Even during a week like Kona, where everyone’s focus is squarely set on Saturday’s battle, it’s a statement that hits any triathlete where it hurts: For less than the price of a racing saddle, you could purchase an entire bike that will forever change the life, future and opportunities of another person living in a third-world country. A bike can mean the difference between a young girl safely making her way to school everyday, or for a man who’s recently lost everything in a natural disaster to be able to have a reliable form of transportation to rebuild his life.

When SRAM and Trek bicycles founded the organization World Bicycle Relief in 2005, it was shortly after an earthquake and tsunami had devastated parts of Asia. “They worked with World Vision and were able to provide more than 24,000 bicycles to the people of Sri Lanka,” says World Bicycle Relief’s Grassroots Organizer Katie Bolling. Since 2005, World Bicycle Relief has donated 89,707 bicycles to countries in need all over the world. “We’re currently focusing our efforts on places like Zambia in Africa, where affordable access to bicycles can help in numerous ways from providing easier access to education to helping AIDS/HIV workers more easily do their jobs caring for the sick and helping spread awareness about disease prevention.”

Team World Bicycle Relief members Jordan Rapp and Michellie Jones took the charity’s message to heart, and have each worked hard to spread the message about how a bike can change someone’s life for the better. This year will be Jordan’s third year raising money in the lead-up to Ironman Arizona in his RappStar Charity Challenge. Since 2010, the RappStar Charity Challenge raffle and donation drive has raised upwards of $40,000. Jones was especially touched by the World Bicycle Relief’s Bicycle for Education Empowerment programs, which works with groups including the Salvation Army and CARE International to provide bicycles for young girls in order to go to school. “When hard times or unrest occurs, young girls are the first to be sent home from school,” says Bolling. “And even if they are allowed to go back, walking there can be an incredibly dangerous endeavor.”

What started as a small project by two bike manufacturers has grown into a multinational charitable organization that works with high-powered groups like the Clinton Foundation and Zambia’s Ministry of Education to make sure their two-wheeled gifts are just sent off and never thought of again, but rather are used as tools of change. In Sri Lanka, World Bicycle Relief retained an independent organization to track the impact of their bicycle donation program, and what they discovered was that 88 percent of recipients depended on their bicycles for their day-to-day welfare, and a single bicycle could save a household 30 percent of it’s annual transportation costs.

This year, groups like the Ironman Foundation and the Janus Charity Challenge are stepping up to lend a helping hand—or wheel as the case may be. “The triathlon community has been such a great supporter of this charity, and every year the sponsors give more,” says Bolling. “It’s been so great to see such a great cause supported by such a great community.”