Last weekend I drove over into Berkeley Springs, WV for the 2013 Team Inspiration summit.
Working hard at the summit
Team Inspiration is a charity run by my friend Roseann Dougherty to help those affected by cancer to increase their quality of life through fitness and exercise programs. This year I’ll be pioneering the social media side of things (please follow at @TIWarriors as well as organizing a new project, the Warrior Kids program. If you’ve heard of Girls on the Run, it will be like that, except triathlon and both genders and to fight cancer. If that makes sense.
Roseann is one of those people that has a huge heart and knows how to wring everything she can out of every 24 hours. You can read her story here, but the short version is that one of her triathlete friends was diagnosed with aggressive cancer 12 years ago, which inspired Roseann to become an oncology nurse and start Team Inspiration. She’s pretty incredible and I’m lucky to know her.
Roseann and Jess
It was a fantastic weekend getting to know everyone. I made a new friend (who is actually my age! and shares my irrational fear of serial killers) and got closer with some old ones. We spent Saturday planning (okay… and eating…) and then Sunday morning we started the day off right with a trail run! Up a mountain!
Going up….
It was super tough… It’s a week later and my glutes are still harboring a fairly intense grudge against me. But there were gorgeous views so the climb was totally worth it.
View from the mountaintop. Yes, we ran up here.
Becca, Roseann, and Erin with the TI-themed trail markers
You can bet the whole time we were out running we were thinking about the breakfast waiting for us back at home. And we were rewarded. I think I could smell the soy chorizo from the bottom of the hill our place was on! TI volunteer and Mid-Maryland tent captain extraordinaire Dawn was good enough to make us fritatta, pancakes (with chocolate chips, obviously), soy chorizo for me and bacon for non-veggies, and a delicious fruit salad. Does life get better than this?
The delicious meal prepared for us! I ate the pancake already. Thanks Dawn!
Really looking forward to volunteering this year. I’ve already met so many great people and I can only imagine that will continue throughout the year! I’ll keep you guys updated on my adventures into childrens triathlon and fighting cancer :)
Hey! I was on Pinterest and someone pinned a picture from your blog of you with Roseann and I recognized her. I will be joining TI for two triathlons this year and joined the team through Erin Laird (she’s my fiancés sister). My name is MaryAnn btw and I know this is random but thought I’d introduce myself. I look forward to meeting you and really like your blog :-)
Great to meet you Maryann! I’ll be excited to meet you in person for the races this year! Which are you doing?
And Erin is the greatest :) Such great people in TI!
Erin is really awesome! I’m excited to me the team :). I am doing the Columbia Tri and Rocky Gap Iron Girl with TI. I’m also doing the Quarry Man and Celebrating Hereos Tri but just as an individual. I hope to do EagleMan next year! What races will you be doing?