to sleep. They drove her back to her starting point the next day.
So much kindness from strangers was something she didn’t expect.
“It took me by surprise,” said Thompson. “My hope was I would be left alone, that no one would harass me or heckle me. Instead, people went out of their way to be nice to me.”
There were times when she was in danger. She crossed a 7,000-foot mountain pass in a snowstorm with winds that threatened to blow her away. It was 17 degrees.
“I was numb.”
Workers at a truck stop let her spend the night.
When Thompson reached her brother’s house, he was just starting to eat again after surgery a month earlier to remove cancer from his sinus cavity. An earlier surgery removed oral cancer from his tongue and his jawbone.
He still faces reconstructive surgery. The good news is he’s cancer free.
“He’s battling every day,” said Thompson. “But, he’s on track and getting stronger everyday.”
John Thompson now has a date in Clinton, Okla. Officials there invited him to be the parade marshal for the 2007 Route 66 festival after Michelle Thompson paid a visit. Meanwhile, his sister plans to raise more money and create a nonprofit foundation to carry on.
“It (the ride) was absolutely worth it, but we are not done with the work,” she said. “This is my new passion. I have two jobs now, one as a consultant and one trying to raise awareness of cancer in our community.”
Thompson may also take on other cancer issues. While she was in a gift shop in Gallup, N.M., wearing a jacket bearing the name of her Web site, an American Indian approached her and said: “Cancer is killing my people.”
She learned uranium exposure from mining is the suspected cause.
The bike Thompson rode to California will be auctioned on eBay to add money to the fund to help her brother. But she plans to buy another and keep riding to outsmart cancer.
“Originally, this was about one person trying to help one person they love. Now, we would like to take it farther,” she said.
By Scott Richardson
srichardson@pantagraph.com
Join Michelle and the Route2outsmartcancer Community in helping John Outsmart Cancer. 
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