Pallotta TeamWorks, famous for creating the first AIDS rides, has gone out of business. But cyclists continue to raise money in rides with smaller budgets and in-house management. Each new ride also maintains an individual style and range in geographic area, from New York City and San Francisco, to rural trips in Texas and Hawaii.

The gradual demise of Pallotta TeamWorks (PTW) was fraught with lawsuits and losses. In 2001, 78.6 percent of funds raised for the national AIDS Vaccine Ride created and administered by PTW went to overhead costs; subsequent rides were cancelled.

Also in 2001, the San Francisco AIDS Foundation (SFAF) and the Los Angeles Gay Center broke ties with Dan Pallotta’s company over costs and contract disputes, and created their own ride, the AIDS/LifeCycle. PTW threatened a lawsuit and switched its list of beneficiaries. The Center and the SFAF suffered a decrease in donations, but recovered the next year. Pallotta TeamWorks didn’t.

Cal Callahan works in the Volunteer Services Department for the SFAF, has crewed on four Pallotta rides, and is a member of Team Bear, a group of hirsute gay men and their friends.

AIDS/LifeCycle’s next ride is June 6-12. With about 1400 participants this year, Callahan says the SFAF’s new rides are working.

"As much as the whole soap opera was so acrimonious, Dan [Pallotta] did a great thing at the beginning," says Callahan. "He brought charity fundraising to a new level. But it was always essentially about him. He went from about seven events a year to 27 events a year. He tried to grow the company too fast. What we saw was just questionable spending."

Callahan recalls the pageantry and almost zealous tone of each ride’s opening day. "Dan was on stage every night," he recalls. "On two occasions, he told people to do multiple events. We were cycling 600 miles, raising a few thousand dollars."

Callahan disapproved of Pallotta’s speeches to participants in which he told them to sign up for more rides and that participants were still not doing enough. Of AIDS/LifeCycle, Callahan says,

"We’re trying to make [the ride] educational, to raise awareness without really shoving it in their faces."

Team Bear is an attempt "to address the stereotypes that bears would not do this kind of event," says Callahan. "We’re a somewhat neglected subculture," he says, about the presumption "that basically the bears will eat and drink, and not do anything athletic."

But his group isn’t limited to hairy guys. "The first year, we had a bearish straight guy and a Filipino woman," he says. "She was our Goldilocks."

David C. Smith, Ride Director for Austin’s Hill Country Ride for AIDS, admits that having only 320 participants makes for an intimate ride, but he says, "It feels big because everyone’s excited by the growth."

With minimum pledges of $600—less than a quarter of what the last PTW events required—the average Hill Country rider raises over $1,000.

Having worked on Pallotta-organized rides that failed to bring even 30 percent net profit, Smith says their own event "turned into something positive. But ours was really grassroots; no fancy banners along the roads, just the power of the community coming together." The ride, which took place in April, raised over $397,000, surpassing its own goal.

For Braking the Cycle’s first 2003 ride, 47 riders netted $151,000 on a ride through Chesapeake Bay in Maryland to New York City to benefit the AIDS programs of New York’s LGBT Community Services Center. Registrations for the 2004 ride are up 170 percent. More than 80 riders will take a similar route this Sept. 10-12.

Eric Epstein, President of Global Impact Tours, created Braking the Cycle. His company runs trips to Thailand and Africa, as well as a hiking tour through Honduras, where participants visit an orphanage that receives funds from tour fees. "You meet the people for whom you’re making a difference," says Epstein.

A former AIDS activist who handed out condoms and safer sex information to New York City students, Epstein worked with PTW from 1996 to 2001. But after becoming "increasingly disaffected with the direction the company was going," Epstein left.

"There’s no escaping the fact that [Pallotta] had a brilliant idea," says Epstein. "But he let the focus get away."

Epstein says that PTW "made a strategic decision, with a change in the marketing that went from it being about AIDS to it being about personal challenge. Those things led away the core committed riders."

To contend with competition from other fundraisers, Epstein works with previous beneficiaries who have access to veterans of previous events. Growth comes through word of mouth, and Epstein focuses on donated ads and services.

The concept of AIDS rides continue on a leaner scale, but Epstein sees a cautious expansion into newer rides.