San Diego Man Runs 500 Miles In Fight Against Cancer
PALM SPRINGS -Five hundredmiles.Seventeen days.One mission, cure cancer.
That’s the goal of long-distance runner Mike Sheehy.
“We have a lot of friends who were lost to blood cancer, breast cancer and various other types of cancers, so we wanted to do something different in 2010 and kick off the new year in the right way, in a positive way. A little extreme, a little crazy running 500 miles, but something to create awareness to get the community rallied on the fight against cancer,” he says.
He’s the founder of “Cures Rock!” a grassroots organization with the goal of raising awareness and money to benefit the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. He started at the Cancer Survivors park in San Diego on New Year’s day and will finish in Phoenix, Arizona. Sheehy and his support group arrived here in Palm Springs. Their fourth stop to take time and visit the Eisenhower Lucy Curci Cancer Center in Rancho Mirage.
“We had the opportunity to visit the Eisenhower hospital to visit the oncology ward there and we have a bunch of gifts and stuff to remind everyone there, they’re not forgotten, they’re not alone in this fight,” Sheehy says.
Nearly 140,000 cases of blood cancers are diagnosed in the U.S. every year, making up about 10% of all cancer deaths. This tour is looking to raise $100,000in donations to help fund cancer research.
“We have to fund research in San Diego, Riverside, all over the place and that’s been down for the last couple of years because of the economy so we’re looking for ways to be creative and get more funding,” says Bill Martin with the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.
Next stop isYucca Valley and 29 Palms. So far they’ve raised about $20,000. A short run Sheehy says, for money that will go a long way.
