#1665 Kent Has Something to Say

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Kent Schnakenberg returns to share how one bike ride turned into a life’s mission—raising awareness, saving lives, and inspiring thousands through Team Schnak Strong and the fight against type 1 diabetes.

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DISCLAIMER: This text is the output of AI based transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors and should not be treated as an authoritative record. Nothing that you read here constitutes advice medical or otherwise. Always consult with a healthcare professional before making changes to a healthcare plan.

Scott Benner 0:00
Friends, we're all back together for the next episode of The Juicebox podcast. Welcome. Hi. This

Kent Schnakenberg 0:13
is Kemp snackenberg. I started team snack strong, you know, back in 2014 and I'm very, very excited to be back on your podcast. It's amazing to me how you grow on this thing, and I'm so proud of you, and how many people continue each year to say they listen to that podcast and reach out to me. So I'm excited to be back on Scott.

Scott Benner 0:31
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Kent Schnakenberg 2:14
This is Camp snackenberg. I started team snack strong, you know, back in 2014 and I'm very, very excited to be back on your podcast. It's amazing to me how you grow on this thing, and I'm so proud of you, and how many people continue each year to say they listen to that podcast and reach out to me. So I'm excited to be back on Scott, is

Scott Benner 2:33
that true? Kent, you were on episode 76 which, I mean, maybe is the second year with would that have been 2016 maybe? Well,

Kent Schnakenberg 2:42
I just thought it was 10 years ago, so it's probably 2015 or 2016 and that first year just was started getting messages and emails and stuff on Facebook for people all over the country. And when I was doing, you know, the rides all over the country that year, that's how I started meeting people, going to their houses and take it out to eat. So you obviously have a big following, and that's why I'm excited to get another chance to kind of give you a 10 year, a 10 year recap of what's gone on since

Speaker 1 3:08
then. Yeah, no, that's awesome. I'm trying to look up the episode right now. I think it was 76 Yeah, yeah. I'm just seeing that now, so, but I'm trying to figure out what year it was, see if I can't find it like it's it's been so long ago. Oh, I know what the problem is. When I search for 76 there's been 41 other episodes with the number 76 in them. That's why I'm getting so that's why I'm getting so

Kent Schnakenberg 3:34
many returns. I really think it was 2016 for some reason, 2016

Scott Benner 3:40
Okay, well, that's really great. Oh, I appreciate. I do want to kind of start from the beginning, even though, you know it's going to be something you said in the past. Tell me again how this all started, what your connection was to it. And then we'll, we'll pick through, okay,

Kent Schnakenberg 3:52
well, I mean, in 2014 my connection is, you know, my niece, Michelle, and she was diagnosed, and she was 14, and obviously that's quite a while ago, and she's doing amazing. She's now a pediatric nurse. She went through Texas A and M with full colors. Now she's helping kids and giving back that way. And I just decided, my brothers and I decided to go to Lake Tahoe for a JDRF ride, which I had no idea what JDRF was or nothing about type one diabetes at the time, but my brother said that'd be fine. So my twin brother and my younger brother, Mike, who's Michelle's Father, we went to Lake Tahoe and rode 73 miles around that lake, met a lot of people, and really did enjoy it. I got back on the shuttle bus to go back to the airport. I said by a young lady, her name was there,

Scott Benner 4:40
CGM on her arms. Ken Tell me again. I you dropped out there. Her name was, what her name was, Aaron. Aaron. You know what? Kent, I'm gonna stop you for a half a second. I think I figured something out. Because, okay, you remarked to me that the first time we did this, we had audio trouble, right? And just now i don't i think i. Think there's something about the resonance. I know it's gonna sound crazy for a second, but I think it's something about the deepness and the resonance of your voice. When you're talking and you don't modulate, you start to I don't know how to describe it, but your voice starts to disappear, and then the minute you modulate, your voice can get a little higher, a little lower, it comes right back again. I wonder if you're speaking at a frequency that the phone gets confused.

Kent Schnakenberg 5:24
It's pretty low.

Scott Benner 5:25
Yeah, tell me when you're on the phone with people regularly. Do they ever ask you to repeat yourself? Oh, you

Kent Schnakenberg 5:30
know, I talk so fast most of the time, I think they just let me go. But do you want me to try the speaker phone? Would that maybe help? I'm fascinated

Scott Benner 5:37
by this because you got right to the part where you you'd gone on the ride, and you were on the bus coming back, and as you were talking, your voice just disappeared. And I realized now it's not the head that

Kent Schnakenberg 5:47
you had a last set, that last that happened in the last time we did this too, when you re listen to

Scott Benner 5:51
it, yeah, yeah, that's really interesting. So I don't know if the speaker phone would change anything. I actually I'm going to tell you something, what slow down a little bit, okay? And I wonder what that's going to change. And Lee, and the guy that's editing this, Rob, leave this all in. I think it's really interesting. I'm going to recap, just to make sure, okay, your niece gets type one. She's like, 14 years old. She's a full on adult now, right? You got you and your brother want to support you know, your family, right? You head out, you do this JD or F ride together. On the way back from the ride, you meet somebody on a bus. Start there, right?

Kent Schnakenberg 6:26
So after the ride, I got on the bus to go back to the airport, and I sat next to a young lady named Aaron, and I noticed a CGM on her arm. And so we started talking, and I asked her when she was diagnosed, I expect her say, you know, like six or eight or 10, because at that point I thought all people just it was all kids that got, you know, type one diabetes, right? And she said she was 42 and so it just amazed me. And she started talking, and then I she said, you know, really, realistically, half the people that get this disease every day are kids, and half of her young adults or adults, and so that led to a lot of interest in a great talk all the way back. And that's when I decided I wanted to do another ride. Just something inside of me told me to do another ride. So I signed up for the last ride of the year, which was in Tucson, Arizona, and I flew out there by myself. I didn't know anybody at all. I just got to meeting some people and stuff, and think it was 104 mile ride. And that night, on a Saturday night at the awards banquet, I was awarded this spirit jersey. And I really didn't even know what it meant at that point. And so they asked me to come up and talk. And I was up there speaking and to all these people. There's like 400 people in the room, and I noticed everybody's eyes were right on me. And I just, I just at the end of the at the end of my speech, I said, Okay, I'm doing all seven rides next year. It was like something came over me at that moment. I don't know if God came into me or what, and just, it was just a big deal at that point. And I decided just to go a full bore on this thing. And I got back to my room that night, and somebody has sent me a message on Facebook that showed a picture of a blue candle, and I didn't really know what a blue candle meant, but I've come to realize it's never good. And there was a 12 year old boy that had passed away that day, the same day I won this award from misdiagnosis of this disease, and that's when I decided I didn't know anything about the disease. And I thought, well, it's time to start spreading awareness. So that's when all this started coming to me, like on the plane ride home. You know, if I'm going to go to all the rides next year, I want to try to visit all 48 lower states, get a truck and logo it out, and have the symptoms on it and our information on it. And so I got that done, and the same girl named Aaron said I'd met, contacted her, and she hooked me up with this man named Matt Fisher, who had lived with type one his whole life. And he was a graphic artist, very talented guy, and so he, without even meeting him, helped me design the truck, just through emails and stuff and a guy at the local bike shop. And, you know, that's, that's kind of what started the truck. And that's when we decided to try to do, you know, go to all 50 states and visit all 50 states for over I had this, you know, this idea about trying to do 50 rides someday. It's kind of went from there.

Scott Benner 9:08
Kent, I want to stop you. First of all, the talking, speaking more slowly. Thing is the perfect fix for this. So, okay, yeah, so keep going the way you're going. You're doing great. I think it would be helpful for people to understand like, you just got this motivation. It's not like you. I mean, yes, your niece is a connection, but still, like, I think for most of us, like, I went and did the ride I supported my niece, like, I'm good, I'm going home now, something motivated you, and you said you don't know what you know, if it's God that put it in your ear or but, I mean, I want to understand more about you. Like, because, how old were you when that happened, when you, when you go on that first ride with your niece? How old are you 60 years old. 60 okay, and you're, were you retired? You were working?

