Day 1 – “End of the Earth for a Cure”

Today, twelve runners from the NF Endurance family will begin their journey to Antarctica. Below is a post written by NF Endurance Director Steve Kendra on Thursday evening as he reflects on the journey ahead. This is the first of a series of posts that will chronicle their epic expedition to the “End of the Earth for a Cure.”

So, tonight, I’m sitting here tonight next to a warm fire. The Olympics are on TV, and my wife is sleeping on the couch. Our basset hound, Sparky, and the cats are sleeping near her. Both my daughters are tucked away with their PJ’s on inside-out and spoons under their pillows. That’s because there is yet another major winter storm whipping past the back porch and shaking the house tonight here in southeastern Pennsylvania, and they abide by the superstition that this will guarantee a snow day. Perhaps, the most snow this area has ever had in a single winter — a nearly perfect winter to train for running a marathon in Antarctica. I hope they can stay home too. I’m missing them very much already.

In about 36 hours I’ll be heading out on arguably the most adventurous thing I’ve ever done, heading down towards the South Pole, with 11 others on the NF Endurance “Extreme” Team. We’ll be joining 88 other athletes from around the world on this excursion to the end of the world. Some of the guys on this team make up the best friends I have in the world. Others I know a little, and a couple, I don’t know at all. I expect in about three weeks we’ll all be friends and our families from here on out will be just a little bigger.

This event, dubbed “The Last Marathon” is organized by a company called Marathon Tours. Our program coordinator Trish Hardy has been working with them for years now bringing this dream to a reality. Besides keeping all of us organized, she’s also been packing up my buddy Bill to head out Saturday morning with us. I’m not sure that all of the thousands of people associated with NF Endurance . . .or especially those 2 million people out there with NF, fully appreciate Trish and the wonderful folks who make up the NF Endurance staff and all they do to keep us all running, riding, climbing and funding the world class research of the Children’s Tumor Foundation.

I sure do. . .and I’ll bet most of the team traveling on this “End of the Earth for a Cure” Expedition know too.

Twelve of us will be crossing off a big one on our bucket list over the next three weeks. I’ll do my best to keep you up to date with how we’re doing. We thank you for following along vicariously through this blog. We all love Trish and the staff, but we also know full well where the bread is buttered and where the rubber meets the road. . .clearly none of us would be on this adventure without our friends and families who support us. To those of you who have gotten behind the mission of the Children’s Tumor Foundation financially and helped the Antarctica NFE team put more than $200,000 towards keeping those research wheels turning, you know we appreciate you. But you should sleep even better knowing that it’s not really what we think that makes any difference. It’s the difference in the lives of all those who suffer with NF that truly makes you the heroes in this quest.

Next stop: Buenos Aires, Argentina.