Inspiration in Morocco

From Marv, our CEO and Founder --

We all speak often of building capacity and clarity of purpose within our organizations. These are essential characteristics to achieving results for our customers.

On Sunday, April 4, in Morocco our dear friend and colleague, Gary Guller, began running the Marathon De Sables, a 6-day, 150 mile race across the Sahara Desert. Gary was the first one-armed person to summit Everest in 2003 and led the most diverse group of disabled trekkers to Everest Base Camp in history. Gary lost his arm as a result of a 1,500 ft fall in a climbing accident some 20 years ago where one of his two climbing partners died. As some of you know, I climbed and trekked with Gary for five weeks in Nepal in 2000.

Gary has been working on his conditioning for months, completely focused on his desired results:
1) finish the race
2) finish in the top half of the 1,000 competitors from around the world.

As you can imagine, Gary faces some unusual challenges in running while carrying his water and nourishment for the entire day. The distances for each day range from 13 to 51 miles per day, depending on the stage and terrain. Gary does as much as anyone to raise awareness of key issues. For this race, he is supporting the Christopher Reeve Foundation; you can find out more about the Foundation by clicking here.

Weidner has been a sponsor of several of Gary’s expeditions and we’re certainly among his biggest fans. Gary finished the first stage on Sunday, April 4. If you would like to follow Gary or send him a message, you can do so by clicking here. Gary is racer number 661.

A little more direct but more complicated is the website for tracking specific racers, which you can access by clicking here. You’ll be asked to download the Silverlight plug-in; once you do, you’ll be able to use the site. At the top of the page you’ll see "Live", "Stages", and "Runners". Click on "Runners". This site is a bit slow but effective. On the left hand side you'll see a list of competitors. Scroll down to #661 Gary Guller and click. His profile will come up on the right and you'll be able to see where he is on the course at different stations during each Stage. You will see our logo here as one of Gary’s sponsors.

We hope you can take a few minutes and follow Gary, and possibly contribute to the Christopher Reeve Foundation. We have long supported Gary in his quest to use his expeditions to make a difference in the world. Gary makes his living as an inspirational speaker, working with organizations to inspire them to improve performance, leadership and team work. You can access his web site by clicking here, and his very active blog by clicking here, where you can also follow him through the Marathon.