Sunday, May 16, 2010

Want To Join Team Bella?

I spent the weekend down at Apollo Bay with the rest of my family.

My sister-in-law, Clare, passed away after a 7 year fight with cancer in November last year. She was 36. While she was still with us, a family friend, Peter Lister, decided he would run the Great Ocean Road Marathon and try to raise a few thousand dollars for cancer research. From this seed grew Team Bella - a consortium of family and friends who decided to support Peter's vision - some by running in various events, some by simply coming along and supporting, most by donating money.

It was quite emotional at times - watching my brother run through the finish line with his 'Clare' tattoo on his shoulder.  I'd never seen it before. I was extremely proud of my young nephew, who ran the 14k event in an excellent time. Clare's immediate family all ran, as well as most of mine. I was thrilled that so many other people were there to support this excellent cause and to show their love for Clare.

Even the commentators joined in, giving Team Bella a plug every time one of our runners finished. I was told we had 60 runners in the different events.

Apparently Brain Cancer research is the lowest funded cancer research in Australia. Well, thanks to the tiny seed Peter planted all those months ago, They are about to be $28,726 better off.

It's not enough, but it's a start.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

It was a great weekend Steve. A very worthy cause.

Steve Cameron said...

We all had a great time and it really is an extremely worthy cause.

Thanks for the support, Penny.

Steve

Unknown said...

Hi Steve, just saw this post after another great weekend at Apollo Bay with another $14k raised which was amazing. I only managed the 6km this year due to a newborn taking up all my spare time! We've already booked again for next year, so here's hoping we can raise some more much needed funds to such a worthy cause.