Newton Residents Run for Boston, for Runners Everywhere

In early 2012, Newton residents Alex Silberman and Amanda Kelly-Silberman fell in love -- with running.

On Sunday, the relative newlyweds (yes, they also fell in love with each other and have been married about 10 months now) will take part in the final leg of the One Run for Boston, a cross-country relay fundraiser for OneFund that started in Los Angeles on June 7 and will cross the Boston Marathon finish line this weekend.

Silberman said they first got into charity running as part of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society's Team in Training. During the 2013 Boston Marathon, Silberman said he cheered so hard from the Wellesley roadside for the Team in Training runners, that he gave himself a migraine and had to head home.

From their California Street home, Silberman and his wife watched on television as two bombs shattered the joy of runners and spectators at the finish line.

"We knew so many people that finished right around the time of the bombing," Silberman said. "The fear and anger that they attacked our city and also our 'thing' -- running. We decided right there that we would try to run it in 2014. And we're not fast, but we decided to try and run it in under the time of the bombing."

And then they learned about the One Run for Boston and the efforts of runners from across the country to reach out and help. Silberman said the early days of the fundraiser didn't look promising, with only a handful of people initially signing up to participate in some of the far western legs of the relay.

But when the relay leg departs Sunday from Newton City Hall, tracks up Heartbreak Hill and continues along the route all the way to the Boston Marathon finish line, there will be more than 600 runners taking part.
On the One Run for Boston website, Alex Silberman and Amanda Kelly-Silberman's profile reads "We run for the victims and for the city. Boston is our home, running is our community."

Throughout the relay so far, Silberman said the participants from throughout the country have kept in touch via Facebook and Twitter, encouraging one another and serving as a nationwide network of cheerleaders.

"We've all just promised that if they get miles -- the baton -- to us, we'll bring it home," Silberman said. "To take that baton along with 600 other people and carry it home. To know that it's been touched and dropped and rained on -- to get to carry that to the finish is pretty powerful."

The One Run for Boston effort was dreamed up by three British runners who wanted to do something with the running community to help OneFund and through it, the victims of the Boston Marathon Bombings.

Donations can be made through the One Run for Boston website. See how by clicking here.

For an image gallery of relays legs across the country, check out the One Run for Boston Facebook page.