Kent Schnakenberg 9:48
No, I'm still working part time at to this day. You know, it's still in the whole northeast Kansas thing, where my territories, I'm a salesman, you know, I'm just doing it part time now, but that's where. You know, started raising all the money, and that's where I learned about going, Yes, when I started my going to school program, that's when I started learning about Camp Discovery at all. Everything kind of ties into that, I

Scott Benner 10:10
guess. So what I'm saying is, you're 60 years old, you're still working. It's not like you're looking for something to do, right? You're not at home, like bored, right? Would you call this just a calling?

Kent Schnakenberg 10:18
No, I do. It was my mission. It was my moment in life. And that's why the last story I'll tell kind of explains that. But it was just that moment in life when God came into my soul, or whatever, and just said, you know, this is your deal. You can help these people.

Scott Benner 10:32
You can't really explain the motivation that you found for just you really got struck by something,

Kent Schnakenberg 10:37
yeah. I mean, I've always been a, you know, a generous person. I've always been a person that looked out to help other people, but this was just something that happened, looking in those 400 eyes, sets of eyes, and knowing all these people had a connection to type one diabetes, and they were like, looking at me like, we need your help, I guess is the way I would put it. I guess so,

Scott Benner 10:55
because you're kind of an outsider that just showed up and, I mean, you got the award because you have, I'm assuming you had so much enthusiasm. They were like, Who is this guy and why is he so excited about all this? Right? And especially without a direct connection. You have your own children. Yeah, I got two children, five grandchildren. Okay? So you have your own family. My point is, you have things you could be doing, you know, and you're giving a lot of time to something else. So along the way, over the last I mean, what year was this? It

Kent Schnakenberg 11:21
was 2014 is when I did the first ride that did the two rides, then, then when I committed to do the seven that started in 2015

Scott Benner 11:29
Okay, so you started doing this, literally, the year before I started making this podcast. I started making the podcast in 2015 Okay, so our timelines kind of match up that way. So at first you say there's, well, I guess the idea was there were seven JDRF rides around the country the next year, correct? Yes. Did you actually make it to all of them?

Kent Schnakenberg 11:48
Yeah, I did at one time. I pointed and did 25 in a row. I just finished my 49th and I'll do number 50 on Florida in December.

Scott Benner 11:56
Oh my gosh, you started. Oh, sorry, my phone's not muted. Hard. And had pancakes a little while ago. That's what that is. Okay, I guess you mentioned the truck earlier, but for people who don't know you, decided, like, I'm going to take a pickup truck and deck it out. And what did you end up calling your your ride team? You mean the truck? Yeah, the truck.

Kent Schnakenberg 12:16
Trucks called the t1 destroyer. We had a national contest, and people sent in names, and the person they wanted said you are the t1 destroyer. So that's what you need to call your truck

Scott Benner 12:25
awesome. And so I can picture in my head black with like, yellow graphics, right, correct, yep, yep. As a matter of fact, growing up, Arden slept in a T shirt that was yours for years, like it was one of her sleeping T shirts. And that's great. That's amazing. It's funny. I don't know if she knows what it is, but it's one of her she has a Dexcom sleeping t shirt, that one and another one, and they just went through the like, she was constantly using them. Nevertheless, like, so you got the truck because you're gonna go to your ideas. I'm gonna go to all these different places and correct, raise awareness. Like, that's really just your goal, right? Like, I just want to try to find people and teach them about type one diabetes,

Kent Schnakenberg 13:04
yeah, I mean, to stop senseless deaths from these kids that have passed away from being undiagnosed or misdiagnosed. And, you know, I've been in several homes, it's the worst thing I've done in all these years, is homes that have lost their kids, and listen to them and say, I wish I'd known I wish somebody would have told me. And just, I want to stop that. And, you know, raising awareness has obviously helped me raise so much money. It's been incredible. How much easier it is if you let people know what you're trying to raise money

Scott Benner 13:29
for. Well, it was my next question is that now you you're saying you're about to go on your 50th ride. Like, how does this like, how do you fund it? Like, are you independently wealthy? Or is there? Like, I mean, yeah,

Kent Schnakenberg 13:40
I work. You know, I've worked a long time and made a nice living, but we raised a lot of money. I mean, since we started all this, I mean, we probably raised between what we've given a JD ref, which is now called break through, T 1d they just rebranded last year. Yeah, and, you know, our team, snack strong Fund, which we can talk about, hopefully we've raised like, $1.2 million since we started. That's

Scott Benner 14:01
insane. Ken, that's really wonderful. And so some of that money gets donated off and some of it funds your traveling and your awareness raising. Today's episode is brought to you by Omnipod. It might sound crazy to say, but Summertime is right around the corner. That means more swimming, sports activities, vacations. And you know what's a great feeling, being able to stay connected to automated insulin delivery while doing it all. Omnipod five is the only tube free automated insulin delivery system in the US, and because it's tube free and waterproof, it goes everywhere you do, in the pool, in the ocean or on the soccer field. Unlike traditional insulin pumps, you never have to disconnect from Omnipod five for daily activities, which means you never have to take a break from automated insulin delivery ready to go tube free. Request your free Omnipod five Starter Kit today at omnipod.com/juicebox Terms and Conditions apply and. Eligibility may vary. Full terms and conditions can be found at omnipod.com/juicebox type that link into your browser, or go to Juicebox podcast.com and click on the image of Omnipod right at the bottom. There's also a link right in the show notes of your podcast player. I have always disliked ordering diabetes supplies. I'm guessing you have as well. It hasn't been a problem for us for the last few years, though, because we began using us Med, you can too us med.com/juicebox, or call 888-721-1514, to get your free benefits. Check us med has served over 1 million people living with diabetes since 1996 they carry everything you need, from CGM to insulin pumps and diabetes testing supplies and more. I'm talking about all the good ones, all your favorites, libre three, Dexcom g7 and pumps like Omnipod five, Omnipod dash tandem, and most recently, the eyelet pump from beta bionics, the stuff you're looking for, they have it at us. Med, 888-721-1514, or go to us. Med.com/juicebox, to get started now use my link to support the podcast. That's us. Med.com/juicebox, or call 888-721-1514,

Kent Schnakenberg 16:21
no. The funny travel and everything, my wife and I find ourselves. Oh, I mean, it's all we've always just paid for all that ourselves now. Oh, my God, no, we Yeah, and the T shirts. Obviously, we've given out a lot of T shirts over the years. I mean, we just celebrated with the company that does our T shirts. They've just printed their 26,000 T shirts. So we've given out over 26,000 T shirts since we started it, and we funded most of that for a long time. But the last few years, we've had some people step up say, hey, we want to help you pay for the T shirts when you come to our school, that type of thing. So 26,000 T shirts, yeah, and all of them have our team snacks, and they have the symptoms of type one on the back, and they're the key to this whole thing about creating this whole army of kids, you know, to help us all over the country. Actually, we've sent these shirts all over the world, and people wear them. They love to wear them. And you know that my theory is, if they're standing there at McDonald's, in line or on vacation or whatever, because you see these shirts everywhere, all over northeast Kansas and around the country, you know people are going to read some of those symptoms, and hopefully they'll remember the top four or five of them, and then they'll remember that if somebody in their family says something, or, you know about their kids or their granddaughter or whatever, and you know, help them say, and help them know to say you need to get to the hospital right now and do the blood check. You just need to get to the hospital right now. You can't wait.

Scott Benner 17:35
So the simplicity of your motivation really is that you have that experience in front of those 400 people, and then that evening, someone tells you about a young child who passed away from not getting diagnosed.

