Help Murray Drew and family

"I suppose you have heard the news about Murray Drew, if you have you can skip the next paragraph.

On Wednesday about 6PM he was turning left on to Haultain off of Foul Bay Road (in Victoria). It was dark and wet out. A car driver did not see him (obviously) and hit him from behind. Murray was air lifted from the Jubilee Hospital that evening to Vancouver. Bottom line is he broke his C3 vertebrae in three places and is a quadriplegic at this point. The CT's and other scans showed no brain damage and no internal bleeding. But I'm afraid you can not get much worse than a C3 being broken.

The point of this email (post) is to let you know that I have decided to organise a by donation fund to help the family with travel expenses for the next year, or however long Murray will be living away from home. At this point "The system" is taking care of Murray, I think we need to help out those often forgotten in situations like this, and that is of course his family. We all know that by helping the family out, it would please Murray a great deal.

Karl at Oak Bay Bicycles 1968 Oak Bay Ave, V8R 1E2 has agreed to be the focal point to receive all donations. At this point (Sat night) I understand that Karl will be working with Murray's son Jeff to open a bank account for this purpose. It may be best to consult the Masters Web page (as per above) before you make out the cheque. For those of you unable to do this I am sure that if make it out to Oak Bay Bicycles Karl will deal with the money transfer. Just ensure you put "Murray Drew" in the memo section of the cheque. But please check the web site for the correct addressee of the cheque to save Karl the work. THANK you Karl, for being the focal point in this. Please donate anyting you feel is appropriate. The focus of the funds will be to support Murray's family in their time of greatest need. We would like to cover his family's travel and lodging costs, as well as demonstrate the support of the cycling community. As you are out Christmas shopping please drop of a donation at Oak Bay Bicycles. If every rider in town dropped off $5-$15 to support the need, Murray's family could focus on Murray and not on the expenses. As a club, I am trying to organize a large donation to help aleviate the financial burden that accompanies berevement. There has been so many phone calls and emails sent to me I am happy to say that thanks to the Masters Association ALL information about Murray's condition will be focused on their web page located here www.bcmasterscycling.net So if/when you're wanting to know how he is doing this will be the best place to go.

PLEASE forward this email to any and all people who know Murray be it cycling, personal or business associates. If people get more than one copy of this email sorry, but that's how email works. On a personal note, I felt very lonely on the ride of 20 people this morning. Something I do not think I will ever be able to totally overcome [this]. Pat Leask"