My bro - Avon cancer walker

My brother last weekend walked in the Avon walk for the fight against cancer. He wrote a little synopsis on the walk. I found it interesting and thought I would share it on my blog.
A little history on my brother: he is not a jogger but he did play a lot of tennis in his youth and is still an avid golfer. About 2 years ago he had 2 hip replacement operations and still feels pain from it. He is 50+ and is average weight

Here is an overview of my weekend. It is a little long.

The walk was great; there were a lot of great people working there. I got to the event at 6am.

They had granola bars, apples, juice, and coffee in a tent outside. We were in a park

behind Soldiers Field with 3200 walkers. There was a commencement address on a stage

outside at 6:30. They got people worked up and cheering.

Then they had people talk about why they were walking and who they had lost to cancer.

The walk started at 7am. Everyone poured out on to a bike path that was next to Lake Shore drive.

It was a mass of people. You couldn't see the ground under you; you didn't know where you were stepping.

You just walked at the pace of everyone else. You got a nice view of the city and the lake.

It looked like the crowd was a mile long. I was towards the back of the crowd.

The weather was cold and overcast. Luckily I brought a wind breaker. I definitely needed it.

After a couple of miles the crowd started spreading out and it wasn't so congested.

We kept walking north down the path next to the beach until it ran out.

It might have been 6 or 7 miles, and then we headed into the neighborhoods of the city.

There were a lot of twists and turns, waiting at lights, a lot of people beeping their horns.

A lot of cheering from people watching and from some of the walkers.

They had rest stops, bathrooms, and a place to get snacks around every 2 miles.

They had lunch at the 10 miles mark. I thought that was kind of early in the walk.

I got there a little after 10 am. They said that some people only go 13 miles the first day.

They have the lunch early for them. They had vans that would pick you up and they take you

to the next stop if you needed it. We winded through the neighborhoods and then went

through a forest preserve for a couple of miles. They had signs with arrows along the way

and a mile marker to let you know how far you had gone. Maybe 2 or 3 percent of the walkers

were guys. I was asked who I was walking with. They weren't used a guy walking by himself.

I guess most of the guys came because they were accompanying someone else or being

dragged along I guess. The walk ended at 26.3 miles at Warren Park on 6800 North Western.

It was like a city over there. There were thousands of people. A lot of tents for people to

sleep, a big tent for eating, and big tent with nurses and doctors for those with problems,

buses to take some of the people to a hotel, and semi trailers that had showers built into them.

The walk started at 7am and I think they cut off at 7 or 7:30 pm. You had a schedule that you

needed to stick to. If you stayed too long at a stop or had trouble walking they would take you to

next rest stop or to the end of the walk if you wanted. They called that sweeping the ones who

couldn't make it or got behind. They had roving vans that were looking for people who needed help.

There were a lot of cheering stations where people were handing out candy and cheering you on.

There were cars that were blasting their horns; some of them were colored in pink. There was a

pink ambulance van that was pulling a trailer that had big speakers on it and was blaring music.

There was a guy in clothes on a stand above the speakers dancing. He reminded me of the

Buzz beer guy on the Simpson’s. They were driving and he was dancing up there all day long.

In the later afternoon his dancing started slowing down a lot.

There was one big guy, maybe 6 foot 4, and more than a couple hundred pounds that

was dressed all in pink. He had pink tights, a pink ballerina tootoo, and pink top.

He was carrying a big pink flag that I think said something like the Sisterhood of the TaTas

or something like that. A lot of people had shirts and clothes with sayings

on them like Save the Tatas, or Save Second Base, and every different variation on that theme.

And there were a lot of groups that had similar group names like that. I talked to the big pink guy,

I called him Mr Tootoo. He had been in 39 of these walks and had been doing it for 12 years.

He does several each year and has a group that goes with him. I think it was the Sisterhood of the

TaTas or something like that. That is a hard thing to do because you have to take the time to

travel and you have to get $1800 minimum donations for each walk. He said that he was a good

talker and had no problem raising the money.

I had a hard time raising my money and the day before the event I was still $400 dollars short.

I was on the Avon message board and they said to go early to event registration the day before

the walk and carry a sign that says you need donations. If you had collected your money early you could

register online. If you didn't you had to come the day before the walk at the Rosement hotel

and register there. The registration opened at 2pm. I left work at 1 and got there when it

opened. I brought a sheet of paper and a marker and wrote I need Donations - I am short $400.

There were several people in the front of the area with similar signs. I waited about a half hour

and got my money. There were people who had extra checks that were over the $1800 they

needed and were handing them out. One women handed out a little under a thousand in

extra checks. I got one for $150 from her with a Doctors name on it. I guess she knew a lot

of doctors and got them to kick in the bucks. I got my money and headed down the hall to register

but told the others standing there that I would come back if I had any extra money. I kept holding

my sign while I was heading towards the back of the hall to register and one women gave me

check for $100 and while I was standing in line one guy gave me a 20 dollar bill. I registered

and went back to front with $170 that I handed out. I was done with the whole thing in a little over

an hour.