Kent Schnakenberg 17:46
Yeah, somebody sent me the message. You know, since then, it's just that's, I've just always been very driven, you know, I'm a salesman by trade. You know, selling and fundraising and all this is kind of all the same thing. You just, you have to let people know what you're fundraising for. You let have to let people know that you're serious. You know, when they see my truck and they, you know, they they see me go into a school, you know, people just they realize this guy is serious when, I mean, nothing is more exciting to me than walking into a school 400 kids or 600 kids or 800 kids, whatever it is. I mean, I've done like 75 of these school visits and assemblies over these years, and they all have a bright yellow temp snack shirt on. And right away, they're bought in because they know this guy's serious. He's giving us a t shirt. We need to listen. Yeah,

Scott Benner 18:31
you know, I just That's simple. You're not just wandering and talking. You're saying there's clearly a structure around what you're doing. And when you show that to people, they think, Oh, this is a real thing. And let me take a minute here to find out, how did you start that? So you have a school awareness program where you you go around and speak even, how does that begin? Like, how do you where does that idea come from? And then how do you grow it?

Kent Schnakenberg 18:52
Well, I mean, through my territory, which is northeast Kansas, you know, that's where I've done a lot of these. Obviously, here in accord, I've done them all over the country now, as I'm traveling and stuff, but I just decided one day, like I said, that if I'm going to have, you know, kids to help me, I could create an army of people out there spreading awareness. Because you don't see anything on TV type one diabetes, except now some CGM commercials. Yeah, you don't ever see anybody talking about symptoms. It's not. National organizations don't talk as much about awareness as I wish they did. I mean, they're, they're great at raising money and doing the research, but I just thought, I'm just going to try to do this on a grassroots level. And it's worked, and it continues to work, and it's the proven, you know, it's a proven mission. It's a proven theory that by doing that, it's helped us raise all this money, and this money has done so much good. But, you know, I just when I started going to the schools, the first thing I ever did it was in 2015 I one of the I was reading a book to the second graders up in nemas Central elementary school, because the teachers asked me to come in and read. And I'd given all the kids a t shirt because they knew they'd seen my truck. And I saw the teachers in the back room, you know, talking, back to the room, talking, and they came up and said, We got an ID for. Fundraiser. And so before I knew it, we were going to do a bike ride with the second graders from that school and the Catholic school. So if you think, have you ever done anything crazy in your life, try taking 75 second graders on a four mile bike ride. And it was just the coolest thing. We got there in the morning at the elementary school, and everybody was wearing their shirts, and they all had their bikes. I think four or five kids didn't have bikes. And then around the corner, here comes the kids from the other school, and they're peddling their little bikes. And the priests from this from the school came and rode with us. And it was four laps around, you know, this school, and each lap was about a mile in the first lap, you know, I said, Okay, everybody behind the big guy. Everybody stay behind me. Light up. I mean, we had the teachers. We had people staggered through there, yeah, went all around the first time, and it worked out pretty good. And all sudden, kids started going faster and faster. They wanted to pass me. And we got back around halfway the second time. I heard man down in the back, and I looked back, and there was a pile of them back there. And the teachers got, you know, to them real quick, and they I went back there. I was all worried, and they said, You can't hurt a second grader. You're fine. So we rode one more lap, and then by the fourth lap, I was so nervous, there was some kids that were running the whole time. I said, Let's just all park our bikes and walk. I said, nothing could go wrong, you know. So we all held hands, and we started around this big one mile block area, and I looked over the tree, and there's two kids in a tree and to kids in the streets. And, I mean, it was one of the craziest things I've ever done, but at the end of it, they gave me a check for like, $3,300 they had raised just through that school that day within what a huge surprise. And and that's when I decided to start going to schools. And I just, every chance I get, I go to schools and talk. It's amazing.

Scott Benner 21:40
Yeah, so when you speak to them, what do you give them, like signs and symptoms to look for? Or is it more about the opportunity to make their parents aware and the teachers aware? What is it? What's your goal when you're doing that?

Kent Schnakenberg 21:52
You know, it's about a 30 to 45 minute thing, depending on, you know, how big the school is and stuff. But we just start talking about team snack and why I started. And, you know, then we get into what is type one diabetes. You know, I explained to them that it's an autoimmune disease, and anybody can get it in. Your classmates that have this disease didn't do anything wrong. It's not what they eat, it's not how much they exercise, and it's not contagious, you know, just try to make everybody feel more comfortable. Yeah. And then, you know, we talked a little bit about bike safety. But the highlight of the whole thing is when I give the kids that play with type one a chance to come up and speak. And you know, in some schools there might be one kid, or some schools there might be 12 kids. And you know, the smallest school I've ever done is like 178 kids K through 12. And the largest I've ever done was 1100 high school kids in Paintsville, Kentucky. Every one is different. And, you know, they just, it's amazing how brave these kids are when they get up and talk. And it just empowers them. For the first time in their life, they can go up there, and we can talk about the CGM insulin pups, and why they're wearing these things on their body, and why they get to go to the school nurse more often. It's just very empowering. And some of the things they say and some of the things that come out of that, or things, you know, I'll always remember, there was this one little girl at a very small school I went to, and it's K through 12, and there was a third grader there that had been just diagnosed to her parents, got a hold of me and asked me if I come to a school assembly, which I always say, yes, if I can. And we got there, and the principal said, This is great what you're here for, but I want you to let you know we have a sixth grade girl that has type one also, but she never wants to be recognized. She doesn't want to talk about it, and don't ask if there's anybody else, I mean, and I would never do that. And if kids don't want to come up, I never make them. But we got, you know, through the through this thing, and towards the end of the assembly, and this little girl and her parents were up there speaking, and they were just so, so great. And she went to sit down, and all of a sudden I see this girl stand up, and she just walks right out of her out of the stands, and right up to me, and she says, I'd really need to say something. And right then I thought, well, this is that other girl, yeah. And she took that microphone from me, and she walked over in front of the sixth graders, and she just said, you know, I want you to know the reason I don't wear a two piece swimming suit or tank tops because I'm embarrassed with all the spots on my body and all the bruises from having to give myself shots. But I have to have those shots to live every day, she walked back over to me and handed me the microphone, and she said, thank you. And as she was going, I'll never forget, the whole place stood up and give her a standing ovation. And the next day, her mom called me and said, You know, I don't know what you did or who you are, but you changed my school that day and took her bag and showed everybody what was going on. And there's just so many things that happen like that. You know, over the years, these kids, they're just it gives them a chance to not have to hide, not to have to hide it anymore, right? That's the whole gist of the school program, and it just continues to grow. No?

Scott Benner 24:50
I mean, if you didn't do anything else, just that story alone is, is probably worth the whole thing, right?

Kent Schnakenberg 24:56
Yeah, yeah. I just even, even when we're traveling across. Of the country, and I'm speaking in rhetoric clubs or, you know, I get to stay in some people's houses now, because I've met them at rides and stuff. You know, they're just, we became, I became good friends with so many people through JDRF. And it's pretty it's pretty amazing. You know, when the JDRF rides, I've done all these rides now, and I've won that spirit Jersey, and then I won two green jerseys, which is, man, I've raised the most at that particular ride in all you know, last year, December, I think it was my 47th ride, but that was awarded the rose jersey. And the rose jersey is something that I always wanted to win. It's the it's a jersey that's given out to a person that doesn't have type one diabetes, but has done so much to help people that live with type one diabetes spread awareness and raising money. And Rose was a lady that passed away from the horrible disease that was writing for her daughter. The Rose jersey was just because she made everybody promise to keep the journey going after she was gone. You know, last year in Amelia Island, this is how this whole thing kind of keeps coming back around. I was in the morning. I was dressing. I walked downstairs and had my road jersey on. This young man walks up to me, and he goes, Mister snacker, you're not going to remember this, but in 2015 you had a booth set up in Wichita, Kansas at the JD ref walk, and you had your bike there and your truck. And I came up, and I was just so small, and I just looked at you, and I said, Someday I want to do a JD ride like, if you ever do one, I promise I'll be there. And he was, he was there at a million Island, you know, 10 years later. And he said, you know, you just, you kept your promise. Things like that to just, you know, I get tired, you know, I'm 70 years old now. I'll be 71 in January, but six like that just motivate me to continue on, and I can't keep doing it the same pace. I just never want to stop. I never want to quit on these kids, because I know today, tomorrow, the next day, there's going to be another 250 people that are going to be diagnosed, and most of them don't know the symptoms, and they need to know that. They just need to know that they just walking into people's homes, speaking at a couple funerals I have, it's just no fun, and they're just senseless deaths. And I try to get national organizations to buy more into it and talk about awareness, put the symptoms on the back of their shirts and stuff. But at this point, I still haven't been successful with that, so I'll just keep doing it myself and with my family. And my wife is an unbelievable partner and all this, she's, she's just so great, and it's let me do so many things. I mean, you got to realize I've probably been gone 250 more nights away from home, traveling, just doing this, and she's just all about it, and she knows I'm doing good things, and she loves helping people like I do. Yeah, well, Ken,

Scott Benner 27:33
how long you've been married? 45 years? Yeah, she probably thrilled me at least. I gotta be honest with you.

