DAVID MAMARIL HOROWITZ

david.horowitz@bgdailynews.com

Bowling Green resident Logan Locke went a long way to honor his late mother’s 51st birthday in February: fifty-one miles, to be precise – on foot.

Nevermind snow and storms the night before: Five times around the 10-mile Briarwood route he went. On June 25, he’ll go more than 150 miles, for a third time, to again honor others: those with multiple-sclerosis.

“If someone else is suffering, a way to connect with them is honoring them with a run,” Locke said.

He’s among the many in Bowling Green’s vibrant running community, whose reasons for running can span benefits from health to camaraderie, therapeutic activity to spiritual wellness, and more.

“It brings people of like kind and like mind together,” sums up Lilly Riherd, director of the local, annual running fundraiser bg26.2 & Half Marathon.

Riherd’s among many locals who, like Locke, go to lengths to raise funds for multiple sclerosis. She helped found the fundraiser 14 years ago, after her sister, Susan Riherd, died from an MS complication.

These days, the fundraiser committee comprises about 25 volunteers, and some 300 volunteers on the November race day, to ensure events go smoothly and fundraise for MS.

“Everything we do, it’s in memory of Susan,” she said.

Running itself keeps Lilly Riherd on an even keel – a therapy and activity among friends, she said. But it’s also, similar to Locke, helped process grief and honor her loved one as well.

“We had that bond,” Riherd said.

MS Run the U.S.

Locke’s upcoming dayslong run for MS – from Williamsburg, Iowa, to Platteville, Wisconsin – is part of a 21-person run to cumulatively cover 3,260 miles from California to New York for the MS Run the U.S. relay.

The team members each commit to fundraising thousands of dollars for awareness, research and direct support to patients with MS – an unpredictable, chronic autoimmune disease with a wide range of symptoms. It damages the brain, spinal cord and optic nerves, which together control everything a person does, according to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

Locke’s also not the only teammate from here: Wesley Waddle, another local, completed his 157-mile segment – from Milford to Spanish Fork in Utah – last month.

He would try to start at around 7 or 7:30 a.m. A two-person road crew checked in every several miles.

He effectively ran a marathon for each of six consecutive days. With the recommended training plan, Waddle’s run went well – the experience, surreal, he said.

For Waddle, running was initially for health, but 15 years in and 40 pounds down, he’s long since fallen in love with the mental benefits and therapeutic mind-body connection. He joined a running group for camaraderie and support, as well.

The MS run was different, he said.

“It’s something really rewarding to know you’re running for a cause,” he said.

Locke, a Christian, described his previous runs as a spiritual journey, where he’ll feel a higher power presence in difficult places.

“I think it allows me to connect with God and be appreciative of the things I have in my life here, my earth life,” he said. “It’s provided me a lot of comfort and clarity to push through physical and mental challenging times.

“The fact that I have an able body and (may) run hundreds of miles at a time, that’s not hard compared to somebody living with a disability such as multiple sclerosis. It just changes your perspective.”

People can donate to the cause at msruntheus.org.