Patrick Dempsey Challenge

This detailed experience is from my friend and Dempsey Challenge participant, Christy Chase. She raised over $3,000 to go to the Dempsey Center. Thank you for sharing Christy! You are going to be well known by Patrick as many times as you get to see him.

I tried to make this as detailed as possible, but my memory kinda sucks. Hopefully this will satisfy the Patrick fans who couldnt be there

10/2
Friday consisted almost solely of traveling. I got up at 4AM to get on a bus at 4:40 to get the light rail to get my 7AM flight out of Minneapolis. It was almost as exciting as it sounds. Had a rather long layover in Atlanta, which was made longer when my first plane had some sort of electrical failure and we had to switch planes. But despite leaving over 2 hours late we were only an hour and 10 minutes late getting into Boston. My mother picked me up and I got to drive for the first time in a month and ½ when I drove from the airport up to our hotel in Portland, ME. After dinner it was sleep time! Haha

10/3

Saturday was kinda awesome. And by kinda I mean extremely haha. Got up at 6 and got ready to drive up to Auburn for my mother’s volunteer shift at the Auburn Mall. I hung out there and “did some homework” while she volunteered. Got all my incentive stuff while I was there too. I got a Dempsey Challenge gym bag, water bottle, long sleeve shirt, a Hincapie jersey, a paper to pick up an autographed Patrick Dempsey picture the next day, a bunch of coupons and a random box of 84 tampons, which I found very amusing haha. I saw Shannon before she got to go on her private bike ride with Patrick.

There were tons of volunteers there though, way more than were needed, so we ended up leaving a little before her shift was supposed to be over. Denny’s was consumed. We drove the 40 miles back to the hotel since we had a while before the dinner that night. I did a little “Patricking” (watched Grey’s), took a nap, and got ready for the dinner! Probably the longest I’d taken getting ready for anything, except maybe my senior ball, but I needed to since I was going to a dinner with Patrick Dempsey! We left really early to drive back up to Lewiston, and got there really early. Better early than late though! So we hung out in the car outside the place for a while, it was really fun.

The reception started at 6, so around 5:50 we decided we could go in, since we saw a few other people go in already. My mother came in with me too, even though she wasn’t technically supposed to be there. At the door I gave them my name and for a minute the lady couldn’t find me on the list and I got nervous, but then she found me under “participant” and gave me my bottle of syrup for my seat holder at the dinner. My mother was still outside the door at this point, and I went in. Immediately I saw Patrick talking to the few people that were already inside. I saw Joe Foster pretty quick too. A minute later my mother just wandered in and no one stopped her, and at that point Patrick just left the people he was talking to and was walking kinda near us, and as he was walking by he saw us and got a huge smile and came right over. He first hugged my mother and gave her a kiss on the cheek, then did the same to me.

My mother said something about meeting him at Watkin’s in June and he was like “Oh yeah, of course I remember! How have you been?” My mother told him we had been great. Then she mentioned how much money I raised for the Challenge ($3,380 officially, though $150 in checks are still on the way) and he put his hand on my shoulder and was like “That’s great, thank you so much!” My mother then pulled out her disposable camera and had Patrick and I pose for a picture, and he totally rubbed my back AGAIN. He asked how the trip there was and if we had driven from NY, and my mother said she did and that I flew into Boston. I then blurted something about my plane having mechanical failure so it took me forever to get to Boston from MN and he kinda looked at me weird and said that sucks or something. I don’t really think he understood what I said cause I was talking so fast. My mother took a few more pictures on my camera, cause digital is clearly better than disposable. Then his sister came in and he was like “Have you met my sister Mary?” My mother said yeah, but Mary came over and shook our hands and started talking to my mother. Patrick was listening, but I wanted to get a picture of him kissing me on the cheek, and since he had already done that once I figured I could ask, so since I’m super awkward I said really fast “My friend wanted me to get a picture of you kissing me on the cheek, could we do that?” and he kinda did a double-take and was like, “Yeah, sure.”

