Spring racing season means a trip west to Stokesville Campground for Race #2 in the VAHS. RCC would leave after school on Friday to camp for our fourth time in the past year. Read about our exploding trailer tire and a day of racing stories.

The Richmond Cycling Corps is a nonprofit that serves youth living in the East End. As a 501 (c)(3), we rely on philanthropy to serve our mission. In 2021 we saw increased generosity across the board. This type of generosity allows our small organization to continue serving our youth and allows us to dream up bigger and better ways to carry out our mission.

So, besides yourself, who are the magical individuals who donated to RCC?

Korey has been part of RCC since 2014. Seven years later and he is now riding for Kelly Benefits Strategies on their under 23 team. Early in 2021, he finally got a new bike - a full-suspension racing bike that would be a huge upgrade over what he had been riding. This is the story of how Korey would get that new bike. As told in everyone’s own words.

Q & A time with RCC youth. We ask each of them about the past few months of races. Hear about their favorite race, where they improved, and their favorite moments of the season. Our youth all improved so much on the bike, but they also are growing into soon-to-be adults!

Another race day for RCC as we went to Woodberry Forest School to compete against hundreds of middle school and high school students in the state of Virginia. We had brought eight youth with us to see six of them compete on their mountain bikes.

Cycling and more particularly, cycling races inherently skew towards the wealthy. We are struck by this fact every year — the race fees. Since we cover the costs of all of our programming, we understand why the barriers for entry can be too high. Even if you have a bike and have enough training the races are not close and they are not cheap.

Decades of policies and actions have led to a dramatic level of concentrated poverty in the East End. Public housing structures have kept a majority Black population living well below the poverty line. From redlining and segregation to the destruction of neighborhoods, Richmond has a long history to unpack. Then, we can see how these structures are perpetuating poverty and harming its residents. Lastly, we will try to unpack what is next for the East End.

The 2021 VAHS racing season had Richmond Cycling Corps traveling throughout the state of Virginia. The first race was at the Miller School of Albemarle near Charlottesville. Then RCC took the Legacy racing team on a camping trip to Stokesville for back-to-back race days. Six of the seven students on the trip had never camped before. Read about our races and camping…

When it comes to OST programs that involve athletics there remains a gap between affluent kids and kids that are living in poverty. Children from families that have annual incomes of $75,000 or more have an 84% participation rate in youth sports. Comparatively, only 59% of children from low-income families participate in sports.