Due to the unprecendented global situation in regard to the COVID-19 pandemic, Cystic Fibrosis Canada BC/Yukon has made the decision to move GearUp4CF 2020 to a virtual format to keep our riders, volunteers and communities safe. 

We're asking that you complete your virtual ride challenge between June 20th - July 26th to allow you more time to train and fundraise for your virtual ride. Now you can complete your ride, your way, on your own time.

Yes! Registration is quick and will allow you to create your personal fundraising page!

No, there is no registration fee for the virtual ride.

No, there is no minimum fundriasing requirement for the virtual ride. Please set a fundraising goal for yourself and see what you can achieve! 

Yes, there is a jersey. Deadline to order is June 1st, 2020. Jerseys are expected to arrive my mid-July. Please plan to receive your jersey to commemorate your 2020 Virtual Ride. Jerseys are $75 including shipping costs.

Yes, the following are some helpful hints to help you attain your goal:

Set a goal: Set an ambitious, yet attainable fundraising goal for yourself and share that goal with everyone you ask to donate.
Get social: If you are active on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, use them to get the word out. Tweet or post with a message about the ride and why you are participating. Provide a link to your page so that people can donate easily online.
Ask: Not being asked is one of the top reasons Canadians do not donate to a charity.
Invite others: When you meet someone that is moved by your story, ask them to consider signing up and riding with you.
Say thank you: When you receive a donation, thank the person who has supported you with a personalized email, handwritten card, or a phone call. They will be more likely to support you again in the future if you thank them in a personal way.
Email Blast: Send an email to your family, friends, co-workers, neighbours and everyone else you know asking them to sponsor you. Provide them with links to your page and directions on how to donate. The key to making your letter successful is to ask for a specific dollar amount. Don’t forget to follow-up with a phone call!
Social Media: Use social media like Facebook, Twitter or a personal blog to update your friends on your training and get them excited about your adventure. Make sure to include a link to your personal fundraising page.
Local Businesses: Approach businesses that you have a strong connection with and ask them to support you on the ride. A great place to start is your local bike shop!
Spread the word: Wear CF related clothing while training and tell everyone what you’re doing. See if you can get complete strangers to support you.

Above and beyond everything else, we are doing this ride to raise money to find a cure for cystic fibrosis. Raising money can be a daunting task, so we have put together a list of suggestions based on approaches that have been successful for past participants.

You will need to login to your account from the front page, www.gearup4CF.com at the top right of the page, then enter your login details on the second page. On the left side of your personal page, click ‘change’ on the fundraising goal in the middle of the page and modify your personal fundraising goal. Enter your new goal and submit the changes.

Make a bigger impact by personalizing your page! Once you register, by default you will have a Personal Page created for you. You can personalize this information by clicking ‘edit message’ and saving what you write. You can also upload your own photos and videos.

If you need your username or password reset, please call us on 604-436-1158 and we will ask you some security questions and reset your details for you. Remember that your username and password are case sensitive.

On your Personal Page, click the "Add Media" button in the photo section and in the message box click ‘Add image’ or Add media’, File Upload, select the photo you wish to place in that piece of the layout. You can only upload a photo in ".jpeg" format. Click “Save image”.

Due to the situation with COVID-19, we strongly reccomend that all donations are made through your personal online fundraising page as it is difficult to process cash and chques at this time. If you do recieve cash or cheques from donors, please call the BC/Yukon office directly at 604-436-1158 to arrange processing.

If you are collecting cash or cheque donations and would like your personal online fundraising page to reflect your success please follow these steps:

1. Sign into your account
2. Click on the ‘Fundraising’ tab at the top of the page GearUp4CF.com
3. On left side, click ‘Manage cash and cheque’
4. Enter the donor’s information and submit

Donors that provide us with a valid email address will receive a tax receipt via email.

Donations $20 and over receive a tax receipt. Tax receipts are issued immediately from the website when an online donation is made. (If you have donors that pay by cash or cheque please allow some time for tax receipts for cash and cheques to be processed).

Tax receipts for fundraising events may not be issued for the purchase of a product, entrance fee, lottery ticket or revenue from an event. For example, if you hold a burger and beer night and raise $800 through tickets sales, raffle and silent auction, you may not submit that $800 for a personal tax receipt. If you have personal expenses from hosting the event, you can submit your receipts to us, and we will provide you with a personal tax receipt for the amount of your expenses. If you have any questions regarding our tax receipting policy, please contact the office.