Of course then 2 other people he appeared to know showed up and got a quick picture with him. I told my mother that he agreed to the cheek-kissing picture so we could take that. When he came back over my mother was fumbling with the camera and he kissed me on the cheek again, but she wasn’t ready, so he stopped then kissed me again, for like 10 seconds while we were waiting for my mother. It was magical. After that my mother pulled out the copy of the newspaper article about me raising money for the Dempsey Challenge and gave it to him and he took it and gave it to Mary and told her to put it up on the site. My mother told him quick that my father was doing a lot better and he said that that’s great. She then mentioned that she wasn’t really supposed to be there and he said it was fine and he was glad she got in. About then tons of people started coming in and started crowding around us, so he said it was great to see us again and to have fun and he went to talk to other people.

So basically at this point I was completely freaking out cause Patrick freakin Dempsey had just kissed me three times! I was shaking so much I could hardly text to tell my friends about it haha. Shannon and her husband Tom showed up then, so we went over to talk to them. They were nearly as popular as Patrick though so we didn’t get too much time to talk. By now the place was filling up a lot so we wandered around for a bit. We saw Joe standing alone with 2 glasses of wine (one for him and one for Patrick, who he was waiting for), so we went over to talk to him. He remembered us from the races too. We talked about how crazy the Utah race was with all the crashes and stuff. He said the car is still being rebuilt for the race in Florida this upcoming weekend. Then he said something about hes the most disposable thing on the team, but I said he wasn’t. Poor Joe thinking that!! Then we were talking about how he doesn’t really go to things like that where he had to dress up and he felt like a fish out of water. He said Patrick was joking with him about putting on his nice clothes, and he said they called it something, but I really can’t remember at all what it was, but it was funny haha. My mother told him she wasn’t supposed to be there and he was like “Look at you, they’re not going to kick you out!” haha I got a picture with him and we were making fun of the use of a disposable camera at first and he said he hadn’t seen that in a while. Then we were talking about the event the next day and he said he was riding in it and he had to ship his bike to ME and it was a pain to do. He had to get over to Patrick quick though so I wished him luck in the FL race and said he hopes to see me at the Watkins race next year.

We got some of the food and sat and ate that for a bit. It was all really good. They had tons of people wandering with appetizers too, and they looked expensive. I didn’t have anything though cause at the time fruit was all I felt safe eating since I was still kinda freaking out and the last thing I needed to do was puke on Patrick or something haha. We went and looked at the silent auction things and they were all ridiculously expensive. They probably made a lot of money off of them though, which is good! I kept positioning myself in the room so I had a good view of Patrick as he took pictures and talked to everyone there. Whenever we couldn’t see where he was we just looked for the mob of people, cause he was inevitably in the middle of it. My mother went over to talk to Mary again for a minute and got a picture with her. She wanted to get a picture with Patrick, but by the time we waited in the make-shift line and were almost to the front he left, so I just took a picture of her with him in the background instead. So some more hanging out occurred, and after a while we made our way upstairs. I thought at that point my mother would have to leave cause I thought they would be checking to make sure people were supposed to be there, so I went upstairs and initially sat with Shannon and Tom. But they had special seats because she was the top fundraiser. Almost as soon as they left though my mother showed up with a lady who she had been talking to who worked at the hospital and said she could definitely stay for the dinner.

I had a seat like 5 tables back from the front of the room where the stage was. The place was huge and really fancy. I had a perfect view of Patrick from where I was sitting, so that was great. When I stood up to get my food he totally looked at me from across the room and smiled. I kinda melted a little inside haha. In the line for food a guy who was kinda drunk started talking to us and my mother was of course going on and on about me and how much money I raised and stuff. He kept saying how awesome that was and smiling, it was kinda funny haha. The food was amazing though! The salad was great, and the white zinfandel (that’s probably spelled totally wrong) vinaigrette dressing was probably the best dressing I’d ever had. The breadsticks and cheese tortellini were great too. The guy who was sitting next to me was really nice and we were talking for a while, mostly about my school and stuff. He apparently does a show on PBS that airs Friday night and he was telling me all about shooting that and stuff. After a while they played a video about the Dempsey Cancer Center. Then the host guy got up onstage and said that we needed to pay attention to the next video, which ended up being a clip of last weeks’ Grey’s episode and the sound was messed up so everyone was laughing. After the video Patrick stood up and waved awkwardly and it was adorable.

