Apr 28, 2016 3 min read

Max Lindsay, a Peters Township resident and sophomore engineering major at University of Pittsburgh, admitted the idea of riding 700 miles on his bicycle from Pittsburgh to Iowa City, the national headquarters of his fraternity, to raise money for cancer research was not original.

A chapter in West Virginia completed the trip several years earlier.

But Lindsay, 20, the philanthropy chairman at Pitt’s Delta Chi chapter, said he felt compelled to make the trip. Not just for an adventure, but for the chance to give back.

“I brought it up at a chapter meeting in January,” said Lindsay, the son of Sarah and Paul Lindsay of McMurray. His fellow Delta Chi brothers liked the idea, and two of them, Malcolm Juring of Squirrel Hill and Zach Ward of suburban Philadelphia wanted to ride along.

The three Pitt Delta Chis plan to leave Pittsburgh on Monday morning, two days after finals are finished, and try to get past Youngstown, Ohio, on their first day on the road.

After that, they have no idea what their next stops will be, Juring said.

They are raising money for the V Foundation for Cancer Research. The foundation is named for former North Carolina State basketball coach Jim Valvano, who won a national championship in 1983 and died 10 years later of bone cancer.

The foundation is the Delta Chi charity of choice. Since 2006, Delta Chi’s 120 chapters raised nearly $1 million for the V Foundation, according to the foundation’s website.

“We know it sounds like a bit of a crazy idea,” Juring said.

The three fraternity brothers would like to raise $3,000 for the V Foundation. Their expenses along the way are coming out of their own pockets, not from donations, Lindsay said.

Juring, an experienced cyclist, is serving as the unofficial leader of the trip, which is scheduled to end May 12 in Iowa City.

Ideally, Juring said he would like to ride around 100 miles a day, but because of topography, that might not happen. When the terrain gets flatter, Juring said he expects to go more than 100 miles.

The trip, which will take them through parts of West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and finally Iowa, will be done mostly on back roads, Juring said.

“Hopefully, there will be a lot of Subways along the way,” Juring said, adding they will bring snacks and stop at sandwich shops and diners that they come across.

If they get stuck in a major thunderstorm, or some other sort of bad weather, they plan to keep riding – if possible, Lindsay said.

“I have not seen this part of the country,” Juring said. “It’s been my experience that people are pretty supportive.”

Lindsay said he is hopeful that the bike trip will also change some perceptions people may have of sororities and fraternities.

“That’s the beautiful thing about Greek life,” he said.