Lon Lomas was a runner that was entered in to a 100 mile race this year.
 |
| Lon Lomas |
Tim Lambert is a runner who is running his first 100 mile race this year.
Notice the different tense used in both of these statements. Unfortunately Lon was killed on the 7th July near his home whilst out cycling in a hit and run incident. He now won't be able to complete his dream of running 100 miles.
Lon and Tim knew each other through social media, as is true of a lot of our friendships in the small, although ever increasing, ultra community. I too met Tim via the world of social media but have also had the pleasure of meeting him on a number of occasions including running with him.
Tim is planning to run the North Downs Way 100 this weekend in honour of Lon. If that wasn't enough (100 miles is a long old way), he is also going to run the 100 mile race later this year that Lon had planned on entering. This event is in Texas in December, which is where we need your help.
If you were suddenly not around anymore, for whatever reason, who would look out for your family? We all have family & friends and you like to think your love ones would be looked after and I'm sure they would be. In this case, a guy from the other side of the world (almost) is helping out too...I don't think you can ever have too much help at a time like this. Tim is going to Texas and after he completes the race will present the finishers buckle to Lon's wife and kids.
Tim has managed to get free entry in to the event thanks to the organisers. He has managed to get free transportation & accommodation as well. What he needed help with was the £750 airfare to get to Texas and so he setup a Crowd Funding page to help raise awareness and to help fund this great cause.
Within 24 hours of Tim's blog post going live, I'm happy to say that the initial target has been met and currently stands at £990 at the time of writing my post (I've been busy, honest). There has been some great coverage from The Guardian newspaper and Run247 which has really helped raise awareness. Meeting the inital target is great but now there is a stretch goal that we're aiming for. So that doesn't mean you can put your wallet away, every penny raised over the total will go directly to Lon's wife and children to try in some small way ease their burden.
So I urge you to go to the crowd funding page and donate/pledge what you can afford. This isn't a small or large charity fund raising event with lots of people supporting the cause; this is a very personal thing that Tim is doing for somebody in our community and it makes me proud to say I'm a friend of his.
