How’s This For Motivation…

North Shore Athletics has recently started sponsoring a program which is designed to get street kids, with little to no direction, into running. The goal is self explanatory and from all accounts it most certainly seems to be helping. I met these kids a week back and my first impression was that they were a bunch of punks…kinda to be expected given their circumstances…however, we all know not to judge a book by its cover…

Thanks so much for all the great gear. The kids wore it proudly on the marathon.
Speaking of the run, it was a great success. All 5 boys ran it and finished between 4 and 4.5 hours.
Marcos finished even though he broke his arm on Friday night and wouldn’t go see a Dr. for fear that he wouldn’t be able to run. Tough kids.
here is a photo of the kids. They’re champions!
left to right: Tony Xie (his 4th marathon); Frankie Joseph (14 and his 2nd); Lawrence Bolan (16 and his 2nd ); William Vu (14 and his 2nd); me; Marcos Da Silva (14 and his 2nd).
Thanks again for your tremendous support. You make these kids feel important.

I was out supporting some friends during the marathon on Sunday, and I vividly remember seeing ‘Marcos’ run past. I cheered him on, even though he did not recognize me. My lingering thought was that he had absolutely zero running form, and that he was making the run a hell of a lot harder than it had to be…of course I later learned that his arm was broken and that was why he was slumped to one side!

I know one thing for sure, the next time I find myself in a tough mental place in a race…I’ll be dedicating some ‘toughen up time’ to thinking about these kids. Champions for sure, and motivational to say the least!!

GR