Kent Schnakenberg 27:39
Well, I mean, can you imagine, once, like being married to me, it's not always fun, but, but but she's just, you know, and our grandkids, yeah, they love it. And it's, it takes some, you know, not very many people would be able to do that. It takes somebody strong like that. And, you know, she's done like, six or seven rides herself, and she actually did her first 100 mile ride a few years ago on the cross. And I was so proud of her. She's always there to support

Scott Benner 28:00
me. Do you ever have the feeling that you've given something away in your own life, for these other for these strangers, and that it's a thing you can't get back? I mean, if you ever missed time with your own family over this or and how do you handle that?

Kent Schnakenberg 28:11
I mean, I obviously missed some things I probably shouldn't have, but I think my family, I don't think that I've ever given anything away, and I think my family understands how important this is. It'd be one thing if I was just out there golfing or traveling, you know, going to football games with guys. But, and, you know, they have a lot of connections now with these families and stuff, and they know that this is my mission, and they're part of this mission. They're, we call it team snack strong, and we're all team snack and, you know, it's just, it's part of our family name, and it's our nickname, and it's just something we continue to do. So I wouldn't say that I regret anything at this point in my life. I may look back on that someday, but we've made life long friends all over the United States, and we connect, stay connected, with these people. And you know, it's just it's very seldom that, you know, within a week or I'm not getting two or three messages, you know, would you please send us a t shirt? And I always try to send a note with it, and I'm always at the post office sending out shirts. And, yeah, you know, just continue to go to school. So I have five schools up in northeast Kansas that their eighth grade classes every year as part of their class. And I do this at Emporia State University too, with the class that I go in and talk and I hand out T shirts, and I go back several times a year. And you know, that's culminated into we have our own northeast Kansas takes team snack, Diabetes Awareness Walk for the last several years. And each year that thing raises 10 to $15,000 and we have three or 400

Scott Benner 29:32
people show up. I asked you can't because yesterday, I mean, it's a good example, like, I'm gonna go back maybe nine months ago, I interviewed this person. She's just type one. She was young girl, and as we were talking, I realized that she was an American Sign Language interpreter. And I said, Wouldn't it be interesting if I took one of the series from the podcast, you know, the one for newly diagnosed people, bold beginnings? And what if I got it translated into. To into American Sign Language. I paid somebody to stand in front of a camera and translate the entire thing, which is a huge undertaking, right? And I first thought like, well, maybe I could get a sponsor to pay for that. Then I realized, this is going to help a handful of people, and it's going to be really valuable for the people it finds, but it's not going to find, I don't imagine 1000s of people, right? It's going to find 10s of people, or maybe 100 people. It's going to be really helpful for those people, but nobody's going to want to put money down. So I didn't even bother asking. I said to the girl afterwards, I was like, Michaela, what would it cost me to have you do that? And she gave me a very fair number, and I reached into my pocket, and I paid her, right? And it took probably months and months and months for us to get it together, and for her to, like, figure out how best to do it. And also, there's 26 episodes of this thing, and just recently she finished. It's awesome, right? And as I was paying her account, I thought, this is not enough money for the amount of work she put into this. I'm not paying her enough. And I felt bad about that. And then I had the videos, but I didn't have the time to put them together. I had to make a website for them. I had to get them onto YouTube. I guess a lot of back end work that's kind of boring. But then maybe four or five days ago, someone on the Facebook group asked, Does anyone know where somebody who needs ASL can get diabetes information? And I thought, huh, I have that on my hard drive, and what a great opportunity. So I spent the last few days making a website, uploading stuff like, you know, making sure everything on the back end was done. I got up yesterday, I recorded at 9am at 10am I thought to make myself breakfast, but started to work on the ASL stuff instead. And then I finished it last night at 1130 and I put it online, and I put a post up, and I was like, hey, here you guys go. It's, you know, I was really giving it to this one person. I was like, here, this is for you, for your brother. Wow. And I don't feel like I wasted my day, but there are a lot of things I meant to do yesterday, and one of them would have been like, exercising. And, you know, on the very simple and basic level, there's I skipped my workout yesterday. I didn't do a lot of things yesterday, and instead, I worked on this thing for the entire time. I was wondering what your answer was, because if somebody asked me, Hey, you feel like you gave your whole day away yesterday for for nothing, I would say, No, I don't think so at all. Like it feels really valuable to me. I don't know a lot of people who get to go to work and feel that way, I guess is my

Kent Schnakenberg 32:23
point, no, every day is a new opportunity, you know, to help somebody, whether it's with type one diabetes or anything. And what you did there was so commendable, because, you know, you didn't just help one person, you helped the family, you helped other families. And you really can't waste your day. I mean, you can exercise later today. You can exercise tomorrow. I mean, I could ride my bike when you give something to somebody that needs you and doesn't have what you have to give, then it's well worth it. And that's, that's kind of way I feel

Scott Benner 32:48
I've heard you. It was really hard, because your voice is very deep, but, like, I've heard you be emotional twice while we're talking, right? And the little girl saying to you, like, Can I have the microphone? I have something I need to say? Like that made me cry. I got emotional when you said that her words. It is because it's the bigger picture. It's like, she's there, she's she's got some energy, and she's like, I've been holding this thing inside. I'm miserable holding this thing inside. Yeah, and I need to get rid of it. If you can be a little part of helping somebody do something like that. I really think it reverberates around the world. I'm sitting here thinking about these kids who sat through your program at school and will 10 years later be in college, and some kids going to get sick, and they're going to think like, oh, that's probably diabetes, and maybe help that person and that thing like that on that first night that you wanted to do, yeah, you'll do it so many times in your life and beyond your life, you won't even, you'll never know how many people you touched. I don't believe well, you know, I

Kent Schnakenberg 33:46
got a card once a few years ago from a second grade teacher that I had been at their school two years before, and she said, You know, I listened to what you had to say normally during assemblies. You know, I'm creating papers or whatever. But she said, you know, you gave us all these shirts, and you were very interesting to listen to. And I listened to everything, you said. She said, two years later, my son started showing the symptoms of type one, and so right away, we got him, you know, to the hospital, and his blood sugar was like six or 700 and she goes, I know in my heart You saved my son's life.

Scott Benner 34:16
Well, I mean, at the very least, you saved him from like, a terrible bout with DKA and all the things that might come with it, and her having to feel like she missed it, like I talk to people every day who, you know, carry a terrible burden around with themselves, like because they missed something, and their children didn't pass even they went through a thing that they just wished terribly they would have understood better, so that they didn't have to have this experience. Yeah, no. I mean, Ken, it's, it's, it really is awesome. What you're doing.

