Time To Dig Deep - Race 1 Coming Up

In about a week, I run the first of three half-marathons this year to raise money for clean water in Africa.

As you may know, last year I ran my first 13.1 to complete a capital water project in our adopted town of Katito, Kenya. We needed to raise a final $60,000.00 to complete a water and sanitation project through World Vision. Through the generosity of many of you, I raised over $3000.00 and as a team, we raised over $100K and the project has since been completed. My time was three hours, twenty minutes, and forty two minutes.

Because of my participation with World Vision and this fundraising, I have been invited to attend the celebration of the completion of the water project, in Katito, in May. I am so honored and humbled to have been selected to participate and I cannot wait to see the good work that is being done with the funds that I helped raise. I will also have the opportunity to meet the children that we sponsor through World Vision. It is an amazing opportunity and I can't wait to go.

My expectation is that I will also see the incredible needs that remain there. I hope to bring that back so that I can share, with first-hand knowledge, the overwhelming hardship and need that remains. I hope this personal experience will give me the credibility to ask you for money as part of ongoing fundraising. If my expressing the need does not move you to give, perhaps my personal account will. If you've given in the past, perhaps my story will motivate you to give again and more generously.

Even before I knew I was going to Kenya, I decided that this year I would run three races in an attempt to raise $13,700.00 for clean water in Africa. This audacious amount was selected because it is the cost of a deep water well and hand pump that can provide clean safe water for hundreds for years. That's the enduring impact that I would like to make in this world. I would be honored if you helped me make that impact.

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All I can do is train and run. Without your donation, it is meaningless. Would you please consider and generous donation to my page that will help those who don't have the basic life giving substance of water? Would you donate to my page to help reduce death and disease caused by water borne illness? Would you help improve the quality of life to children and families by providing water?

In two months, I will be able to share the impact of your donation - through first hand experience. But that shouldn't be a reason to help now.

In a week, I'll be sweating, running, and enduring a grueling 13.1 miles in New York. I hope to be met by family and friends at the finish line. It will be a wonderful experience, made so much more meaningful by your generous support.

Remember, I have World Vision orange shoe laces which will be given to someone who donates $15, or more, before race day on March 24. These are new laces sent to my by World Vision as a Thank You for raising more than $500.

SL