The presentation started after that. The host was talking about how much money was raised through the Challenge and stuff. Then the senator (governor maybe?) of Maine got up and presented Patrick with an award for making the center in Maine and how much good it is doing for everyone there. He got up to accept it, and said it was for everyone who works there, and especially for his sister. It was cute. Then the host started talking about how he had first met Patrick 30 years ago when they went to Cleveland together for a juggling competition, which had jugglers from all over the world and Patrick came in 2nd. He was then like “So I would like Patrick to come up here and do the exact routine he did that day…. Just kidding.” Haha Then he had Patrick come up along with a guy who runs the hospital or something (not exactly sure who he was but it was something like that). They did a Q&A thing. Patrick’s first answer took like 10 minutes and at the end he said “Sorry that was really long-winded” and the host was like “That’s ok, I just won’t be asking you another one.” Hahaha Basically he was talking about how he wants the Center to be attached to the Central Maine Medical Center so it can be integrated with the cancer wing so the patients and caregivers would be able to get a massage or support before/after they are there for treatment. He also was saying how the room reminded him of the circus? Haha It was super random. After a few questions the other guy sat back down and a unicycle came out. He wanted Patrick to ride it and Patrick said he hadn’t in about 10 years and the stage was tiny, but he got on and tried. The first time he kinda failed, but he tried again and rode it for a little and then fell flat on his face haha. He was totally fine though and it was hilarious (theres a video of his up on facebook if you care to see it). Then Patrick was talking about how many awesome people he has met from racing all over the country and how he had seen a few of them at the event tonight and how much that meant to him. It was so sweet! After that the pro-cyclists came up and did a little Q&A too. 2 of them were super nervous and hardly said anything haha. They were talking about how they first got into cycling and how it became a passion and what the Challenge meant to them.

I think next were the awards. Shannon got to go up onstage first for raising the most money and having the most number of donors. She talked for a minute onstage too. There were a few other awards also. For the survivor one they gave them really fancy looking clocks that you’d put on a mantle or something and the one survivor lady had a whole speech planned and asked Patrick to take back the clock so she could read it off her paper and after he takes it she apologized and he was like “Oh, its fine, we have plenty of time. Time…” and he pointed at the clock and laughed and it was adorable.

Next up was the Maine Hysterical Society skit thing. It was pretty funny! The beginning they did a song and then for the last thing they did this performance where they were eating beans and one of them fell to the floor and they yelled “Is there a doctor in the house?” And Patrick hesitantly stood up and they told him to come back onstage and gave him a lab coat, a scrub cap and a stethoscope and had him sit in the audience and then when they said that in the skit he was supposed to jump up and yell “I’m a doctor!” and run onstage, check for a pulse with the stethoscope and then announce that the man needed brain surgery. He ended up sitting at the table right across from mine so I had an awesome view of him as he waited for his part. He was making awesome faces and it was great. The first time through they did it normally and he jumped up and yelled his line and started running up and the guy called cut and said they needed to do it again cause Patrick ran weird and “no real doctor would run like that.” So they did it again, this time they did it in slow motion, so when Patrick jumped up he yelled it slowly and did a slow-mo run to the front and was fumbling with the stethoscope as he went and it was hilarious. Again they called cut and they did it again, this time they were rapping. So when Patrick jumped up this time he started rapping too and he walked all ghetto up to the stage. When he got there he stood over the guy who was on the floor and leaned over and started spanking himself as he checked his pulse, then stood up and announced that he needed brain surgery. By this point everyone was dying laughing, it was so funny! That was the end of the skit and they took a bow.