Kent Schnakenberg 34:43
Well, you know when we're like when I was at diabetes camp last year, and, you know, I'd want to talk a little bit more about that, maybe in a minute. But please, here they have, they have doctors and nurses there. Obviously, from this one is close to Wichita, Kansas, you know, I walked, I went in there, and they just said, you just need to know. That you have, you're making it possible now for kids to just walk into the room and just say, with their parents say, I need a blood sugar test. She goes, the worst thing is, when we get a type one child that's, you know, in an ambulance, or worse yet, on a helicopter. She said, there's just so many kids that could benefit from these programs. And so that's another reason to keep motivated, because just think of all the kids all over the world that hold this inside, like you said, and don't want to talk about it, or scared to talk about it. It's only because nobody's giving them a chance. Yeah, you know that's I just want to give them a chance to open up and let the other kids around them know. You know, it's not weird for them to be wearing these things on their arms, at their legs. They're things that keep them alive. They have to have them to keep alive every day. There's a reason they carry Skittles. It's not because they love candy. It keeps it's a chance to keep them alive every day, and that's why we'll continue to do even if I can't do the rides and travel around the country as much. I'll continue to talk to groups, and I'll continue to help people in this area and all over the state of Kansas and go to as many schools as I can. I mean, you know, we have a team snack strong fund. We actually started right after I talked to you. I think even I mentioned that we were getting ready to start it, and it's under the Emporia Community Foundation. And so for any child that lives, you know, in the seven county area with type one diabetes, you know, each year, they can get $1,500 a year from us, you know, for scholarships, and for, excuse me, $1,500 a year from us to help pay expenses of the disease. And there's another foundation that's tacked on another $1,000 to that for the same kid, you know, also, plus that if they want to go to Camp Discovery, you know, we're going to send them on a full ride scholarship. And I think the average price now to camps like $1,000 and since we started, I think the first year, we did 1010, kids, it was in Dexcom City, Kansas at that point, and it was 73 miles from your side, ride my bike up there with a friend early in the morning to get there, you know, around noon, and the kids would be waiting for me. And so now, every year when we go to camp, they have a team snack day, and it's on Wednesday East Lee, and we can't, you know, there's 100 kids there. It's unbelievable experience. I don't know if your daughter's ever gone, but we give all the kids a shirt, and I get her down there and talk. And I think we've given out now 175 scholarships since we started. And last year we sent 36 kids, and this year we're going to send 40 more. And it's just the camps are one of the best thing that I ever hooked up with. I mean, it's just so empowering. They get lifelong friends, they get a talk, and you know, when they have their meals, they're all together in this big room, and they get up in each cab and talks about who changed their pump and who did this, and it's just, it's so cool, and they come out of there, and their lives are changed forever. And we want to definitely continue that

Scott Benner 37:28
program. Yeah, for sure. So this year, I had the director of Camp Sweeney on the podcast, and while he was on, he said, I'd like to give away, you know, to the listeners, I'd like to give away a spot at Camp Sweeney and camp sweet, it's pricey. I think it's over. I literally think it's like $4,000 right? And it's a three week camp. They go for three weeks. Oh, wow. And I said that that'd be great, you know, I'll give it away. We got off, got off the call, and I said, Let me, let me reach out to a sponsor and see if I can get somebody to, like you give one away, and we can get a sponsor to give one away, right? And I think I'm pretty sure us med did it. So it's one of my sponsors. So we gave way too. And then, you know, they were so excited about it, and it did good buzz for the for the camps, they said, Listen, we have benefactor that would like to give away another one. I said, let me go ask another sponsor. And I got, I got Omnipod to give away another one. And then before I knew it, the 2025 was, you know, Camp time was coming up, and I think we sent, like, I've lost count. I think we it was six or eight kids we sent to camp, wow, just random drawings, like people just sent in, like, here's why I want my kid to come. I randomly picked names, and the kids went off. And I got a video a month or two ago, and I was like, What is this like? It was, I was tagged on Instagram, and I jumped and looked at it, and it's just this giant group of children, and this one little kid up front, and he's like, hey, you know, thank you so much to the Juicebox podcast for sending me to camp. I'm having such a great time. And like, just countless kids behind him, like screaming, thank you. And I sat there, and I thought my whole life should be sending kids to camp like I should, you know, I should. I should quit everything else I'm doing and try to find a way to send more kids. What a lovely experience. It was new for me, yeah. And then I just recently had one of the kids on to talk about it, and and he had such a great time and experience, just like you you described. So I can't imagine how it must feel to send 40 kids.

Kent Schnakenberg 39:23
That's it. Well, it's empowering. And, you know, it's we try to, obviously, we pick kids from importing area first, and then we pick kids in northeast Kansas, because that's where we still continue to raise so much of our money, and so many of the schools I go to and stuff. And then we, but we've sent kids from all over Kansas, and the camp ADA has been great to work with this. I mean, Camp Discovery is great and, you know, give us an opportunity to do this scholarship program, and I think it's helped fill all their beds, and now they have a waiting list, and it's, I promote that camp anytime I get a chance to because, and I'm sure that we sent a girl in Arizona to. Camp out in Arizona. I send a girl in Colorado to camp in Colorado, just, I mean, I walk in a bike store last year in Green Valley, Arizona. We go out there and visit friends. You know, the guy out in the under the bike store saw my truck, and he goes, You know, my daughter was just diagnosed. And I said, Well, can I meet her? And he called her home. She came down there, and before I knew it, gave her T shirts and talked to her about what we did. I said, you've ever been to camp? And she goes? No. Said, Well, if you want to go, you know, help pay for it. And so a few days later, they got a hold of me, and she just got back from camp, and she had an unbelievable experience. It's only because I needed to fix a flat on my tire on my bike. I mean, it's just, yeah, it's not very many days go by where something cool doesn't happen to me, but I try to reach out all the time. You know, I've got my shirts, I got the truck, so I'm always visible, but I just don't want to miss an opportunity if I can to meet a kid.

Scott Benner 40:47
I'm jealous that you get to do it in person, because I think I have your experiences, and I might have them with more frequency, but mine are all virtual, you know, for the most part. Yeah, you

Kent Schnakenberg 40:59
know, look how many people you're reaching. I mean, you're, I have no idea how many subscribers yet, but it's got to be a lot. Because, like I said, that first year you were getting started, I was getting started 10 years ago, and just people continue. It was last year. Somebody reached out and Ryan walked up said, I remember you from the Juicebox podcast, and thank you for everything you do. I just, I mean, you're doing what you know, you're doing what you were meant to do. And I think I'm doing what I was meant to do. I mean, it takes I agree all sides to do that, and we have so much support from our community and from schools in this area and from people all over the country. I mean, when we raise money for it's called Match Day at Emporia Community Foundation. It's in November, and we started like, I think it's six years ago, with this match day thing. And each year we've led, you know, you know, each year it continued to grow. And last year, you know, we received a check for $106,000 and that money, you know, that money, helped so much. And I think since we started this with them, we raised over 600,000 just for our foundation, and, you know, for our fund there. And but each year we're paying out, you know, 30 to 40 to $50,000 you know, two kids with the financial aid and going to camp and stuff. So we need to continue to work hard to raise money, because I really want to have one that is a legacy fund when I'm gone, and to continue to do this program. And you know, not only help kids with the expenses necessary, but you know, continue to raise awareness with what we do. And you know, I don't know if I told you this, but now I have two team snack trucks. And you know, the first one is a 2014 the one you had the picture of took all over the country, and now it's got 430,000 miles on it. So two years ago, three years ago, in case, this one comes out of stuff, so about a 2022 and the same lady that logoed out the first one had all the designs and logo. Get out this one just the same. So I've got two of them sitting at my house. I've been driving the newer one to the longer rides like Wisconsin and Florida and some of those. But otherwise I just drive my old one. Everybody at the Ford dealership here, and everybody all over the data saying, what's your goal? And I said, I want to get to half a million bottles. You know, I want Ford Motor Company someday to recognize this and do a national commercial about this guy that's driving all over the country in a Ford f1 50, you know, to raise awareness, saving lives, raising money. And I know that Ford's a big sponsor of breakthrough T 1d and that hasn't happened yet, but I always hold out

Scott Benner 43:13
hope. Yeah, that's really wonderful. You know, you said something a second ago that really, because I think about it too, about like, keeping it going, like, when you're talking about all these people that you're helping and, I mean, would you just say, like, 30 to $50,000 of just, like, financial aid to people who are, you know, just struggling to pay for stuff? And you think, Well, when I stop doing this, like, I mean, it's not a giant organization, Ken, right? It's you. So, like, you get too old or too sick or too tired or whatever. Like, what happens to all of it? Like, how are you trying to I know you're planning for it, but what is it you're doing to try to keep that alive?

