In mid-March Brandon resident, Grant Hamilton and his wife travelled to Europe for Grant to get a taste of what cycling the terrain of the Tour de France might look like.
Hamilton is the only Canadian to participate in Tour 21, a fundraising initiative by Cure Leukemia, the official charity partner of the Tour de France. Tour 21 follows the exact same route as the Tour de France to be held just one week prior to that iconic race.
For Hamilton and his fellow 24 riders from all around the world, it's not so much as a race as it is a challenge to complete the trek, with the goal of raising £1,000,000 ($1,753,949 Cdn) for Leukemia research. The Brandon resident has been working tirelessly to put on the miles, build strength and endurance, and raise his own personal goal of $55,000 for the research incentive.
"It was quite a large training camp in Mallorca, Spain and it was just wonderful," he explains about last month's cycling venture. "It was my first opportunity in a couple of months to ride a bike in the real world other than in the virtual world."
"But what a confidence builder to come together with some of the people that I'm going to be riding with this summer, to get to know them as people and as fellow riders, to learn how to ride together on roads in a small group pretty tightly together," explains Hamilton, "and to do some of the most toughest, longest rides in my life and to realize this training is paying off. I am going to be able to tackle this challenge. And I'm not going to let myself down. And I'm not going to let my donors down. That felt really good after a week of hard riding in the mountains in Spain."
As Director of Marketing and Communications at Brandon University, Grant Hamilton is very pleased to be participating in an educational aspect of Tour 21.
"One of the things that the charity does is that they partner each of the riders up with one of the clinical centres and I've been told that I'll be partnered with Oxford University Hospital in the U.K. and I'll be able to talk to researchers and nurses there who are working directly with leukemia patients and hearing about some of the clinical trials that they're doing."
“You know, we have great Cancer Research right here at Brandon University and great researchers in all kinds of different fields,” shares Hamilton. “But I feel very privileged to have some insight into what goes on in setting up these research programs and how important the funding is to keep them going.”
“And, you know, learning that this is a worldwide thing,” he adds. “It happens in Brandon, but it happens across the country, and it happens everywhere. We see other other areas cutting funding in some of this research and you know that's going to cause problems for years down the road. And we want to make sure that what we're doing is creating solutions for years down the road and not causing problems.”
“They are a great group of people and I'm really looking forward to three weeks on the road with them."
Hamilton had met some of his fellow cyclists at the official unveiling of the Tour de France 2025 route last October in France. But to meet the rest of the team and spend time on the road together in Spain last month was very special.
“It was wonderful to spend a whole week, hours at a time, riding beside people, learning about their families, their jobs, what brought them into this challenge, and finding the ways that we have things in common and things that are different,” he shares.
“They are a great group of people and I'm really looking forward to three weeks on the road with them. You know you can't always say that when you meet people that you're looking forward to spending three weeks day in and day out with them. But these people, I am, and everybody's in it is for the same reason. We want to do a physical challenge for an extremely good purpose, and it makes me feel good about the people that I'll be riding with.”
Tour 21 takes place this summer from June 20-July 28th, one week before the actual Tour de France.
Please listen to more with Grant Hamilton below!
(all photos are of Grant Hamilton's training camp in Spain last month)