WeHowGrew
Team Droopy and Bike MS By Marcella Durand
Kristine Druen’s husband, Jimmie, was diagnosed in April 2007. Three months later, while on a camping trip, she
decided to form a Bike MS team with a group of
friends and coworkers. Six months later there she
was, on the longest ride of her life.
“We so just winged it,” Kristine, who lives in
Kansas, said. “We showed up that first morning
thinking, what have we gotten ourselves into?
None of us had ridden more than 20 or 30
miles straight. And that first day, we rode 87.”
Jimmie and Kristine Druen
Accept the challenge
One hundred rides. One destination. A world
free of MS. Find a Bike MS event near you and
register today: www.BikeMS.org.
34 Momentum • Summer.2011
Cushioning the bumps
Now, if Kristine were to start over again, she
would train first.* But not for the reason you
might think. “The hardest part wasn’t the
bicycling,” she remembered, “but the sitting.
Getting on the bike that second day was really,
really difficult.” She advises novice riders to
wear padded bike shorts as she now does.
“They definitely help.”
Kristine’s dad has ridden Bike MS for over 20
years in Springfield, Mo. So he lent Kristine and
her team support. “My dad was as close as we
got to professional training,” she laughed. The
last three years, he’s ridden with Kristine’s team,
and in 2010, father and daughter rode on a tandem bicycle. “It was different, but fun!” she said.
*Visit BikeMS.org for information about
a free Training Peaks account.