Kent Schnakenberg 43:47
Well, I'll be setting up soon a legacy fund with the Community Foundation to where, you know, when you and I'm trying to get it to a certain amount of money, to where they manage, you know, they've managed the money, and it has a very good return on the investment. Through this Community Foundation, I think there's like 300 funds. 300 funds. We're very lucky and important to have that. And you know, the Legacy Fund means, once I'm gone, that they'll continue as they're boarding, you know, their directors to manage the fund, and, you know, and still give out the money. And you know, it probably will lessen, as far as the camp thing, as far as, you know, kids from around the state that are going to camp. But also, I have other people now that are trying to figure ways to send more kids to camp because they didn't realize what the need was, you know, people from other places. And I've had parents that reach out and said, you know, this year, we could just pay your own way once you send another child this year. And so there's a lot of people on board. We won't let it die. It'll continue to grow in some fashion. And, you know, help as many people as we can.

Scott Benner 44:39
Somebody has to be the center of it, the beating heart, because that's you right now. So someone along the way is gonna have to pick the mantle up and decide that they want to carry it the way you did. Yeah.

Kent Schnakenberg 44:47
But I'm telling you this Community Foundation, the two ladies there, I mean, they're all in on this, and, you know, they do these legacy funds, and they love what we do, and we love what they do, and so it'll it'll continue on. But I'm also hoping for. A long time down the road too.

Scott Benner 45:01
It's like, I ain't looking to stop now.

Kent Schnakenberg 45:03
I've had had some health issues the last two years. Obviously, that's going to limit me from, you know, doing as much in the future, but I can still do a lot. I mean, I was doing a lot, a lot for a while, and this, you know, but two years ago, when things were just really going strong, I was doing a ride in La Crosse, Wisconsin, you know, I had noticed that, you know, had some issues with going up steep stairs and stuff. But I just figured that was from being 70, you know, or 68 I guess

Scott Benner 45:31
at that time, what ended up being the problem. Well, anyway, I

Kent Schnakenberg 45:35
did 40 mile ride that day. But, you know, I felt pretty good, but I'd already, I tried to go up this bluff. Everybody just kind of does in La Crosse. It's a really cool area. It's called grandpa's bluff, I believe. And I got a couple 100 yards up there, and my heart just started pounding, and I thought, This isn't right. So I came back down. And luckily, I had had a physical setup for that. You know, I got back on Sunday, I had a physical. On Monday, my yearly physical, they'd already set up a stress test, because it's been 10 years since I've done one. And, you know, I went physical, and everything was fine. I needed a stress test the next day, give me the shot to put the stuff inside my veins, and they take the pictures, and I go back in there and sit down and, you know, they're getting ready to hook me up to all these, you know, to the monitors and stuff, and get on the treadmill. And the lady looks at me, she goes, you know, you got afib? I said, Man, I don't even know what AFib is. I've just heard it on the radio. And she goes, Well, it's not good. Then I guess the picture started coming back in, and they were just staring at the screen. And when they're both looking at the screen and not talking to me, I know it's not good. And so they actually didn't even let me get on the treadmill. And they called, you know, the cardiologist here in Emporia. We have new Newman Regional Health, which we're blessed to have, and they have a full time cardiologist and department in CAS lab. And you know, within a half hour, he was down there, and he drew a picture my heart, and he goes, Ken, you have three blockages in your heart. One of them's 80% one of them is 90% one was 95% at that point, my wife wasn't even there. My wife was in Kansas City, because I she just, you know, I just told her, I'm just going to go do the stress test. And so she said, you might want to call your wife. He said, within about two hours, we're going to have you in surgery. And I looked at my So, do I need to get a second opinion? Do I need to do anything else? I mean, you know, your mind is just racing at that point, because this all came out of nowhere, basically. And he said, you know, we can fix this here. Count, and if it's something I can't fix, I'll send you on to Topeka, to Kansas City. And just the way he said it, I trusted it very much. And they got me ready. It took me up to the surgery, and the Cast team was there, and they were unbelievable. It was just a great experience for whatever an experience could be like that. But I had three stints put in, get down to recovery, and you know, your heart's still in afib, and so that's something I've been dealing with and will continue to deal with. I have a double procedure in January that hopefully will take care of that, get me off some of these blood thinners and stuff, because that's limited me in the riding by myself and doing a lot of things, but, but I've been able to continue on. I mean, I did three rides last year, and I've done two this year. Gonna do the one in Ford in December before my right, you know, before my surgery. So I'm just I was very lucky that I actually tried to write up that bluff, which made me decide I gotta go ahead through this stress test, people have been very understanding, and, you know, sending me a lot of Cartage and well wishes, it just slowed me down. It hasn't stopped me. But I don't believe you'll be seeing me do any more 100 mile bike rides anywhere.

Scott Benner 48:18
Well, can I ask? Because I just had a guy on that was talking about heart issues, but, yeah, correct. You're not, I'm guessing you're not a smoker,

Kent Schnakenberg 48:26
right? No, no, just my dad had heart issues. So it's like, my family,

Scott Benner 48:30
familial, okay, I was gonna say because, I mean, you're, you're as active as anybody could be, yeah, moving constantly and and the rides and everything else, right?

Kent Schnakenberg 48:40
Yeah, it just wasn't, you know, things just happen to people. Yeah, when I was 60, I really felt 25 and now that I'm 70, I kind of sometimes feel 70, but most of them really feel like to get in front of kids and go to schools and talk. I'm back in my 40s and 50s, but I've got a lot of good years left. I, you know, ahead of me. I hope. And for as many times, you know, as much as I can do this. I want to keep going. I want to keep doing this. I'll tell these kids all the time, you know, I wake up every day trying to think of things to make your life better, and that's kind of what I try to do. And I said, I won't quit as long as I'm physically able to. And they, they believe that, and I believe

Scott Benner 49:14
that. I tell people all the time when they they thank me for the podcast. I was like, I really have to thank you, because the way they support it and listen to it and keep the you said, you don't know how many people have heard it, and I almost hesitated to tell you at the time, but I'm getting ready to celebrate 20 million downloads, like total downloads and a lot, you know, yeah, and that's because people, they listen to it, they enjoy it enough to share it with somebody else, that keeps it going. And maybe one of the unforeseen things that they don't see that I hear when I'm talking to you is that allows me to get up in the morning and think about like, I wonder what people need. Like, you know, I've heard you say a couple of times, like, I can't get big organizations to put signs and symptoms on their T shirts or their stuff. And I mean, I probably understand that. It's it probably feels like a bummer. To them, and that's not what how they want to present. They want everything to be upbeat. And we're working towards something that kind of feeling all the time. But you know, I brought that ASL thing up to you earlier, like no one else is doing that, Ken, like no one's going to put the time or the effort or the money that it takes into creating helpful start out information for people with type one diabetes who are deaf or hard of hearing, they're going to tell you, like, there's just not enough of them. Like the juice isn't going to be worth the squeeze. Like the amount of effort they're going to put into it, they're not going to see the return, especially in this digital age where people want to see 10s of 1000s of clicks on something, they want to see hundreds of 1000s of downloads. They're not looking for you to reach five people anymore. You try to show something to them and say, like, try to imagine this. Like, I don't think it's hard to get them to imagine it, but I think that now that I've done it, I don't think it'll be as difficult to reach out to them and say, hey, look, here's how much money it would take to, you know, fund this to do for this kind of information or this, like, and now there's a place, and you can see people getting to it and using it. You can get them a little more excited to keep going. But, yeah, I hear all your frustration. Like, I mean, what a no brainer for Ford to send somebody with a camera out to talk to you for an hour and put something or just

