Iron Horse Ultra

Iron Horse Ultra

I am ready for race number 4. Iron Horse ultra in St Paul AB promise to be challenging and beautiful. The route will cover the beautiful farmlands, lake shores, riverside of the county of St Paul while incorporating the old abandon CNR railroad. The race start Saturday 9th at 6am and it ends Mother’s day at 1pm giving me 31 hours to finish.
I am looking forward to this race; I am able to bring my kids for at least part of the way. My sister who lives in Vancouver is meeting us in Edmonton and my kids are having a mini vacation with her and my nephew.
I am also looking forward to running with a lot of my ultrarunning friends. I only started ultrarunning last year and in a short time I had a wonderful opportunity of meeting fantastic people from all over Alberta. Iron Horse Ultra is part of the Alberta Ultra Series which attracts a group of runners from elite to recreational. Alan Lam is coming as a support crew, he is an accomplished runner and very knowledgeable about endurance sports since he has supporter for Badwater Ultra which is considered the thoughts ultra in the world, also with me is Claudia Katz a great friend and an amazing photographer, it sure help to have friendly faces around me when things get though.
This last few weeks I had off where sure interesting, it was fun to watch my body experience withdrawal from the highs of running, after Australia I had to cut down my training to let my body rest and it was harder than I thought, all of a sudden I was behaving like I had a broken heart, watching endless bad movies and eating Mac and Cheese.
During this time I also had a chance to get more involved with the charities I am representing. Cnib, Foundation Fighting Blindness and Operation Eyesight had their annual fundraising events and i either volunteer or I was a guest. Last night Operation Eyesight presented me with a guide stick as a thank you. A guide stick is a stick that is giving to people in villages in Africa when somebody goes blind. they are giving a guide stick to navigate. This is as much help as it’s offered. The saddest part is that these types of blindness are avoidable but in developing countries are very common; the cost of restoring their sight it’s as low as $30 dollars. The guide stick was presented to me because this person in particular doesn’t needed any more, Operation Eyesight made that possible, so the stick is a symbol of what an amazing impact a small gesture such a running a race for pledges can make on someone’s life. It sure helps put things into perspective about why I am doing this.
Is unfortunately that because I am on the spotlight at the moment i get credit for the work i do, but these charities had been doing amazing work and changing people’s lives even when nobody was looking. Standing there on these events being thanked was an overwhelming moment for me since I am so grateful for their support. Giving back is just a way to say thanks, but also how could I just stand there and not be involved when I know what a difference had made in my life.
But Albert Einstein said it best with these words, “The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.” So as long as there is a reason to and an open road I will keep running.