A reason to run

For most people, a deep breath of fresh air and a walk outside is often taken for granted. \nNot for Pamela Warren, a cancer survivor who walked outside for the first time in six months Saturday morning in the one-mile family event at the seventh annual Hoosiers Outrun Cancer run.\nWarren was diagnosed in the fourth stage of large-cell lymphoma cancer. During her six-month battle, she walked three miles a week on the Bloomington YMCA's indoor track. Three weeks ago, Warren completed her chemotherapy, and she found out recently she is cancer-free. Her husband, daughter and friends walked with her to celebrate on the sunny morning.\nMore than 4,000 people and pets participated in the one-mile children's race, one-mile family walk and 5K run/walk. Some finished the race with their children in strollers or toted them through the course in red wagons. Friends and lovers held hands, hugged, laughed and cried at the finish on the turf of Memorial Stadium.\nJohn Haury, chair of the Hoosiers Outrun Cancer steering committee, said Saturday marked the largest participation in the history of the race.\n"We've raised at least $150,000 this year -- that is our best ever," Haury said. "We had more runners than expected, and so many people have shown up. We couldn't accommodate them, but they walked anyways. It was a great problem to have ... It's perfect, it gets better every year."\nAll proceeds from the race go to the Bloomington Hospital Foundation's Olcott Center for Cancer Education, a facility Bloomington residents Lloyd and Joan Olcott funded eight years ago to support cancer education, cancer patients and their families. The center was especially close to the Olcotts, since Joan Olcott had cancer twice.\n"We wanted to provide lots of education and special help for patients and their families," said Joan Olcott, whose husband died in 2001. Saturday Joan Olcott walked with her family and was ecstatic with the race's turnout.\n"I'm thrilled to pieces," she said.\nLike Joan Olcott, several people who participated in the races had been personally touched by cancer.\nJenn Walton, an IU student from Carmel, Ind., ran in the 5K race with her boyfriend, Zack D. Richards, a senior majoring in criminal justice and psychology.\nIn August 2005, Richards' father Mark was diagnosed with bone, brain and small-cell lung cancer. A month later, he passed away. Richards said they ran the race in memory of him because it was around the one-year anniversary of his death.\n"I wanted to do good for him," Richards said.\nThe winner of the 5K race, Gerry Groothuis of Mooresville, Ind., said there were multiple reasons why he ran, but one was most important\n"No. 1, by far is that my dad is a cancer survivor," Groothuis said. "He had lymphoma and was diagnosed almost eight years ago. He is in remission and doing really well -- he's really healthy, so that is my inspiration."\nWomen's basketball coach Felisha Legette-Jack presented the race's awards.\n"Today is extra special because my father had throat cancer," said Legette-Jack, a Bloomington resident who lives on Olcott Boulevard, a street named after Lloyd Olcott. "I love the fact that we are doing something as a community."\nThe biggest group participating in the event from IU was a 161-member team from the Kelley School of Business. Members of the group wore T-shirts in celebration of accounting professor Walt Blacconiere, who has pancreatic cancer. His wife, children and several Girl Scouts from his daughter's troop also joined the team.\n"I am touched," Blacconiere said. "This is awesome."\nIn early September, Blacconiere informed his students he would not continue teaching in the fall semester because of the severity of his type of cancer. Second-year MBA student Rebecca Kvam subsequently put the team together.\n"Because Walt was such a caring professor, with a great passion for life, the MBA students wanted to do something to let Walt know how much we support him," Kvam said.\nLast year, Blacconiere ran the 5K with a time of 23:40. This year, he didn't run but stood by the finish line with the team.\nLike he told his students when he said he would be back to teach in the spring, he said at the awards ceremony: "I'll be back next year running"