Donations Update

Thanks to peoples very kind support I am on my way to raising the $3500 that I pledged to Livestrong


Click Here to Donate,

Open Letter To You.

Hi there,

In 2010, cancer will be the number one cause of death on this planet and one in three people will be diagnosed with cancer during their lifetime. This disease has taken a toll on billions of families already, including my own, but we can each make a difference in our own way. I’ve decided to join Team LIVE
STRONG and raise awareness and funds for the fight against cancer.
On Nov 9th 2010 I will be running the New York City Marathon as a member of the Livestrong Team in an effort to raise money to fund Cancer Research. My personal goal is to raise $3500 and I am appealing for your assistance to make it happen.

Please visit my fundraising website , where you can make a donation online. (No donation is too small)
If you don’t want to donate online, you can print off a donation form from my fundraising page and mail a check. Please write my Participant ID# (291870796) on the check.
All donations must have a donation form attached and should be mailed to the address on the donation form:
Lance Armstrong Foundation Events
National Mail Processing Center
P.O. Box 6002
Albert Lea,
MN 56007‐6602

Even if you are not in a position to make a donation, you can still help to fight this terrible disease by forwarding this email to your friends and family. Or by posting a link to my donation page on your Twitter or Facebook Page.

I have also setup a blog at http://sponsorjohn.blogspot.com where you can keep up to date with my escapades and find some other ways to help out. Together I truly believe we can take a step closer to finding a cure for Cancer and I am looking forward to the day when it is a thing of the past.

Thanks for your support and live strong

John Davis

Ebay

I have started to put some items on Ebay to help raise my $3500 that I need to raise for Livestrong. If you would prefer to bid on something rather than donate then this is the perfect opportunity for you to help out.

There will be a variety of stuff in the coming weeks and so be sure to check back often, in case you miss the deal of a lifetime.

Links:
My Ebay Listings

My Live Strong Donation Page

We are all in this together

Anyone that knows me, can attest to the fact that I love music and naturally music has become a part of my training. Listening to 'Rain' by The Cult in the sweltering heatwave this week helped take my mind off the 90+ degrees that I have been running in.
I've opted to add one song per day to my playlist and hopefully to let people in on some new stuff.
This song by L.A. based Human Life really should be the start to anyones training plan for any Marathon. I highly recommend it. The video too is awesome.


Human Life 'In It Together' Official Music Video

New Shoes

I have been experiencing a really uncomfortable throbbing n both of my ankles for the last two weeks and so today I went into Marathon Sports to see about getting a new pair of running sneakers.

The sales associate there first asked me to walk without shoes on so he could see my mechanics. I was blown away when he said "you have a slight rolling in your ankles, but it's ever so slight."
I explained to him about my ankle pain and he brought three different pairs of sneakers for me to try out, but more than that he made me run down the street in them. How is that for service?

The end result is that I purchased new Brooks Adrenaline GTS 10 and I think that they are going to be awesome.

$1 Twitter Challenge

For a few years now I have had this personal notion that the Internet could be a seriously empowering medium for people to help others out, the problem is that there seems to always be a middleman looking to make a buck in the process.
One of the things that I thought was that if people could part with just $1 they would hardly miss it. But if all those individual dollars went to one place then that would be HUGE..
It's with that simple idea in mind that I would like to lauch the $1 @Twitter vs. @Facebook Challenge. I have committed to raising $3500 for the Livestrong Foundation and cannot do it with out the help of my friends and perfect strangers alike. I hope you know how much your contribution means to me and how much it means to the cancer survivors, their families, and caregivers who will receive the benefits of your pledge.

Please donate here on the official LiveStrong Page
1. Post a link on Facebook or Retweet this on Twitter and mention: @limerickman $1 Challenge
3. Donate one dollar to Livestrong in the name of somebody important to you
4 Feel empowered that you have probably made a massive difference in the world.

If you cannot make a donation, then still please follow me on Twitter my Twitter name is @limerickman
Together we can make this happen

Catching Up

It's been a while since I got around to writing a blog entry, but here it is and I will try to be much better from here on in. It's nice to know that this could ultimately be a nice reminder of just how hard running a marathon is and may even serve as inspiration for others in the future.

So over the last month I have basically being working on my endurance. I am running everyday, usually between 5 and 7 miles. This week I really wanted to start on the track and do some speed work to see if I can get my pace back to a decent rate.

Last Saturday I ran in a short 4k race in Lanesville, MA. and managed a pace of 8:11 per mile. Even though it was a short race, the course was challenging for me with a lot of short steep hills, but the real challenge was the heat. We have just entered a heatwave here in the Boston area and temperatures are in the 90's. On Monday I got motivated enough to do a long run of 10.25 miles along the Minuteman Trail, it was hard Temperature was 93 degrees and there wasn't a cloud in the sky. The fact that I managed to finish was great for my ego and I felt that in decent conditions I would be unstoppable.

I wanted to share a good pre run energy boost that I am using and really works a treat:

2 slices bread
1 tblspoon of butter
1 Banana
1 tblspoon of honey

Butter the bread
Slice the banana on top of one slice of bread
spread honey over the banana
Place the remaining bread slice on top (Yup you got it.. it's a sandwich)

Eat approx 1 hr before your run.

Looking forward to tomorrow... Track workout

Also if you read this blog please pass on my donation link to your friends.. I need to raise $3500 before November and if only 700 people were to donate $5 then I would acheive my goal. I'm not running the NYC Marathon for me, I'm running it for us..

