Carbondale Rotary Hosts Bikes for Bikes Malaria Fundraiser

Aspen —On a night in Kenya, with the sun setting and rain pouring down, a community health promoter known locally as a daktari got on her bicycle. She was in her 60s or 70s, and she had a call from a village four kilometers away. A boy was sick with a high fever. She rode through the dark, found him, tested positive for malaria, and administered tablets. The next morning, she brought him to the clinic. He survived.

Dr. Daniel Perlman told that story during a 2025 trip to Kenya, and it’s the reason Carbondale Rotary is hosting its second annual Bikes for Bikes fundraiser on Sept. 27.

The event is a 15-mile ride from Basalt to Ironbridge along the Rio Grande Trail. It’s almost entirely downhill, a detail that matters when you’re asking neighbors to pedal for a cause 7,000 miles away. Last year, it rained on the event day, and they still raised more than $10,000.

Perlman is a retired infectious disease specialist and the executive committee chair of Rotarians Against Malaria, a group that unites over 5,000 members worldwide. He and his wife, Bryna Perlman, spearheaded the effort to shift Rotary’s global health focus from polio toward malaria. With polio eradication showing promising progress, the organization expanded its scope. The money raised in Carbondale goes directly to Rotary clubs in Africa, where the logistics of treatment are brutal.

Tim Whitsitt, a Carbondale Rotary board member and the event’s organizer, puts it plainly. “Malaria is very treatable. It’s a problem of logistics, though,” he said. “It is extremely difficult to get to large populations in those countries because there are no roads.”

That’s where the bicycles come in. The daktari in Kenya rides a bike from Buffalo Bicycles, a company that builds frames for durability and ease of maintenance on tough roads. The bikes are designed to carry big loads, which is essential when a health worker needs to transport medicine or supplies to remote villages. The Bikes for Bikes event makes those bikes its fundraising focus, tying the physical act of riding in Colorado to the physical necessity of riding in Africa.

The World Health Organization reported 610,000 malaria deaths worldwide in 2024. For many of those patients, the distance between a village and a clinic is the difference between life and death. The daktari Perlman spoke to knew that distance intimately. She didn’t have a car, and she didn’t wait for the rain to stop.

Participants can register as individuals or teams. Individuals are challenged to raise at least $50, while teams aim for $220. The route is open to anyone who can ride a bike, and the challenge isn’t about speed — it’s about showing up.

Perlman reflected on the daktari’s ride with a simple observation: “Probably would have died if it hadn’t been for this lady going out there on her bicycle in the rain.”

The event is a small part of a global effort, but for the people who ride from Basalt to Ironbridge in September, it’s a direct line to that woman on the bike. The math holds up: treatable disease, hard roads, and a bicycle that doesn’t quit.