As I write this blog entry we are closing in on 21 days exactly till the start of my portion of this fundraiser. Tonight we sit at $15,203 raised so far. The goal we set was $25,000, is this still attainable, absolutely!!! Regardless of the final amount I know without a doubt there are thousands of people in the last couple of months that we have reached who never knew what the Wounded Warrior Project was. Now they do. From our fundraiser I have been contacted by 3 other individuals, two on the east coast and one in the Washington State area, all inquiring about how we went about our fundraiser. The first thing I tell them is that you have to have a group who believes in what they are doing, my wife has spent countless hours on this fundraiser. Dan Elsener was the reason we even got this ball rolling, without those two and there hard work this summer, I say without hesitation, this fundraiser would be no where near what it is today.
The territory manager for Mizuno USA, Sophia Wharton and her fiance Ben Holmes have literally clothed me to do this run. Sophia and her company provided me with ample amounts of new Mizuno Precisions and to top that her and Ben paid for extra pairs out of there pockets to ensure I had enough brand new pairs to change every 50 miles, thats 5 pairs of brand new shoes. Mizuno donated so much apparel for this, It would take me an hour to type it all! Thank you both, I am truly in your debt.
Brent Welch with Resort Promo Wear is still selling event shirts and donating a portion of the sales to us. Eric Steele the RD of FlatRock 25/50k is donating a portion of race entries to us, up till Aug 25th and Phil and Stacy Sheridan are doing the same with the Horse Thief Canyon 10k. Darin S. whom is running the Leadville100 this weekend is taking per mile donations and giving that to the fundraiser. People have been so giving it is unreal.
The American Legion Riders will be escorting me through most major towns along the route. Tony Brown our route coordinator has put his fair share of hours into this and will be with us as well for the duration. The post event party is at HOOTERS Wichita, they will be giving away visors, hats and shirts, plus other specials. That will be from 2-5pm Sunday Sept 12th, at the completion of the fundraiser.
As for me, this weekend will be my last long training run before the fundraiser. I will pace Rick Mayo back the last 50 miles of the Leadville 100. After that I am basically shutting it down for two weeks, with minimal running, just enough to stay loose. I am confident I have prepared myself the best I can, many 130 - 140 mile weeks this summer.The only concern I have at this point is the weather, if we get into the 90's it will definitely affect my body on day two. Other than that things are great and I am ready to get started and get this over with, so I can take at least a month off from running!!! Thanks everyone, Semper Fi, Tony
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