Young cancer survivors' maturity inspires TV anchor
Jack Knox Times Colonist Tuesday, September 09, 2008
Scott Fee CREDIT: Debra Brash
The woman walking her golden retrievers along the Lochside Trail looks up, recognizes the cyclist, and calls out "Go, Scott, go!"
"Thanks," says Scott Fee, pedalling past.
CHEK News anchor Fee is indeed ready to go. So are the other 19 members of this year's Cops for Cancer team. Having spent six months training for the 1,000-kilometre Tour de Rock, they are like racehorses straining at the starting gate, impatience wrestling with anxiety as the Sept. 20 launch date approaches.
It's not where Fee would have imagined himself after arriving at CHEK a couple of years ago following stints at stations in his native Vancouver, Kamloops and Edmonton. In fact, he had never clipped into the pedals of a road bike prior to the team's first training ride in March. It was pretty freaky. Now, he doesn't think twice about knocking off a quick 60, 70 kilometres.
What he does think about is the cause: The money raised through the Tour de Rock flows into the Canadian Cancer Society, which finances pediatric cancer research and programs for children with cancer. That includes Camp Goodtimes, where kids with a history of the disease can go and enjoy just being kids, no labels attached. The Tour de Rock team visited the Maple Ridge-area summer camp one day in July.
Like others who have made the trip, Fee braced himself for what he might encounter; the mind does not conjure up happy thoughts when it comes to children with cancer. "I was nervous before I went."
But the camp proved a revelation, any doubts drowned out by the cacophony of grass-stained, dirt-smudged, laughing children. "I actually found the energy there tangible. It was a riot. It was a big party."
He did find one difference among those who had spent their youngest years fighting cancer: "They had this huge sense of maturity to them, yet they only come up to just above your knee."
That sort of experience serves to refocus the team, emphasizing the notion that the Tour de Rock isn't really about the cycling -- something that's easy to forget while grinding up the Mill Bay side of the Malahat as transport trucks roar past your ear, or while eating tire-spewed grit alongside the rainy Pat Bay Highway.
Fee is one of two media riders -- the other being The Zone's Dylan Willows -- on a team otherwise made up of police officers from around Vancouver Island. He signed on with a lot of encouragement from CHEK colleagues Ed Bain, who rode last year, and Jeff King, who was on the 2002 team.
It hasn't been easy. Fee joins in the long Sunday practices with the rest of the team, but anchoring the suppertime news has meant missing a lot of evening training rides -- hills on Tuesdays, speed work on Thursdays -- which he has had to make up on his own, often cycling solo.
He crashed during a practice in July, continuing a proud tradition among media riders. (Bain and I did face-plants last year, CHEK's Bruce McAllister plowed into a fence in 2003. Jody Paterson actually rode with a probably-broken arm after crashing while cycling alone five days before the 2001 tour began; she didn't tell anybody for fear they wouldn't let her take part, ended up gobbling Advil and icing her injury whenever she could.)
Fee was ordered onto the shelf for a couple of weeks after messing up his knee in a multi-rider pileup (no chance to hide the damage when you have an audience.) "That sucked," he says. "It was hard to sit at home and not ride."
He hated being off his bike, a sentiment he couldn't have imagined just a few months ago. But the Tour de Rock is such an intense experience, dominating the riders' lives as they invest a huge commitment of time, emotion and effort, that being sidelined leaves them squirming. Everyone who takes part knows how special the experience is, a feeling magnified by the fact that participation is a one-shot deal; a fresh team is chosen every year. "I'll probably never be part of something like this again," Fee says.
And now there are only a few days to go before the ride begins in earnest. Those wanting to contribute can log on to http://www.Cheknews.ca and click on Get Scott Around the Rock.
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