December 8, 2024
Half Marathon, 10K & 5K Races

Striders celebrating their Roots

The Striders are celebrating their roots at Reggae Marathon this year and I’m looking forward to meeting Gloria Jones and the 40+ runners coming with her to Negril December 5. The Striders represent the Strides for Hope Charity Marathon Team from Ann Arbor, Michigan and this is their second time at Reggae Marahon.  A smaller group ran in Reggae Marathon back in 2007 and they’re back in 2015 to celebrate their 10th Anniversary.  But rather than me tell you what they are all about, let’s hear from Gloria:

“The Strides for Hope Charity Marathon team gathers together every year to raise money for the Cancer Support Community (CSC) of Greater Ann Arbor.  We provide support, education, and hope to all of those in our area impacted by cancer for absolutely no cost to the patient, care giver, or their family.  This type of community and high quality support is not offered elsewhere in our area, although there is much evidence to suggest that the types of programming we provide (professionally led support groups, nutrition classes, yoga, meditation, etc.) are essential to whole patient care during and after treatment.
 

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Striders at Reggae Marathon in 2007

Many of our STRIDERS (as we call them) run or walk to honor someone close to them who has received services from our center.  Each of our team members needs to raise $3,000 to attend so it is no small commitment.  We run or walk weekly together in Ann Arbor, Michigan to get in shape for the event.  The CSC feels so fortunate to have several STRIDERS who run and raise funds every year.  In fact we attended the Reggae Half Marathon back in 2007 with a team of nine.  We are thrilled that four of those women will be back with us this year.  We are also thrilled with the growth of STRIDES.  This year we are excited to be traveling with over 40 team members to Jamaica on our special 10th anniversary of the program.  Being this was such a special year, we wanted to honor the roots of our STRIDES program and return to this fantastic destination.
 
Our team consists of those in college to those near retirement age.  There are those that walk and those that run and many many people that have never even participated in a 5k!  This can be a life changing experience for our participants.  This year’s team consists of a survivor and her daughter raising money to give back, a mother and a son runner that wanted to honor their late husband/father, the founder of our non-profit, three of our past interns, two of our staff members, a large family group running to honor a young girl who passed from cancer last year, and a whole slew of others who want to give back to their community.
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Some of the Striders coming to Reggae Marathon December 5

Michigan gets very cold in the winter and we are so excited to celebrate our hard effort together in Jamaica for the 15th annual Reggae Marathon.  We are even mostly okay with the fact it starts at 5:15 am :).  The beautiful scenery and warm weather will make everything worth it.
 
You can learn more about our team at our web site:  Strides for Hope.  If you would like to donate to any of our runners, please visit Cancer Support Ann Arbor and click the donate tab on the top right.  Please note that it is for STRIDES for hope and we will use this to help offset the fundraising minimums for some of our group runners”
Gloria, it will certainly we warmer in December in Negril so leave all your winter running gear behind. See you all in Negril Friday night at the Reggae Marathon Pasta Party.

Until next time…

Reggae Marathon RunninGuy (aka Sugar ‘Tuff Gong’ Bong)

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