SMITHVILLE | High school cross-country team makes homecoming kickoff a fundraiser for girl with leukemia

Students run 50-mile relay for toddler

By LINDA MAN

The Kansas City Star

PHOTO SUBMITTED BY JENNIFER CLARK Smithville High School cross-country runner George Clark ran in a relay to raise money for his sister, Lillian, 2, who was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia this summer.

Thirty cross-country runners last week battled head winds and monster hills to join in a relay that stretched from St. Joseph to Smithville — a distance of 50 miles.

It was the kickoff to Smithville High School’s homecoming, and it was also the start of a fundraiser for a little girl who was diagnosed with cancer this summer.

Lillian Clark is 2 years old, and the sister of George Clark, a cross-county runner at the high school.

“She was coming down with random sicknesses,” said George, 15, a sophomore. “She had a lot of doctor visits, and one night my stepmom took her to the hospital. She had a fever and was feeling really bad.”

The diagnosis was ALL — acute lymphocytic leukemia, also known as acute lymphoblastic leukemia. It’s a cancer in which the bone marrow makes too many underdeveloped lymphocytes, a type of white blood cell.

ALL is the most common type of cancer in children, according to the National Cancer Institute.

George said his sister is now cancer-free but expects that she will undergo a few more years of chemotherapy. Her disease, George said, is usually curable.

Meanwhile, the family must be especially careful that she doesn’t get colds or small injuries, George said.

George’s fellow cross-county runners took up the cause and named the kickoff relay event Running for ALL.

The 50-mile run, which is the equivalent of 880 football fields, started at the homecoming opponent’s footfall field in St. Joseph. It ended at the Smithville High School football stadium and lasted roughly five hours.

Dan Weinert, president of the Smithville Warrior Cross County Booster Club, helped organize the relay and arranged for a pro bono photographer to take pictures of the runners as they plowed through Clay County. Weinert hopes to raise money by having each runner contact 20 family members, friends or neighbors and ask them either to buy some photos or donate money. Prices start at about $4 per photo, but will increase after Monday.

Weinert said he hopes to raise $2,500.

The relay day was wonderful — mild weather in the 70s, Weinert said. The downside to the run was the hills and the winds, which Weinert guessed to be from 15 to 25 mph.

“It was just a ferocious headwind,” said Weinert after accompanying the kids on his bike for 44 of the 50 miles.

Weinert said the runners took turns to run in half-mile increments while one of them held a football. As the students ran, a van full of the other runners sped ahead to position the next students in place.

George Clark said the run was pretty easy.

“The hills didn’t really help,” he said. “But sometimes you got lucky so your half-mile wasn’t a hill at all.”

Through the ordeal, George Clark said he’s learned a few things.

“I realize how important prayer is, and I know she can make it,” he said. “We want to make her as happy as can be.”