Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Monday, May 12, 2008
“IN 525,600 MINUTES - HOW DO YOU MEASURE, A YEAR IN THE LIFE?”
As I climbed my last of 26.2 miles, straight up the Hope Princeton Highway with wind, snow, and hail pounding my tired body, this song came to mind.
“525,600 minutes, 525,000 moments so dear. 525,600 minutes - how do you measure, measure a year?”
With the first week now under our belts, running straight from Steve King’s great send off at the BMO Bank of Montreal Vancouver Marathon, to a host of supporters welcoming us at our Planet Organic Market event in Port Coquitlam, to Richard Hunt riding us into Whole Foods in Penticton on his electric bike where we were greeted by the city’s MLA Rick Thorpe, we’re realizing the depth of the year ahead of us. Greg Hendrickson from www.WatchMyRace.com even flew up from California (spandex in tow!) to run the first few days with us!
It’s been a week ten times more than either of us could have imagined, or planned. We’ve been welcomed to stay at all places spanning from the K’wo:k’we:hala Eco-Retreat in Hope, to Manning Park Resort, Bromley Rock Provincial Park, and Twin Lakes RV Park, to the homes of Steve & Jean King and my Aunt Judy and Uncle Chris. People are stopping us on the road, donating money right through the window, interviewing us on our rest breaks, honking as we run past, running and biking with us from the curb right into town. Our ‘Eco-RV’ got a fill-up at Beecroft Biofuels Station in Penticton by Mr. Beecroft himself (!), accompanied by Mayor Kimberly and Terry David Mulligan, and Chris Corfield massaged our bodies to health on his day off.
As hundreds of new people visit our site every day, the Action Challenge numbers steadily rising, people telling us how important taking ACTION for our planet is to them, and their kids, the energy outpour is incredible.
“In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee. In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife.”
We’ve pulled some long days, now having run over 12 marathons, running anywhere from 8 hours a day to 13. We’re splitting up our run days from 13 miles at a time, to 10k, when that’s all we’ve got, to hit our marathon per day goal. On Wednesday, I had a big character builder where Matt got the flat sections and the sunny times, and I got all the hills, sleet and snow. The Powell River Posse had my back up every hill – thanks Andy, Janette, and Rick. Our amazing Road Crew (now known as “The Licious Twins”), Brenda and Vanessa, were there with everything we needed. Matt nursed me back to health
“In 525,600 minutes - how do you measure a year in the life? How about love?”
People ask us how we trained for this. And though we’ve clocked roughly 11,000 miles in training, put in countless hours in the gym with Tony, and are in the best physical shape of our lives, it’s not this that will ultimately take us the distance.
We’re being carried by the reason we set out to realize our vision 19 months ago. We’re carried by what we believe in, our convictions to create a healthy planet now, and in the future. And we’re being carried by the amazing support we’re receiving from people who care to create such a planet themselves. We’re carried by their love for us, and what we’re doing. It’s the 20/80 rule. 20% body, 80% mind which will get the job done every day as we run around our great continent.
And at a deeper level, we believe this is ultimately what will help solve global warming. It may sound cheesy, but we believe it’s Love. People caring enough to change the way we think, the way we do things, those thoughts and actions that are destructive to our planet. People feeling a real heartfelt connection to make a difference during our short time on Earth.
May this be the beginning of many Seasons of Love to come…
Love,
Steph + Matt
Sunday, May 11, 2008
Radio Clip: Listen Up!
Now that Matt and Steph have started hitting the pavement, it's time we support them more than ever! Check out this Run for One Planet radio clip, featuring our dynamic duo:
Entry from Rick Shelton
The following is a really special, personal note from Rick Shelton who came all the way from Powell River with his friends to support the tour en-route through Manning Park, to Penticon.
As a cancer survivor, and incredible individual himself, Rick was an amazing inspiration to us! Thanks for helping us past the bears, up the Hope Princeton, and through all the crazy weather. Hope to see you again :)
"My friends and myself went on a trip to support some friends on a journey and a cause we thought that it would be fun...
I didn't realize the journey that they were about to go on... until the end of the first day when I saw Stephanie run out of gas... she lost all her energy to the point that she walked the last few KM then she finally had to call it a day 3 KM early... The next day 10KM into the day she was back at it, running hard, smile on her face like that day had never happened.
It was such an inspiration to see, it just shows the commitment to the journey that they are on."
Thursday, May 1, 2008
GET READY! Matt & Steph start their journey on May 4!
Hello Run for One Planet Community!
We are now just days away from our official send-off for our year-long run around North America, and wanted to reach out to you all one last time before our departure, with a few parting words.
IN SUM:
Building the Run for One Planet has been a very long, hard and joyful journey. What started as a pipedream, 18 months, thousands of hours, hundreds of people and a ton of sweat later, has transformed into our all-consuming reality. We are so grateful to share this process with every single one of you – thank you for helping to take our dream to reality. Because of our collective effort, we’ve already received national media coverage from all media sources (TV, radio, print, internet); thousands of viewers have come to our site; thousands of dollars have been donated to help seed OUR FOUNDATION; we’ve spoken in front of hundreds of people at events; inspired hundreds of people to take one new action for Earth through our ACTION CHALLENGE and so much more.
OUR FIRST EVENT:
Leaving May 4 with the BMO Bank of Montreal Vancouver Marathon, we will attend our first public event on tour at Planet Organic Market on Sunday, May 4th at 3:00pm at 2755 Lougheed Highway. We would love for every one of you to come out, and share in the beginning of our collective dream of inspiring a continent to take action for the health of our planet.
TAKE THE CHALLENGE:
As we set out, we especially wanted to reach out to OUR community to ask for help in spreading the word to YOUR community to take action for earth through our tour. Through our Action Challenge, our tour goal is to inspire 1 million North Americans to commit to 1 new environmentally friendly habit, to bring about 1 million new actions for Earth. It’s so easy – just CLICK HERE. While you’re at it, please dare 3 of your closest friends to do the same. Even if you have already taken the challenge, go for it again and dare 3 new friends – or a whole group of friends! Friends through friends is how we’ll inspire 1 million people.
THE LEGACY:
We never set out on this odyssey for it to be a one-off, year-long run that would end with our return to Vancouver. The run in itself will be life changing, hopefully for more people than just us. But this is just the beginning. We hope for this to be the start of a whole new way for North Americans to save the planet – by running for it! Through the 2008/2009 North America tour, our goal is to raise $1 million to be the seed money to launch subsequent Run for One Planet Green Marathons to serve as a LEGACY OF ACTION in some of the cities we originally ran through. Our ‘08/’09 tour will be the prototype by which all succeeding green marathons will be fashioned, to galvanize people to get fit and healthy for themselves and stimulate them to pick up the pace to take action for our planet.
Thank you very much from the bottom of our hearts. It’s because of you, and your desire to also make the world a better place, that we are departing so incredibly supported. Get ready to come along on the 11,000-mile journey of your life…
Love,
Matt + Steph
