Medalling the champion

Because my mom did the actual hard thing (beating cancer), she got the medal from the marathon. Here she is receiving her bling at the impromptu medalling podium of a Starbucks table in the St. Paul's neighborhood of London, England.

My mother is a barrister, so while we were in that part of London, we hung out at some of the places familiar to her from her bewigged advocacy days. Here she is outside the Old Bailey (Central Criminal Court) and on the steps of St. Paul's Cathedral.

When medalling my momma, I mentioned that I'm a nutjob who has already signed up to do the LA Marathon again in 2025. Would she like to pick the charity again, and this time maybe I kindly won't screw up the donations portal?

She was game, and so am I. Read on for the full lowdown.

Los Angeles Marathon 2025

On March 16th, 2025, I'll be taking to the diabolically potholed roads of the City of Angels once again, for the LA Marathon 2025.

I do have specific running goals I want to hit. But on the advice of various bored-shitless friends – "Can we talk about the smell of diapers in the morning? Napalm? Anything but running, Zo. Anything." – I'm going to exercise great restraint and keep all running nerdery to myself. (If you're actually interested, click here to see my running goals in discreet tiny print.)

As the fundraising cause for this year's marathon, my mother has chosen Motor Neurone Disease (MND), also known as ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis), or Lou Gehrig's disease in the United States. This disease sprung into the public consciousness in a big way in recent years thanks to the Ice Bucket Challenge.

Despite all the tremendous work done by scientists, advocates, patients and their families, ALS remains incurable and imperfectly understood. (Tragically, both of the founders of the Ice Bucket Challenge, Pat Quinn and Pete Frates, have since died of the disease.) So there is as much need as ever for funds and awareness around this disease.

In that spirit, I'll be raising money for The ALS Association.

The ALS Association

In the charity's own words:

"Established in 1985, The ALS Association (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Assn) is the only national nonprofit organization fighting ALS on every front. By leading the way in global research, providing assistance for people with ALS, coordinating multidisciplinary care through certified clinical care centers, and fostering government partnerships, The Association builds hope and enhances quality of life while aggressively searching for new treatments and a cure."

Read The ALS Association's full mission statement here.

This year, my fundraising page is hosted directly on the charity's own website, minimizing overhead and administration fees.

Fundraising goals

In the LA Marathon 2025, I'd like to raise $2620 for the ALS Association.

I've launched my fundraising campaign super-early this year, so that I can badger more people over a longer period of time and thereby hit that goal. If you're disoriented by my early start: yes, the Los Angeles Marathon is on March 16, 2025. And, yes, that does mean I'm going to be yapping about this for another [x] months. Strap in, baby... to the sedative chair, as necessary. It's going to be one long moody season of me talking about my toenails falling off. (That happens.)

I'll be training for the marathon in some far-flung places until then, including London (my life may have started not far from there, but it's "far-flung" to me now!), Berlin, the Cotswolds, and Sydney. The rest of the time, Los Angeles itself will be preparing me for the challenge of its own topography.

So no matter where you are in the world, you very well might become an innocent bystander to my:

• Stairway Drills! #omfg
• Driveway Drills! #dbl_omfg
• Warm Up Planks on the sidewalk! #wtf
• Warm-Down On-The-Spot Jogging! #wnkr

You might even see me do some actual running.

Should you show the faintest interest in what I'm doing, I'm almost certainly going to passively-aggressively "mention" I'm raising funds for The ALS Association. If you're here because I did that, thank you so much for checking out this page.

And thank you so much in advance for your support and generosity in your donations toward combating this harrowing disease. ALS has already taken some truly wonderful people out of this world, way before their time. It will take more, no doubt, before this fight is done. Until a cure is found, your donations will make the difference between unbearable suffering and dignified care for patients and their families.

Now if that's not worth losing all my toenails for, I don't know what is.

Sincerely,

Zoe Marie Bel (and her mom, Maggie Bullingham)