Kent Schnakenberg 51:15
follow me, you know, send somebody with me for a day and, you know, I would think they'd sell so many more f1 50 drugs to people that live with type one diabetes, if they saw this truck going up, doing all these things. And it's just sometimes the big organizations are real busy. And I'm, you know, JDRF, which is now breakthrough in the American Diabetes Association, have been nothing but great parts of my life. I just thought, if they just do simply print the T shirts, you know, with the symptoms on the back, it's going to help them raise more money. And that's the hardest thing, is to make them understand that the more people know about this, right, the more people are going to donate money. And the only way to tell them to do that is by telling them and along the way, you're going to save lives. I mean, you know, you said something about only reaching so many people with, you know, with the program you were on recently, but if I you know, if you could say five kids a year a year. I mean, what's what? What would be the price on that? Yeah, because you know that a lot of people are diagnosed today, and most of them don't know it's coming, and some of them are going to end up in ambulances and some of them on helicopters, and they just need to know. I mean, you can't stop the disease, but you can stop people from dying from senseless deaths and being undiagnosed or misdiagnosed. You got to

Scott Benner 52:22
tell people, using Ford as an example, they would get great social media out of it, and it wouldn't cost them anything. And like you said, a good video of a 12 year old truck chugging along with 400,000 miles on it, which you would think is, you know, good for sales I haven't done. I'm not going to ask you the number, but 26,000 T shirts, even if you're paying three, four bucks a piece for them, means you've spent $100,000 in T shirts. That's a lot of effort from you. Like, if that's the only thing you had ever done that would have been really impressive, you know, I'm saying,

Kent Schnakenberg 52:52
Yeah, well, I got three orders on my desk right now. One, I'm going to speak to the Girl Scout troop, and I just sent 99 shirts to a preschool that I want to go speak at like I said, this guy, his name is Tom wrong, and it's one 800 T shirts. Is this company in Dubuque, Iowan? I mean, it's crazy. I was at a JDRF ride in 2016 in La Crosse, Wisconsin, sitting there in a in a on Saturday night in a bar with a bunch of crazy people from Iowa, which are great people we've met over the years. And he walks up to me, goes, Hannah, I see you guys do t shirts. And he said, both my brothers are type one diabetic, and I own one of the largest t shirt companies in the Midwest. I want to be your guy. Also, I'm too cheaper than anybody. And since then, it's just been a it's perfect relationship. I mean, I they do such great work. They're quality. Yeah, I call them, I send them the order they send them right to the school. I mean, it's just that when we went by there last week, you know, they're all wearing team snack shirts, there's 30 some employees, and they were so excited to hit that number of T shirts. And we just, I got to talk to him a little bit and take pictures and and nothing probably would have happened if I wouldn't have been earning team snack shirt in that bar at that time. So, yeah, I just feel like I've been put in certain places and certain things over all these years to make all this grow like this and come together. And, you know, just have relationships with the company like that, and have relationships with, you know, Matt Fisher, who helped me design my truck, and now he's got his own ride team called Team fish, and we're really close, and we ride, and he's done so much for the breakthrough RIDE program, and we're just great friends. And I just, I want to keep going for things like that, because I know there's people I could still reach every day, and there's people that hopefully will hear this podcast and understand that, you know, you could do something like this in your area, just to go to the schools and talk in front of people and to go to rotary clubs and, you know, I can't go all over the country. I get messages when you come to this school that I can't I think that hopefully it's what people understand, how I do it, that it's fairly simple. It's just giving some of your time to try to help kids save lives, you know, and just give kids that empowerment, that they're they're not different. They were. They got a bad hand, according to Delta, with this disease, but they got to deal with it, and they want people, you know, they're just looking for hope. I don't know how many times I've heard parents say, You give us hope. And God, what? More powerful than that. You know, with all the medicine in the world, sometimes just knowing that somebody cares, there's guy in Kansas that you don't even know, but look at him. He's driving a truck around the country, and he's trying to do everything, not only to help kids there, but kids everywhere, including yourself. And

Scott Benner 55:15
there's another way to help people feel less alone, really. Yeah, yeah.

Kent Schnakenberg 55:21
It's a crappy disease, you know, can make you feel really bad, and just the stories I hear about, but when I get a kids a chance to talk, give them a chance to just speak their mind and just see their smiles and see their kids, you know, and all their peers in the audience and the teachers. And, you know, when we do this, we give Church, the cooks and the bus drivers, and everybody's there, and it's just they know that they're there for them. They're there for them, to support them. And when I drive through these towns, down that truck, I go by school, and everybody's waving, and kids recognize the truck, and there's shirts everywhere, and there's no reason not to keep doing it. I mean, as long as I'm able to great support,

Scott Benner 56:00
you're you're a lovely person. This is, this is an uplifting conversation. You even have a website that I could send people to, or, how do they

Kent Schnakenberg 56:07
know I don't have a website. I mean, I really try to do everything the old fashioned way. It seems to work for me. I mean, we've got, I've got my personal Kent snacker Facebook page, which I don't know. I have a lot of friends, I guess, on there, and I try to post a lot on it. I have a team snack page still, but, you know, it's one of those pages where they you have to give them money to Facebook to promote things. And so I don't do a lot on that, but I just try, and I usually email a lot, and people call me and stuff, but it works for me. And I think I'm too old to change much. Be honest with you,

Scott Benner 56:38
that's okay. I think that's awesome. I think Facebook's a great way for them to find you, right? It's just your it's just your name. Yeah,

Kent Schnakenberg 56:45
my name just personal name. It's temp snacknberg. And if you go to the team stack page, I think you can get to the the other page by doing that. But

Speaker 1 56:52
you made me think I have the same thought you just have all the time, like, I have a private Facebook group has 73 74,000 people in it right now, and it's insane, right? And yet, if you post something, Facebook doesn't show to most of them. No, yeah, no, no. They want you to pay them to actually deliver your your posts to the people that you've gathered up who have said, I'd like to know what this guy is saying. Yeah, it's really something. And can I get it? I gotta tell you now we're done, but I want to tell you that I'm so impressed by what you're doing that I have not brought up the incredible thrashing that my Eagles gave your chiefs in the Super Bowl. I just let that go. We don't even talk about because you're gonna beat us at two weeks too, because you're a good man, Ken, and you don't deserve that. Okay, yeah, I keep that to myself.

Kent Schnakenberg 57:37
Well, I like to tell you this one story, please, and and, and see if you can fit it in towards the end. Absolutely this that you keep going, please. So this was like in 2015 or 16. I was starting out doing my seven rides for the year, and I was traveling to the northeast part of the country. But at that point in time, I was still trying to hit all these states. So I think the first day I drove all the way to Houston, Texas, from Kansas, and the next day, I drove to Jacksonville, Florida, and then up to Hershey, Pennsylvania. And I, the next day, I drove into the town where the ride was. And, you know, I was early in the day. I didn't really know how to recognize how many days it would take to get through the way I was doing it, because when I'm riding, I'm stop or driving, I'm stopping and talking to people and giving out information. So I got there early, and I decided to just explore the town a little bit. And I went around the town, and, you know, came got some some of their places. They were famous landmarks and stuff. And I'm hoping back to the hotel, I come to this, you know, red light, and it was a pretty busy street, and I looked over to my right, and there's this young man sitting in a wheelchair, and sitting next to was a lady in a folding chair. And I come to find out, you know, that was his caretaker. And I know this young man had some real health issues, because His neck was like lean weight to the right, and his body was kind of leaned over, you know, I could see in his wheelchair was kind of custom made where he had his left hand really clenched tightly on this tray, but with his right hand, he was reaching down and put something his mouth. But the whole time, both of them are just staring at me. And so it was one of those red lights that seems like it goes on forever, you know, it finally turned green. I didn't know what else to do. So as I was driving away, I smiled and waved really big, and he just stared straight at me. But she waved and smiled, but you know, it was kind of a sad smile, like, you know, everybody's seen. And I got up the road, two or three blocks, and something inside us, you know, inside of me, just said, Kent, you need to go back. You need to go back. So I turned on Office street, and I came up behind this building, I think it was a church, and I parked and I walked around the corner, and I just said, Hey, Kent snackberg, I'm here to do a bike ride to help kids with type one diabetes. Tell me your story. And the lady looked at me and she said, Well, this young man was diagnosed early in life with a very severe muscle disease, and he'll never be able to walk, he'll never be able to talk, and he needs 24 hour day care, but he likes to on nice days, we sit out here and look at traffic, and he must have really loved your truck, because he made this really loud the whole time. He's still staring at traffic, and. And so I just looked at her, and I said, you know, what can I do to make your day better? What do you guys like to do? And she thought for a moment, and she said, Well, when his dad comes to pick him up at night, we love to go out to eat, nothing fancy, just different places. And she looked at me, and I was wearing a bright yellow team snatcher, and she said, he really likes bright colored shirts. And I said, Well, just wait right here. And then I ran back to my truck, and I could just tell my heart was just thumping, you know, I knew something was going to happen special that day. And came back around the corner, and I gave her $60 and I said, Here you just go out to your favorite place to eat tonight. On me. And said, just to really enjoy yourself. And I said, here's a shirt for him to wear. And she held up that yellow shirt. She held up the shirt and said, look what this man gave you. And for the very first time, you know, his head tilted up towards me, and this kind of a smile, I think, came across his face, and he lifted that left hand up that had been clenched in that fist, and he opened it up, and I put three fingers in there, and he squeezed him really, really hard, and he made this really loud noise that I always think he was just saying thank you at that point, you know, and then he released My hand, and he started looking back at the traffic, and I just gave her one of my cards. And I said, I just want to tell you I loved you guys. You know, if you ever need me for anything else, anything, I said, please just get a hold of me. And as I turned to walked away, she said, you already have. And I looked back at her, she goes, we've been sitting there for two years. She said, two years, and you're the first person that's ever stopped to check upon us, and she said, You know, that's going to make me, that's going to make his father so happy. She just said, thanks for what you do. And I left. And you know, then her father, or his father, called me that night and just said, you know, I don't know who you are, but you made my family's day, and you did something today nobody's ever done for us. And you know, I like to tell that story when I'm talking to kids, and because I always feel like, you know, every story should have a good message to it. And so the message to that story is, you know, when your moment in life comes, you know, and you will have a moment when you have this opportunity, just don't miss it. And I say my moment came in 2015 and standing in front of 400 people in Tucson, Tucson, Arizona. And I said, and your mom will come. And I said, just don't miss it.

