Week 2 - January 22nd

The tragic events in Haiti were absolutely on everyone's minds and I have to say as regards to fundraising - Please donate whatever you can to Haitian relief - our family made several donations this week and even as we watched the Save Haiti special last night. Unfortunately, unlike September 11th, there is no one to blame and it's just hard to watch the tragedy unfold in the wreckage and the fact that as of today, they aren't looking for survivors anymore. Very sad.

Anyway, was not a good week for me in the running department. I came down with a severe cold and respiratory problem, and it didn't bode well. I did get out for a 3-4 mile run while we were in vacation in Orlando, but not too much outside that and getting back, my daughter got violently ill. One of the valuable inputs I got from my expert panel is to keep a journal so I'm going to start that for this upcoming week. My goal is to run 4 days with 2 days cross training per the Jack Fultz program. I ran on the treadmill today (but treadmill miles don't count) - felt good for a good 48 minute workout.

Donations this week:

Patrick Mullaney - in memory of his dad David and all cancer victims
David W. Adams - in loving memory of Betty Silverson (quick UNSOLICITED plug here but David is my family attorney and has an outstanding Estate Planning practice which I highly recommend. If, like me until recently, you haven't done this - please do this or something like it TODAY, tomorrow may be too late - http://www.dwa-law.com/. )
Roland Dunatov - in memory of John Dunatov

Thank you to all for donations and please remember Haiti First!! Hope for a better report next week.

Week 1 - (sort of ) Week Ending January 15th

So, as my first post stated, I started this back in October/November, but as many who know me - I'm a huge procrastinator (no- really!!) - and I actually wrote tons of posts but never published anything. They either didn't really capture the spirit or what I wanted to say. Ultimately, like a term paper, you've just got to get it done and the project carries on in an end to itself.

Last week, my running consisted of the DFMC team run through the hills in Newton/Chestnut Hill and back through Watertown. My go forward plan is to update on weekly mileage goals

Donations: I want to give special recognition and a very BIG THANK YOU to my first donors: Rich and Patrick Corbett - both in memory of their dad, Dr. Lacey Corbett
The Travis Family - in memory of Everyone touched by Cancer
John Schroter - in support of Mass Highways (as I will be crushing the pavement of course - Thanks John)
Lori McGrath - in memory of Joyce Ippolito and James McGrath
Kevin Cotter - in memory of his dad and my uncle Joseph Cotter
The D'Amato Family - in support of me (thanks Angelo - you're one of the good guys!!)
The Fitzpatrick Family - in memory of Betty Fitzpatrick and Ruth Sullivan
Bob Brunelle and Family
Alley Catyb - in memory of his dad, Alley Catyb, Jr.

I also want to thank those who gave me some valuable advice (none of which was - don't do it - are you crazy??) from good friends and former marathoners Steve Marquedant, Tim Sullivan and Patrick Mullaney. There is no substitute for experience!!

Thank you to everyone for their donations and I'll keep updating!!

OK - Enough Already, Let's Start this Thing!!

Actually, this thing has been started (or maybe in neutral) for awhile. I decided to run the Dana Farber Marathon Challenge in 2009, sometime after my mom died of lung cancer. A friend of mine here in Billerica had a great experience and raised a ton of money for cancer research and I thought why not me, too?

My story is pretty simple. I grew up in Hopkinton MA and the Marathon was always part of our lives. As kids we would get up early and pedal our bikes up to the Town Common before they shut the streets down, and play football right their in the square and then run down to climb elm trees near the start to get the right vantage point. I can remember sometime in the 1970's big TV trucks came in and out comes David Hartman from Good Morning America and we crowded behind and screamed "Good Morning America!!" after he announced where he was "in Hopkinton, Massachusetts, start of the Boston Marathon". Sometime after that I became interested in the running itself and like so many others said to myself, "Someday, gonna have to run the Marathon". Well, I hope the Someday is this year. I'm giving it my all and I hope to raise a ton of money so that all my friends and other family members will someday never have to go through the pain of cancer or watching a close friend, family member or anyone else ever die from such a horrible disease.

Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it!! Thanks for reading and for being part of the journey -- Tom Fitz.