New York Marathon Campaign for                                                 Parkinson’s Disease.

By Mark Humphrey

After 3 failed attempts to compete in the famous New York Marathon local Ocean Grove resident Alan Barber finally received the news he so longed for, acceptance into the New York Marathon.

With the marathon being a long held dream and a bucket list item for Barber, the entry acceptance meant that he could devote the famous event to raising awareness for Parkinson’s disease.

Having two close friends who have been diagnosed with the disease, Barber set out in early May of this year to launch a campaign to raise awareness and funds globally for Parkinson’s disease based on the back of his New York Marathon attempt. “I have picked Parkinson's Victoria in Australia and Light of Day Foundation in New Jersey USA in particular and hope that we can generate some momentum between the Ocean Grove I live in and the one that founded our town” said Barber. 

His journey will take him to New York in November of this year to compete in the famous marathon that runs through 5 New York districts. The 16 week training program for the event has consisted of weekly averages around the 60km mark with distances slowly being increased to average around 80 km per week.

Today’s Surf to City for Parkinson’s run was to put the campaign on the local agenda as part of the Parkinson’s Awareness Week. Speaking on the steps of the Geelong City Town Hall Barber said “3 months ago we set a target of $10,000 to raise collectively for the charities. Due to the generosity of the Geelong public we have re-set the target to $15,000”.  To date the fund has collected just over $12,500 with the revised target a genuine possibility.

City of Greater Geelong Austin Ward Councillor John Irvine received the group of 4 runners on the steps of the Geelong City Town Hall today along with a message of hope from the runners.

Geelong City Councillor John Irvine on the steps of City Hall to greet the runners.

Councillor Irvine noted that he had been aware of Alan’s quest for some time and wholly supported his cause and the awareness he was raising within the Geelong community. “Unfortunately local governments have not been in a position to provide major funding with regards to infrastructure to assist people with Parkinson’s. The goal of Alan’s campaign is to help provide funding for a specialist Parkinson’s nurse for the Geelong/Barwon region which will go a long way towards caring for people suffering from this debilitating illness. I fully support his cause and hope that one day the City Of Greater Geelong will be in a position to assist people with Parkinson’s”.

Joining Barber on the 22km run today from Ocean Grove to Geelong were fellow supporters Philip Christian, Caroline Pascoe and Lisa Dickson. For Christian the campaign is close to his heart as his partner Richard Grimmett has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s. When asked about the significance of the event and awareness of Parkinson’s Christian said “the disease has struck close to home and campaigns like this can only benefit the cause in the long term. What Alan is doing for the awareness of Parkinson’s is fantastic and we all support him in his adventure”.

Alan Barber leads in the group after the 22km run.

For the record, Parkinson’s is the second most common neurological disease in Australia after dementia. The disease affects an estimated 10 million worldwide including 100,000 Australians.

30 Australians are diagnosed with the disease every day with 20% of sufferers under the age of 50.

The number of people diagnosed with Parkinson’s has increased by 17% over the last six years and is now more prevalent than prostate, bowel and many other forms of cancer. US actor Michael J Fox from the “back to the future” film series is one of the 10 million or so sufferers.

Although the Surf to City leg is completed the quest for Alan goes on. Another 8 weeks of training still has to be completed prior to his life-long dream of running the New York Marathon while raising the awareness of Parkinson’s will be an on-going campaign.

Pretty cool support crew in VW Combi's.

People interested in donating towards the charities Alan is supporting can do so by logging onto the following sites.

If you want to donate to the USA based organisation go to http://www.lightofday.org/donate/index/ or for the Australian one go to http://www.everydayhero.com.au/alan_barber