Ride for Her caps Breast Cancer Awareness Month

Close to 100 cyclists joined Saturday’s second staging of the Ride for Her fun bike ride, which capped DFS Saipan’s Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

The ride began in front of the T Galleria entrance and was divided into two distances—short course at 20 kilometers up to Pacific Islands Club-Saipan and back, and the long course at 40K to Hawaiian Rock entrance in Obyan and back to the starting line. The event was part of DFS Saipan’s fundraising activities and proceeds were donated to the Commonwealth Cancer Association.

DFS Saipan president Marian Aldan-Pierce, who completed the short course with human resources manager Esther Ada, said they thought of the event since both of them were also avid cyclists.

“This is part of our employees engagement to the community, part of our work in helping CCA and spread cancer awareness. Since Esther and I were into biking, we came up with an idea of having a one-day bike ride as a fundraising event,” Aldan-Pierce told Saipan Tribune.

“DFS also had different activities in all of its locations. Like here on Saipan, we started it last year but only for DFS employees. This year we opened it up to the community to benefit everyone. We’re hoping to make it a bigger event next year.”

Aldan-Pierce added that they had pledged in organizing various activities that would help the community.

“We’ve been doing various activities for the community for a long time. We are for community engagement and have done a lot of things that benefited the people of the CNMI.”

DFS Saipan’s Breast Cancer Awareness Month began with a presentation by Drs. John Tudela and Phuong Luu to all DFS Saipan employees and was followed with the Pink Bake Sale before ending it with the Ride for Her.

The bake sale collected more than $500 and the cycling event raised over $1,000. Aldan-Pierce together with Ada, DFS general manager Milan Rabold, assistant manager Ben Babauta, and operations support manager Marida Pensader presented a check of more than $2,000 to CCA officials led by program manager Juan L. Babauta, board secretary Bobbi Grizzard, treasurer Cesar Dumatol, and member Lauri B. Ogumoro.

Meanwhile, Aldan-Pierce announced that the Silver Streak Tom Picarro Fun Run will take place for the last time in June next year. This will be the 25th staging of the annual event.

“We’re going to retire the event on its silver anniversary. It’s a bit sad, but we’re going to replace the event with the bicycle race,” said Aldan-Pierce.

Wolf Mojica, one of the brains behind the Silver Streak, will be coming to Saipan in June next year for the final staging of the event named after the former DFS official.