Departments
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Week of 10 September 1999 |
Vol. III, No. 5 |
Feature Article
BU bladers to benefit Leukemia Society
By Eric McHenry
To raise money for deserving organizations, some people pound the pavement. Two members of the BU community prefer to glide over it.
On October 10, Robin Travers and Susan Mix will cover 86 miles in Georgia's annual Athens-to-Atlanta in-line skating marathon. The strides they make will benefit the Leukemia Society of America, which is facilitating their participation.
Travers, an assistant professor of dermatology at the BU School of Medicine, says she has a tremendous personal investment in helping support the society's work. About four years ago, her mother developed acute myelogenous leukemia.
"She's doing very well now," says Travers, "and she got great support from the society through its patient aid program during her treatment and recovery."
Under the auspices of the society's Team in Training
(TNT) program, Travers, Mix, and 13 other Boston-area
in-liners have skated thousands of miles in preparation for
the high-endurance event. The program includes training
schedules, supervised coaching, airfare and hotel
accommodations, and other forms of support and encouragement
for the skaters, who reciprocate by raising a designated
number of sponsorship dollars, and of course, by skating
from Athens to Atlanta.
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Susan Mix (left) and Robin
Travers will skate to benefit the Leukemia Society
of America in the 86-mile Athens-to-Atlanta in-line
marathon October 10. Photo by Kalman Zabarsky
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Mix says that attending an informational meeting convinced her to join the team. "I went to the meeting back in April, more or less convinced that I'd never do anything like this," says Mix, an analyst/consultant in the Office of Information Technology. "And there were so many people there. A lot of them were planning to do triathlons and marathons, but there were a lot of people interested in skating. And I started to get really excited. I realized that this would be a great way to put a big, meaningful goal at the end of my summer."
Mix has been an in-line skater for about 10 years, but has never formally participated in an endurance event before -- although she did run the 1993 Boston Marathon as an unregistered "bandit." Travers began blading only about four and a half years ago, but this will be her second Athens-to-Atlanta. Together with identical twin sister Karen, Travers skated the 86 miles last October without sponsors or TNT support. One of their objectives, she says, was to demonstrate that Athens-to-Atlanta was a viable event for TNT to back.
"The Massachusetts chapter of the Leukemia Society was supporting marathons and cycling," Travers says, "but they were kind of waiting to see how much money other chapters could raise by supporting Athens-to-Atlanta skaters. So my sister and I basically trained ourselves last year. We entered. We finished. Then we went back to the Leukemia Society and said, 'Okay, now we've done it, and we can help you set up a Team in Training program for next year. We know the route. We know what kind of coaching you're going to need.' And the Massachusetts chapter also had excellent reports from the other chapters, whose Athens-to-Atlanta fundraising was very successful."
Through Team in Training, the Leukemia Society's 1999 Massachusetts contingent has had the benefit of a coach, training schedules, free training logs and Power Bar nutrition products, and various other resources. Rigorous preparation, Mix says, is needed for an event that many feel requires greater physical and psychological endurance than a traditional marathon.
"Some people actually race it," she says, "and they finish in four and a half hours. I don't have a time goal. They throw a big party for everyone after the marathon, and my goal is to finish with my team and make it to that party.
"Next year I may actually train to race it," she says. "I'm really encouraged by how the training has gone."
Every TNT participant walks, runs, or rolls on behalf of an honored patient -- an individual who has been stricken with leukemia, lymphoma, Hodgkin's disease, or myeloma. Mix will blade for Nora Switzer, a young girl from Ware, Mass., currently recovering from leukemia. The Travers twins, needless to say, will represent their mother, Janice.
"It's very meaningful to us. Her name will be on both our jerseys," Travers says. "She gets a double dose."
Those interested in sponsoring Susan Mix or Robin Travers in the skating marathon should make checks payable to the Leukemia Society of America and send them to Susan Mix, Office of Information Technology, Boston University, 111 Cummington St., Boston, MA 02215, or to Robin Travers, Department of Dermatology, Boston University Medical Center, 715 Albany St., J602, Boston, MA 02118. For more information about sponsorship, call 617-353-8264. For more information about Team in Training, visit www.lsa-teamintraining.org.