Convio, the company responsible for housing and maintaining The Ride website, has made every effort to protect your information. They use industry-standard SSL encryption techniques to make sure that your credit card information, passwords, and personal information travel securely over the internet. They have also installed an encryption engine on our database server so that your data is securely stored.

All donations go to Cystic Fibrosis Canada to help us reach our mission of funding targeted world-class research, supporting and advocating for high-quality individualized CF care. In 2016-2017, we invested $5 million in cystic fibrosis (CF) research, including grants to support innovative science across a broad spectrum of areas relevant to CF, improve the health and quality of life of CF patients, and bridge the gap between research and clinical care.

To find out more about how funds you so generously raise are used, we invite you to view our Annual Report.

GearUp4CF is managed by a dedicated volunteer committee and our Cystic Fibrosis Canada team. Although the ride looks different this year, we are always looking for volunteers! Please email our team at BCinfo@cysticfibrosis.ca.

GearUp4CF wouldn’t be possible without the generous support of our many amazing sponsors! If you would like information about sponsorship opportunities for this year’s GearUp4CF, please contact Katherine Campbell by emailing her at kcampbell@cysticfibrosis.ca or call 604-436-1158.

You can still join a team for the Virtual Ride in order to fundraise together! However, please note that we are not encouraging riders to bike in groups at this time. If you have already registered as an individual, you can log in, click the ‘team’ button in “Your fundraising page” and create a team. When you click ‘team’ you get an option to create a team, join a team or email a team. Choose ‘create a team’.
For people registered, you can let them know the team name and they search and ‘join the team’.
For people not yet registered, they need to register and ‘join a team’ at the time of registration.

Meet impassioned rider and supporter, Aaron Mittler. His daughter, Lucy was born in 2013 and 2 weeks later, Aaron and Mary got that call that Lucy had been diagnosed with CF. It was devastating.

“We only got the call because CF had successfully advocated for newborn screening for all kids with CF. This gave us a head start for giving Lucy a great start in life. We were introduced to a team and resources provided by CF Canada. We went from totally devastated to very optimistic about giving Lucy a good life and have vowed to support the cause right from the start.”

About three weeks after she was born, Aaron’s friends Mike and Adam contacted him to say they wanted to do something. “It makes me emotional to think about it, the sense of community.” They started ‘Team Lucy’ the same year and raised about $12,000. Aaron joined in year two and have been riding each year ever since. To date, they have raised more than $250,00 dollars!

“GearUp4CF is always an incredible time, meeting and riding alongside people with CF and lung transplants and other riders raising funds for CF Canada. It shows how strong people really are, especially the second day, riding straight uphill for five hours – it’s hard physically as a healthy person and you want to give up and you look beside you and someone with CF is doing it. It inspires me to keep going.

We hope you’ll join us. Please register today!

Please add #GearUp4CF on Social Media. Please use #GearUp4CF and #rideyourway4cf when sharing your ride on social media! Use these other hashtags as well:  #GearUp4CF2020 | #makecfhistory | #aworldwithoutcf | #CysticFibrosis 

Share your ride! Please follow us on social media and share with your family and friends.

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram

Twitter CF Canada

We ask that you please ride safely and responsibily at all times. Please ensure that you are following the health and saftey protocols set out by the Province of BC or your local health experts and that you are keeping both yourself and community safe at this time.Cystic Fibrosis Canada accepts no liability for your own personal ride (damage or loss of property to bikes)..

• Make yourself familiar with British Columbia’s Rules of the Road or your local rules of the road
• Please ensure your bike is in good condition prior to your ride
• Be respectful of any other riders and always be aware of others around you and communicate well in advance when cyclling. Pass on the left only, politely saying "on your left". 
• Control the speed of your bike, even going downhill. Know your limits.
• If you do participate in the virtual ride by biking outside (road bike, hybrids, commuters, mountain bikes) please wear an approved cycling helmet. Riders must have the chin strap buckled at all time.
• All registered riders must agree to the waiver form.

If you have any questions or require anything further, please contact us at BCinfo@cysticfibrosis.ca or call us at 604-436-1158.

The office of Cystic Fibrosis Canada - Western Region is located at 254-4664 Lougheed Highway, Burnaby, BC. Please note our office is currently closed to the public at this time.