If employees would like to save some cash and burn more calories this week, West Virginia University encourages them to hop on their bicycles for National Bike to Work Week May 11-15.

The WVU Environmental Conservation Awareness Now programor WE CAN , WVU Transportation and Parking, WVU Employee Wellness and the nonprofit Positive Spin have partnered to promote the weeklong event through http://wecan.wvu.edu/. Bicyclists can log the number of miles theyve commuted to work at the end of the week at this Web site.

This is the first joint effort between the WVU Office of Sustainability and Positive Spin, which accepts donations of old bicycles and repairs them to resell at an affordable cost.

We hope that the data collected from this week will help us research future wellness initiatives and also boost Morgantowns rating as a bicycle-friendly city,said Clement Solomon, director of the WVU Office of Sustainability.

According to Popular Science magazine, our Persian Gulf oil imports could be cut in half if each American driver rode a bicycle to work once a week, Solomon said.

For a list of bicycle rack locations at the University and log forms to keep track of your miles, visit http://wecan.wvu.edu/ .