My Livestrong Donation Page Let's kick Cancer's Ass

Day 8: Another lap of Fresh Pond

Man what a hectic couple of days that was. On Thursday, Jess joined me for a run and I was surprised she actually completed 3.5 miles with me. It was a little slower pace for me but that in itself was a challenge as I was running outside of my comfort zone and from what i have been reading, this helps prepare for the psychological challenge that the marathon presents.

Over the weekend we went to NYC to see the Lion King and we stayed in Times Square at the excellent Times Square Hotel, no week long stay at the Waldorf or the luxurious W but it was perfect and central for us. I got in a nice strength training workout on the 26th floor of the Edison and watched the Champions League Final on TV while alternating between the threadmill and the weight machines. It was a strange feeling to be the only person in the Gym, I don't usually workout at Hotels, in fact this may have been the forst time I ever did.

We also made it to the top of the Empire State Building whaich was awesome. If you ever get the chance, bring binoculars and dont get conned into the "Skyride" by the guys selling tickets outside. We made that mistake and spent about 30 mins of our lives doing some really lame video tour ov NYC prior to heading to the observation deck. Instead of $18 we ended up paying $45 for tickets and were left feeling ripped off.

All in all a great trip and I can't wait to get back there in November or the Marathon

Day 3: My 1st Training Run and Weird Experience

This morning, Jess reminded me that you don't run in events by talking about them let alone blogging about them and left for work but not before delivering her ultimatum... "You must go for a run today".

The weather here today is crappy at best, it's warm and sticky but with misty rain at the same time. Anyhow I realized that I needed to get off my ass quickly because there is only 171 days left to get myself in shape to get around that course.

And so I decided to push it from day 1, at least from an out of shape fool like myself. The challenge 3.5 miles!!!

I got ready, did the mandatory stretches and the likes. Hydrated a little bit and set off... Man did it feel good... I was running at a pace that I hadn't been able to manage in years.. I felt the wind at my back, my feet landing on the pavement like they were landing on cushions and leaving the ground like I had just tipped a hot coal... I was flying. I thought I could look for a really decent time in this Marathon and maybe I should start thinking about entering some road races around New England...
All this was racing through my mind when I had to stop at an intersection to let a car turn. When suddenly i started to pay attention to my running partner a.k.a my body!! I noticed that my lungs were on fire.. i was shattered and I looked back and realized that I had covered a magical distance of 3 blocks and short ones at that.

So I pressed on, I was determined to finish the 3.5 miles, if I had to crawl. I'd like to say I did it without stopping but I had to walk 3 times (the most I've ever had to stop on that particular run) my head was just not in it today for some reason.

One very notable thing did happen on the run and it was this.. I was running around Fresh Pond and there were only a few people around and as I passed one particularly large tree there was a loud BOOM! and the tree collapsed into the pond. I just happened to pass by as this was happening and thought about how long it had been there and why at that particular moment in time the tree collapsed. Most people have heard of the Butterfly effect of chaos or have heard the term.. "If a Butterfly flaps his wings...." Well the collapse of the tree made me think that perhaps the slight breeze caused by my passing by had somehow contributed to the collapse of the tree.
Is this a sign that by undertaking the task of running the NYC Marathon for Livestrong can in some small way contribute to the collapse of the barriers that cancer has managed to erect before us? I'd like to think so.

The rest of the run was uneventful and I managed to make it the rest of the way without having to stop...

I've got a long way to go.

Day 2 Sponsor My Training Runs

One idea I had for my fundraising is to have companies sponsor me for my training runs and races.

All you have to do is send me a T-Shirt and donate $20 at my fundraising site over at Livestrong and I will wear your shirt on one of my training runs.
What you will get for your company is the following...

1. I will update my Facebook Profile with a picture of me wearing your company T-Shirt.

2. I will wear your T-Shirt running through the streets of Cambridge MA, a really busy area with lots of traffic and close to Harvard University. (This could be anywhere from 5 to 20 miles)

3. I will post several twitter updates linking to your companies Website and acknowledging your company as the sponsor of the day.

4. Anything else positive that I can do to get your company some good exposure.

5. I'm open to other ideas

If it's something you would be interested in please get in touch.

Day 1

This all started 20 years ago... I wanted to run a marathon and signed up to run in the London Marathon. I trained really hard and felt like I was going to do really well and clock a good time. However I was also playing rugby at the time and happened to play in a tournament in Co. Cork in Ireland a month before the London Marathon. The tournament was only for fun and not too serious but I managed to get injured and hurt my back to the point where I had to withdraw from London.
Over the past 20 years each year I found myself saying, "next year I'm running a marathon... blah blah blah..."
During this time I have seen a lot of people succumb to illness and in particular to Cancer in one of it's many ugly forms. I've seen survivors and I've also seen people who have not been so fortunate.
I watched my father battle with COPD and literally have the air taken from him when the rest of his body was perfectly healthy.
I vowed that I would not put this off any longer because you never know what life is going to deal you and decided that this year I wanted to do my marathon. However i decided that if i am going to do it I am not only going to do it for myself but also for those others that wanted to run a marathon but for whatever reason never got to.
it is with that in mind that I decided to team up with Livestrong and help as much as I can to help them in their fight to make Cancer a thing of the past.
I'm hoping that through this experience that I can make some new friends, learn a little something about myself and most importantly be a tiny wheel in the machine that is fighting this disease.
I hope that you will join with me and help me to achieve my goal. Who knows if anyone will ever read this but if there are people out there know that we can all do our part while at the same time pursuing our dreams.

Click Here to Donate