Ok, ok... it's time to finally get something on this site. I have been sitting in the wings watching Brad take charge of this thing for a while. All I can say is it has been amazing to see it start to take shape from an idea to something we are actually going to do! I am really blessed to have been involved in this from the beginning!
So I'm sure an autobiography is in order. I promise I won't be too boring. :-)
Just like Brad, I was also a chubby kid growing up. I was definitely a bi-product of the "Nintendo" generation to which most sociologists show great distain. I ate, sat, ate and sat some more on my quest to not doing anything outside.
It wasn't always like this. I was a skinny little kid at one point. I played soccer, baseball and other typical kid sports and also like Brad was a TERRIBLE athlete. Not to say I didn't like those sports, but unfortunately I just lacked the required hand-eye coordination and motor skills to score points in anything. Somewhere after 7th grade basketball I decided trying to compete with the ultra-athletic kids in my class was completely futile and I then quit all sports.
At one point I had gotten up to 245 pounds on a 5'6" frame with no end in sight. Fortunately, God occasionally hands us situations that force us to change and I woke up one morning my junior year of high school with the worst stomach ache of my life. This ultimately turned into emergency appendectomy surgery and a subsequent loss of ten pounds. My physical condition forced me to not eat for several weeks and I couldn't believe how much better I felt just a few pounds lighter. I was working at McDonalds part-time at the time (an AWESOME job for a fat kid!) and decided to radically change my diet.
Fortunately for me, at the time they had delicious salads (this was before their experimental phase with McSalad shakers and now whatever weird concoctions they put on the entrees like oranges and pecans...) so I decided to eat nothing but vegetables and fruits. Ten pounds became twenty which eventually turned into ninety. I know, I know... it sounds like a lot but I can definitely say puberty had a lot to do with it.
With my new energy, body and attitude I decided to get back into sports. Unfortunately, stinking at coordination-heavy sports doesn't change whether or not you are skinny or fat so I decided track and cross country were the way to go from there. I remember joining the track team my junior year and not being able to run four laps around the track. I think I was down to 175 at that point and was ready to start pushing myself but had been out of exercise for so long that it just wasn't possible to run for more than a minute or two at a time.
Little by little I got better and by senior year was doing fairly well at distance running. I don't think anyone would ever call me a speed demon, but I did beat some people and felt way better about myself. High school ended with good spirits all around.
Then came college and alcohol. I did what I needed to do to get by and graduate but I also spent way too much time at the bars and not doing my homework. I still ran at this point but it was usually a sporadic 20 minutes here and there. I always knew growing up that I wanted to run a marathon but could never motivate myself enough to make it happen. I HATED running hungover but didn't do anything about it until later.
Graduating from college and getting dropped into the real world was enough for me to make the decision to stop drinking and start running. I knew I couldn't drink like other people and I just had so many other things I wanted to get done in my life. I started slowly, running small distances here and there and little by little my mileage improved. Working at a call center and loathing my career motivated my hobby as it became all I thought about while call after call came pouring in.
On impulse, I signed up for the Dam to Dam race and Des Moines Marathon in 2006. I trained for both and by the time May rolled around I was in the best shape of my life. I was able to use that runners "high" to propel me into the race finishing with a time under five hours and happy to make the accomplishment. Everyone who says a marathon is a life-changing experience is absolutely on the money when they make the claim.
Graduate school and work quickly took over the next two years after that and I started to fall away from running. Fortunately I didn't quit completely but frequency became an issue. Graduating with my MBA in 2008 was a great accomplishment, but all I could think of at that point was getting the miles going again. Little by little I have been doing more and more since and I am now almost back to my old long run schedule.
I travel for a living, so getting in more than three or so runs a week is nearly impossible. I try to do the best with the hand I have been dealt and remember that there are people out there facing more difficult situations every day. More than anything, I try to remember to appreciate the times God has given me to stretch and run a good distance on a nice warm day.
I can't wait to start earning money for the orphanage. I also can't wait to enjoy the social part of the run. I know many of the team's families are going to be going with us so it should be a big FUN God party every day we are out. God is definitely working throughout this whole project, so I'm going to do whatever I can to glorify him in the coming months!
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