Running for a cause
Early Sunday morning, a few costumed stragglers from the Halloween festivities in the city finally returned home. On the subways and ferries sitting next to them, thousands of runners, donned in their own special uniforms for the New York City Marathon, were en route to Staten Island.
“What’s really funny is watching all these people that are in Halloween costumes that live in Staten Island taking the ferry back with us,” David King, a first-time marathoner said. “Boy, they must feel like fish out of water.”
Thousands of veteran and first-time marathon runners rode the ferry from the Staten Island Station in Manhattan to Staten Island, where shuttle buses took them to the start at Verrazano Bridge.
As the start of the race inched closer, King, a first time marathon runner, tried to relax on the top deck of the ferry.
“For any training run or race, you just wake up and go,” he said. “I’m not used to waiting.”
King had to wake up at 4 a.m. to commute from Astoria to the start line at Fort Wadsworth, Staten Island. Underneath the red plaid pajama pants and blue turtleneck, he wore a red shirt that labeled him as an American Cancer Society charity runner.
King raised over $3500 in support of the American Cancer Society and is running for his sister, who has ovarian cancer. The money he raised, along with the funds collected by 230 other charity runners, totaled over $800,000.
King is new at distance running, but he is already hooked. He ran the Brooklyn and New York City half-marathons in May and August earlier this year, raising $800 collectively for ACS.
The 27-year-old first became a charity runner by chance, when a customer at a bar where he works told him he could run the Brooklyn half-marathon and raise $200 for the ACS. A month later, in March of this year, running for ACS became more personal when King learned that his older sister, Susan, 29, had a cancerous “pineapple-sized cyst” on her ovary.
“It was serendipitous that I was already running for the ACS,” King said. “Once everything happened to my sister, I just thought, ‘Oh, got to keep going.’ She’s my sister. I’d do anything for her.”
Even though this is his first marathon, King is not nervous. He went through his pre-race rituals, which included sleeping in his race clothes and eating a bowl of banana nut crunch cereal.
“I am really surprised at how calm I am,” he said. “I’ve got goals set, and I’ve got a (finishing time) in mind. But at the same time, it’s my first marathon and it’s New York City. I’m just planning to enjoy it.”
