“Running had always been a component of other fitness elements in my life, but I had never done any distance longer than about 7-8km. My level of fitness for years had gone in cycles depending on how much work and life interfered. Then in 2011 my mother was diagnosed with Lymphoma and passed away after a short battle. At that point I decided that it was critical to prioritise my health and decided to focus on running.
After about a year of casual running, one of my colleagues suggested that my wife Jamie and I join her to run a half marathon race at Uluru in the Australian Outback. The thought of running that distance in such an iconic location was both daunting and exciting at the same time. I signed up and started training with a lot of nervous excitement. Race day came and I loved the experience so much that I wanted to do it again and again. And whilst at the post-race celebration dinner, I met a few masters class runners who were toasting the fact they had just completed their 7th continent. Having traveled to all 7 continents myself I chatted them up and learned not only had they visited all 7 continents but had run a marathon on each one! That accomplishment blew my mind and I was fascinated by the idea.
About a year later I had well and truly become hooked on distance running and had completed a few more half and full marathons. Suddenly our family was rocked by the news that our great niece, Cori, had been diagnosed with a terminal lysosomal disease called Metachromatic Leukodystrophy (MLD). With Cori living in our original home of Texas and us living in Australia, we struggled with what type of help we could provide our family from afar. That dinner conversation at Uluru came back to my mind and I thought, “What if I was to run 7 marathons on 7 continents and raise money for charity to help families affected by MLD?”
My amazing wife Jamie was supportive of the idea and we started to put the plans in motion for what was to be ‘Run Over MLD’.
Over 2015-2017 I set out and ran the Tokyo, Paris, Sydney, New York, Big Five (South Africa), Volcano (Chile), and Antarctic Ice Marathons and we raised thousands of dollars for multiple MLD charities. During the timeframe of the first few Run Over MLD races, I also decided to go extend my challenge and complete the Marathon Grand Slam, which was to finish all 7 continents and add a marathon at the North Pole. That race was the craziest running experience I have completed as we ran on the frozen Arctic Ocean in -40C/F temperatures. We had armed guards watching for polar bears and did 13 loops of a 4km course, that got more difficult as the day went on. I had icicles off of my face mask, eye lashes, and brows. The worst mistake I made was not using mitten style gloves and used my fingered snowboard gloves. After the race I lost feeling in the tips of my fingers for a few weeks and was worried it was going to be worse. Thankfully everything came right. We celebrated our completion of the North Pole Marathon by taking a polar plunge into a small ice pool that the Russian team at Camp Barneo had cut into the ice.
After completing such an epic challenge, I had a bit of a deflated feeling of “what’s next?” I then set out to complete the World Marathon Majors (Tokyo, London, Boston, Berlin, Chicago and New York) but at a much less frenetic pace. I completed 5 of the races by 2019 and in January 2020 I qualified for Boston just in time for the world to change with the pandemic. I’ll get there when the time is right to finish my sixth star.
The most fulfilling running accomplishment next to Run Over MLD has been starting Queenstown parkrun. My wife and I moved to Queenstown in 2017 for a lifestyle change and discovered there was no parkrun in our new home. We didn’t really know anybody in town and thought if we were to start this event to give back to the running community it would help us meet new friends. After finding some local running clubs and getting more support, we kicked off Queenstown parkrun in June of 2018. The event has been a tremendous success with locals and tourists alike enjoying a 5km jaunt in the beautiful Queenstown Gardens with stunning views of the surrounding peaks and Lake Wakatipu. Not only have we made many new friends from the running community in Queenstown, but also many parkrun tourists from around the world.”
Chris @runovermld
(Queenstown)
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