Today CSUN’s Student Recreation Center hosted Spinning Nation® 2015, a country-wide charity bike-ride event in which participants raise a minimum of $100 and all of the proceeds go to the American Heart Association’s “Go Red for Women” movement- a life-saving, heart disease awareness campaign.

This is CSUN’s first year hosting the Spinning Nation® event; Venice-based fitness company Mad Dogg Athletics contacted CSUN and presented the school with the event partnership opportunity in December. In addition to the SRC, hundreds of other facilities hosting this simultaneous event asked riders for a $5 registration fee and a $95 donation, which may come from their own wallets or through friends and family.

One of the seven participants was Amanda Christianson, SRC fitness coordinator and this event’s planner. When asked about the turnout, Christianson noted that the “small and mighty” group would have raised at least $700 towards the cause. Both she and the event’s instructor, CSUN Biology assistant professor Cheryl Van Buskirk, hope Spinning Nation® will come back to CSUN and grow.

Buskirk decided to instruct the class due to her passion for teaching spinning and her favorable view of the American Heart Association’s heart disease awareness and prevention mission.

“People generally don’t think about heart disease being the number one killer of women, but it actually is,” says Buskirk. “Even if you don’t have somebody in your family that has heart disease, it’s really important just to keep in mind the type of diet and exercise regiment that’s really important for staving off heart disease.”