Gladly reposted per Jim’s request:

Jim Graham here. I’m co-owner of Desert Dingo Racing and we running the official World Diabetes Day car - a 1969 VW Beetle - in this year’s Baja 1000 desert race in Mexico (which coincides with World Diabetes Day).
If you’re unfamiliar with the Baja 1000 or Class 11 VW racing, you can find a clip from the documentary “Dust to Glory” here: http://tinyurl.com/289hxz

Two members of our team have Type 2 diabetes and several others, myself included, have a history of diabetes in our families. When we decided to build a car for the race, we contacted the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) in Belgium and asked whether we could do a drive-a-thon for them to raise money for diabetes research and education. They loved the idea, it was approved by the president of the IDF and we’re prepping to leave for Mexico in about three weeks.

It’d be great if folks donate to the drive-a-thon, but we’d be equally happy if they followed us during the race - we’ll be live-blogging and Twittering it as we make our way down the Baja Peninsula.

I’ve included some facts and links below.

Thanks for your consideration,

Jim

Baja 1000 and Desert Dingo Racing Facts

• Desert Dingo Racing is a team of Silicon Valley professionals who’ve come together to race a near-stock 1969 VW Beetle in the 40th annual, 1,300 mile long Baja 1000 desert race. The course will take them from Ensenada to Cabo San Lucas on the southern tip of Baja California.
  

• Two members of the team, Mike Aquino and Richard Palasik, have Type 2 diabetes and several other team members have a history of the disease in their families.
  

• The team has partnered with the International Diabetes Federation and has been designated the official “World Diabetes Day car” for the race. The team is supporting a drive-a-thon fundraiser to support diabetes research and education. 100% of the funds raised go to the IDF. We’re also working with the Federacion Mexicana de Diabetes in Mexico City and expect to be distributing information on diabetes in Spanish during the race.
  

• Diabetes is the third leading cause of death in Baja California. Mexico is second only to the U.S. with the highest prevalence of diabetes in North America, reporting 33% of all cases, according to the SASI Group. Of the 8 million people living along the U.S.-Mexico border, 5.7%, or approximately 1.2 million, have Type 2 diabetes, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Pre-diabetes has been found among 14% of the total adult population in the area on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border, according to the CDC. Pre-diabetes affects approximately one million individuals, impacting 51% of women and 49% of men.
  

• Baja 1000 Race Week runs from Nov. 10-16 and coincides with World Diabetes Day on Nov. 14. The race begins 6:30 a.m. Wednesday, Nov. 13. We expect it will take us 53 hours to complete the course driving non-stop and changing out drivers and navigators several times. We will start live blogging and Twittering when we arrive in Mexico on Nov. 9.
  

• The race attracts 300,000 spectators on the course and millions more watch the TV coverage. It’s the longest non-stop point-to-point race in the world.
  

• Class 11 racing is limited to near-stock pre-1983 VW Beetles that have a roll cage, minor suspension modifications, racing seats and seatbelts and slightly larger tires. The nine-time winner in Class 11, Eric Solorzano, built Desert Dingo’s engine.

Website links
Link to the IDF: http://www.idf.org
Link to the World Diabetes Day website: http://www.worlddiabetesday.org
Link to the Federacion Mexicana de Diabetes: http://www.fmdiabetes.com
Link to drive-a-thon pledge page on the WDD website: http://www.worlddiabetesday.org/wdd_baja1000

Link to Desert Dingo Racing website: http://www.desertdingo.com

Link to DDR blog: http://desertdingoracing.blogspot.com
Link to DDR Twitter stream: http://twitter.com/desertdingo
Link to official Baja 1000 website: http://www.score-international.com

Video/imagery links
Youtube clip from Baja 1000 documentary “Dust to Glory”: http://tinyurl.com/289hxz (The red VW in this piece is owned by nine-time winner Eric Solorzano, who built our engine and is helping us with advice on the race).
Link to World Diabetes Day logos: http://tinyurl.com/399fkp

Link to Desert Dingo logo: http://www.desertdingo.com/images/smlogo.gif

RSS feed

http://desertdingoracing.blogspot.com/rss.xml

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This entry was posted on Monday, October 15th, 2007 at 6:01 am and is filed under World Diabetes Day Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.