Scott Benner 1:02:08
So Ken, I tell you that story is so lovely that I didn't make the joke I was gonna make when you said My heart was thumping that I knew something's gonna happen that day. And I thought, yeah, those are the blockages.

Kent Schnakenberg 1:02:17
Ken, yeah, well, luckily, that was

Scott Benner 1:02:21
10 years I think you've probably by putting yourself out into the world like this, had more incredible experiences than 100 people combined, just by putting yourself in situations where you may or may not have an experience like that, but a little uncommon nowadays, right? Like people don't think to do that as much as you do, and I hope everybody's hearing what it's given back to you, and maybe they'll, they'll do a little bit of them, of it themselves too.

Kent Schnakenberg 1:02:47
Yeah, you know, you were talking about clicks earlier and stuff. And I'm not interested in, you know, the number of clicks. I'm just interested in the amount of people I can reach, the amount of kids I can save, and how many kids we could send a camp, and how many kids we can help with expenses. Because that's, that's what's really important to me in life. I know that they talk about social influencers, they talk about all these things, but I got a feeling that some of that's a pretty empty feeling. But when you, you know can walk in a house and a family's happy to see you after they just got from the home from the hospital three days ago, and just start telling them what you can do for them, and just let them know they're not alone. I mean, that's worth so, that's worth everything to me.

Speaker 1 1:03:23
No, I believe that, and I agree. Well, you're doing it. You're an angel out in the world, for sure. I hope your family is as proud of you as I imagine that I am. You know, your kids are probably older now, right? And your grandchild probably don't really know that. I mean, to one of your grandchildren, you've got to be like, I don't know. Grandpa's got a weird truck and he goes on a bike rides,

Kent Schnakenberg 1:03:40
right? Like, no, they just, they just say, I mean, everything to them is Team snack, you know, Team snack, track team snack shirts they know about. They're, you know, the oldest is 12 and the youngest is, like, I think nine, and so they're, you know, we have three in Kansas City, which is a couple hours from here, two in Denver, which is eight hours from here. So we don't get to see them as often as some people do, but we definitely make a lot of trips both places, and we're really proud of our grandkids, and I'm just thankful that, you know, they're proud of me and what we do, and my wife, and nobody's ever said anything like, you know you missed this. You shouldn't have missed this. They're just they know I'm helping kids, and, yeah, I try to install and install in them, and everybody else that you know, that's the secret to life is helping others. When you have an opportunity to, can

Scott Benner 1:04:23
I ask last question, sure, prior to all this happening to you and, you know, just kind of the randomness of your, you know, of your niece being diagnosed, right? Were you doing stuff like this prior to that, or was this just a departure for

Kent Schnakenberg 1:04:36
you? No, no. I mean, I've always tried to help people. My dad was really big with charities and clubs. And he was ran a cancer golf tournament here for years, and I took over for him then, and he passed away with his ad, and I ran it for several years. And we, you know, we have a Sertoma club here in town with a miniature trade that runs in its rare it's been coming, I think 1955 it started, and it holds like 20 kids and parents. So it runs like three or four nights a week in the summer. And my wife and I pay for all the rides, for all the kids and parents, you know, all summer long for that. And we just had the last ride of the summer last Sunday night, and I think they gave 253 rides out that night. And so that's just money that those families can save, that they love the train. I mean, it reminds me when I was little, when I was riding in. It just a really special place for me, and I want it to be special for a lot of the people. And this club is filled with, you know, men and women that are in their 60s, 70s and 80s, and they continue to do this. And so it's a little bit just for us to support them with $2,500 donation to pay for all the free rides all summers, it's been great.

Scott Benner 1:05:39
You might, you really might be an angel man. I can't. Thank you enough. I'm gonna call this episode. Kent has something to say. Okay, it's a great message. Like, I don't, I don't know another way to say, like, I felt the same way when I told you I had Ernie on from from cam Sweeney, and he was talking about it, I guess, kept thinking like he's been doing this for decades and he's an older man. Like, Why does he keep doing this? You know? Like, like, what keeps him going, you know? And there's something about the his conversation, and the conversations I've had with you that I don't know. I hear a fire and a motivation inside that is not in any way that I can tell, not ego motivated. Like it really is about like, just seeing other people do better. I mean, just, I mean, Ken, what's, what's a ride on the train cost?

Kent Schnakenberg 1:06:26
Well, it's only $1 but it's and, but if they have eight kids, that's $8 and if they want to ride four times, that's $32 and that's money they could just say, you know,

Scott Benner 1:06:35
really thoughtful approach. These people's kids have a nice time, and they and they have eight more dollars in their pocket, and in your thought is they can go put that into something else and and still have had this good time and ice cream on the way home. It's just you spreading joy around,

Kent Schnakenberg 1:06:50
is what it is, yeah, well, I was Santa Claus for 18 years out front of our house, and we used to do it and decorated the neighborhood, and we raised money and toys for the Salvation Army. And so, I mean, that was like, I don't know how many years ago that was, but, and they're still doing that today, 40 years later, in this neighborhood that we moved away from. And so that's kind of cool that they're continuing to the tradition. I mean, we live in a very giving town. People are very nice here, yeah, just, I mean, it's like, I almost have to have one of those hands in front of my truck, wave and, you know, the dashboard, because so many people know the truck, and wave and honk, and it's just a great feeling

Speaker 1 1:07:26
back. Well, listen, it sounds to me like you're still Santa Claus so, well, yeah, I don't know, man, you're really lovely. And this is fantastic. I appreciate you jumping back on and sharing this with me again. I hope that, I hope you hear about people enjoying this conversation for 10 more

Kent Schnakenberg 1:07:41
years? Yeah? Well, yeah, I'm sure whenever you put it on, let me know, and then I can share it to him. I will. Yeah, it's I shared that first episode last night, and people called me and stuff, said we'd forgot about everything you're doing and stuff.

Scott Benner 1:07:55
So, yeah, no, well, it'll be out. I'll tell you about it when we we'll finish up here, say goodbye, and I'll tell you about the timeline. So thank you so much. I really do appreciate this. You bet

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