The death of a friend’s child from brain cancer has inspired Andrew Soares to take on a gruelling cycle ride across the French Alps to raise funds for cancer research.

He’s one of 14 cyclists from Bermuda riding for various charities as part of the Classic Tours Charity Challenge, which starts tomorrow.

Mr Soares is raising money for the Bermuda Cancer and Health Centre and the Children’s Brain Tumor Project, operated by the Weill Cornell Brain and Spine Centre in New York City.

He decided to focus on cancer after American Caitlin Downing was diagnosed with an inoperable, rare brain tumour at age four. “I never met the child, but I followed her progress online,” said Mr Soares. “Her mother, Denise, kept a blog. She was a beautiful little girl. She loved rainbows. I am riding for a cure.”

Because the tumour was at the base of Caitlin’s brain, at the top of her spinal column, it was considered inoperable. Only ten percent of children with Caitlin’s type of brain cancer, diffuse intrinsic pontine glimoa, live more than 18 months. Caitlin lived just ten months after her initial diagnosis.

She took part in a volunteer research experiment with the Children’s Brain Tumor Project that saw half of the tumour destroyed.

“Unfortunately, with this type of tumour, it is very aggressive when you tamper with it,” Mr Soares said. “Researchers wanted to go back and try to get the other half, but she died.”

Mr Soares said he is also focusing on brain tumours because his godmother was recently diagnosed with one.

“She is fighting a difficult battle with brain cancer,” he said. “Maybe if they find a cure for Caitlin’s type of brain tumour, three years or so down the road it will lead to helping people like my godmother.”

He has raised $12,000 so far and has a target of $15,000. He first aimed to raise $5,000 but thanks to generous donations, shot through that goal.

He only started cycling two years ago, and began racing competitively with Team Tokio 18 months ago.

“To train for the ride in France, all we could do is put a lot of miles on the road,” Mr Soares said. “We did as much hill work as we could, doing hills like the one at the Fairmont Southampton hotel and Knapton Hill over and over to build up our legs.”

The ride begins in Nice and ends in Annecy, just south of Geneva, Switzerland. It will involve 560 kilometres of riding, 1,400 metres of climbing and crossing 15 alpine passes.

“My legs are sore just thinking about it,” Mr Soares said.

“I have trained as much as I can in Bermuda. One of the mountains we will climb will be Mount Alpe D’Huez. In places it has a steepness grade of ten percent — that is very steep.”

He said the difficulty of the ride would be weather-dependent. So far, the weather forecast is wet with thunderstorms. The riders will also have to contend with other vehicles on the road and hairpin turns. Mr Soares thought downward slopes would be more difficult as they would sometimes be riding at 50 miles per hour.

“I think it will be tough,” he said, “more of a marathon than a sprint.”

He has chosen a Cervelo cycle for the ride, which is equipped with more gears to climb steep grades.

“It is a nice road bike,” he said. “I treated myself. My previous bike I bought used and was about 12 years old.”

Mr Soares plans to keep a blog of his trip. He also hopes to place video cameras on his bike. He’ll show footage of the ride in Bermuda after he returns.

He’ll be joined by Bermuda residents Charles Thresh, Jason Kyme, Kevin Topple, Dennis Fagundo, Mark Booth, Will Peckett, Matt Claridge, Adam Hopkin, Richard O’Connell, Brian Steinhoff, James Mitchell, Jonah Jones and Mark Allitt on the ride.

See Caitlin’s mom’s blog at www.cheeringforcaitlin.com.

For information about the Children’s Brain Tumor Project see weillcornellbrainandspine.org/children’s-brain-tumour-project. To make a donation to the project go to interland3.donorperfect.net/weblink/weblink.aspx?name=wcmc&id=2. To donate to the Bermuda Cancer and Health Centre call 236-1001 or see www.cancer.bm.