That was a little bit about the different things going on but now let me get back to my walk.

I started at 7am towards the back middle of the crowd. We were packed and everyone

was just keeping with the pace of everyone else. After a couple of miles it loosened up and

people started slowing down and others were passing. I started getting passed and started

to speed up to stay with those that were passing. I thought that I had been going a good pace,

maybe 3 miles an hour, but I increased it but there were still people passing. After a while

I didn't care and fell into my own pace. It had been a couple of hours by then and I was feeling

sore, tired, and crappy. I didn't understand why because I had been training and felt that I should

have been feeling a lot better at this point. I decided not to worry about it and to keep a good

pace and I decided not to take any breaks at the rest stops. I would stop for a couple seconds

to get water and go. When I was training I bought a fanny pack that had 2 half liter bottles attached

to it. The bottles had enough water for me to go 2 or 4 miles to the next stop. I threw a couple

granola bars in my pack and wouldn't stop at the rest stops and started moving up pack of people.

I had lunch around 10 am which consisted of a turkey sandwich, apple, cookie and water. I ate half the

sandwich in a couple minutes and took off. I finished the rest and the apple in the next couple of

hours. I was thinking that I would go 3 or 4 hours and then stop at Burger King or Taco Bell and

pick up something later. I was walking and counting off the miles and thinking to myself, I am in

so much pain, my feet are burning, my calves and back are in pain, and now even

my left shoulder feels like it is swelling up, this sucks, I am never going to do this again. All I want

to do is get through this. I got up to the 13 mile marker and I figured I was half way there and

now it will be down hill from here. It had been about 5 hours since I started and up to this point

I had been walking on my own. I had talked to several people but only for a couple minutes.

Someone came behind me and asked me how I was feeling. I said, does it look like I am doing bad?

She said no, I looked like I was walking ok. I sure didn't feel like it. We started talking and I found out

she was a jogger and had run in several half marathons but had never gone over 13 miles. She had

a pretty good pace but I was able to keep up with her. I ended up finishing the walk with her. She

was determined to get through and walk without stopping. So much for my stopping at Taco Bell.

I figured that it would help to have someone keeping pace so I wouldn't slow down too much. We were

keeping a good pace and walking for over and hour. The weather was cool and overcast, kind of

nice for walking or running. Then it started to rain, the wind started blowing and it started getting cold.

This was miserable. I had a wind breaker and put it on and found out it wasn't really water proof. We

were walking on a sidewalk next to a street and this car throws up a wave of water about 5 feet high

that catches me in the chest. People were still honking and waving but you wanted to tell them to

shut up and leave us alone. The walkers became quiet and trudged along.

We got past the 20 mile mark and then the walkers were starting to feel the distance they had walked.

I had walked 20 miles a couple weeks before and felt ok doing it. A little after 21 miles the pain I was

feeling started compounding. I just kept telling myself, only a couple more hours, I can do this,

I can work through the pain. I told the person I was walking with, Sarah, that I would take

each step at a time but I didn't know how far I could go because I was really starting to feel it.

Sarah said I needed to finish because she needed someone to keep her going. I laughed, it looked

like she had no trouble. But a couple miles later I could see that she had agony in every step.

Every time we went up or down a curb she winced. When we stopped for a light it was painful to

start up again. People all around us were hobbling, stopping, stretching, and stopping at rest stops

to get their feet looked at. We were at a little over 24 miles and the rain had stopped. At least that

was a positive, but I was wet, cold, in pain and wanted to get this over with. My left shoulder was

throbbing and it hurt too much to swing my arm so I held it still on the side. We just plowed through

and we finished at 4:30 in the front 20 percent of the walkers.

When I got there I went to the bathroom, got out and felt like everything came apart. I couldn't move.

I was holding on to things and found a chair and sat there for a while trying to get some energy back.

I was planning on staying there but everything hurt so much that I called home and asked to get picked up.

They had 2 person tents but I figured there is no way I could get any sleep laying in a sleeping bag

on the ground. I went home, had something to eat, several Advil’s and went to sleep. I didn't know if

I would be able to walk the next day. It felt like I had pushed myself to hard. I woke up once, took

more Advil, and went back to sleep. In the morning I was really sore but felt that I could try to finish.

I got dropped off and I was a little late. The walkers were at least a half hour ahead of me. I got into

a good pace and after an hour was surprised to find that I felt better than the previous day. I started

catching up to walkers in the back and felt good as I was moving into the middle of the pack. I started

talking to people as I was passing them and it made for an enjoyable time. When people were passing

me the day before they wouldn't talk to me. I decided to say something to almost everyone I passed.

It made time go by quicker. I was in pain but felt a lot better than yesterday and knew that 13 miles

would be a lot easier than 26. The day had started cold and raining but a couple hours later the

rain stopped and it warmed up a little. I finished the walk at 1pm and then went out to celebrate by

having Cajun food at Heaven on Seven with my family.

I am so sore today but I was able to complete both days. I can safely say that is the farthest I have ever walked.

I don't know if I will ever attempt to do anything like this again.