Spring Forward

Last weekend, we fell back as we retreated from Daylight Savings, but Wednesday evening, we sprang forward. That’s right, Spring Team had its final informational meeting and then its kick-off!

The team is small so far, but hopefully will grow. Come to think of it, it wasn’t a huge team last year either, but we did good things. The turnout wasn’t tremendous for either meeting. Something like 20 people had signed up for the info meeting and maybe 10-12 showed up. And at kick-off, other than coaches and mentors, only about 8-10 participants were there. But I know that others on the team could not make it, so once training starts it will improve.

All of us who work hard for this cause are a little discouraged about it, but it is what it is. Fundraising is not easy under the best of circumstances, which these hardly are. But clearly, people can raise the money, and will raise it if they start early, develop a good plan, work with their mentor, and do something every week towards implementing their plan. But when you are looking at needing to raise $3,000 or $4,000 in an economy with 10% unemployment, it may not feel doable, even though it very much is.

My part on the team, other than speaking at the meetings, is as mentor captain. I guess I mentor the mentors, even though they don’t need a lot of mentoring. I haven’t ruled out a spring event, or a summer one either. There are a lot of options. My friend Nicki is mentoring and running the New Orleans half-marathon on the 13th anniversary of the bone marrow transplant that saved her life as a 20 year old. It would be fabulous to do that with her. Or I could branch out and do the St. Anthony’s Triathlon in Tampa, or the Lake Tahoe Century bike race in June. Both of those would require a bike, but they would be a step towards earning that Triple Crown. Or I could take the route of my fourth full marathon, in Seattle, a city I’ve never been to. I like to combine a little adventure with TNT.

As always, we have a great bunch of coaches and mentors, and of course the participants are always fabulous people. A couple of them have already raised $350 - $500. At least a couple of them have compelling stories. There’s the young woman who recovered from non-Hodgkin lymphoma a year ago, thanks to drugs developed in part with LLS funding. There’s the woman who will be doing her first triathlon who lost her husband, and her young daughters losing their father, to leukemia six years ago. Evil, evil diseases! We need to be as relentless as cancer is to defeat it.