The dinner was over now, so we went up and talked to Shannon again quick and my mother wanted to get a picture with Patrick but again when we got in the crowd around him he left almost right away. My mother talked to the lady from the hospital again quick and then we headed out. It was quite an amazing night! Of course it was absolutely pouring on the drive home and I was driving. I was going 40 down the expressway most of the time, it sucked! But I was kinda ok with that since I had such a great night. By the time we got back I was pretty exhausted, so I talked on the phone for a bit then went to sleep.

10/4

Yet again it was an early morning, and we had to get up at 6 again. We got ready to go quick then headed out and drove back up to Lewiston. Once we got there most of the roads were closed cause of the event so we couldn’t figure out how to get to the parking garages we were supposed to park in haha. We found a spot on the street and walked to the park where everything was going on. When we got there we immediately saw Patrick onstage and went over to get a better view. Just then he got off the stage to get ready for the ride and ended up walking right next to me with his security guards. The people around me were freaking out about touching his back/being that close to him. After that I went over to the 5K staging area to wait for everything to start. They had a 15 minute delay, but eventually they had Patrick and all the pro-cyclists leave first for their 50 mile bike ride. 2 minutes later the 100 mile riders left, and there were A LOT of them! 50 mile riders were next, followed by 25 and 10. Then finally they had the 5K people get ready. They were talking about how Christine Chase from Mercedes was there and the “official starter” of the 5K. I thought it was amusing that her name is my name except for one letter difference haha. The 5K started though and initially I was really close to the front, but everyone kept passing me. I hadn’t run in 2-3 weeks so I was kinda out of shape, and there were a LOT of hills, but I ran the whole way so I was proud. I ended up with a time of 34 minutes 23 seconds.

After the run I was exhausted and sweaty so I rested for a bit then wandered around to see all the stuff they had there. There was a performance of jugglers and they were really good! My mother of course was going around talking to EVERYONE so I just wandered off alone haha. They had breakfast there for free so I got a bagel and Pepsi cause I needed some caffeine to wake up. By this time it was windy and pretty cold, so we went back to the car so I could put on my jeans instead of shorts, which was a very good choice. There were so many people around it was crazy, but really awesome. My mother got 2 free massages and I picked up my autographed Patrick picture that I got for raising over $1,000. I went over to watch the people coming back from their rides about 45 minutes before Patrick and the pros got back. It was great seeing all the people come in. One guy’s pedal had fallen off during his ride so he finished by walking his bike with his pedal in his hand! The announcers kept updating us on how far out Patrick was, “Latest news is Patrick and the team are 10 miles out. At the rate they’re going they’ll be here by Tuesday.” Haha

After a while they finally did show up. He looked super happy to have finished it and was waving at the crowd as he rode by. When he got off the bike he went over and gave his mother a kiss and then they got mobbed and some press people were taking pictures of him, his mother and the pros. He signed a few autographs for fans there and then was escorted by security out of the mob. He made it about 50 feet before being interviewed and mobbed again. He had 3 cameras in his face and 100 people crowded around, it was kinda crazy. I noticed his hair was still perfect and he had JUST taken his helmet off. He is clearly magical. Or his hair spray is… After that security escorted him behind the fence to the trailer. The announcers reminded everyone he’d be back out for the 3PM presentation.

It was around 12:45 by this point, so I got my free food quick, and it was actually really good! And it was a lot of food, including a veggie sandwhich, a roll, corn on the cob, a baked potato and ice cream. Definitely delicious. We watched a little of the cheerleaders that were performing and then decided we could probably leave since we had a 560 mile drive home. My mother started talking to another lady on the way out, and she turned out to be a close talker. It was kinda funny though. She seemed pretty jealous of the picture of Patrick kissing me haha. We left at that point though, sadly, so we didn’t get to see the presentation thing at 3PM, but with all the people there and all the mud it probably wouldn’t have compared to the dinner anyway.

The trip home was luckily uneventful and we made it to my house by 9:30. It was an AMAZING trip! And the Dempsey Challenge ended up raising $1 million for the Dempsey Center which is absolutely great!! I’m really proud that I was a part of it and I definitely hope to go next year again.

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