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Raising Funds for Alzheimers

Amanda Nelson and her friend Mickey Scott ran 87.5 kilometres this weekend, raising over $1,500 for the Alzheimer Society of Oxford County. Amanda did the run for her grandfather.

WOODSTOCK - A woman from Woodstock ran a remarkable 87 kilometres this weekend to raise funds for the Alzheimer Society of Oxford County.

Amanda Nelson did the run for her grandpa Jim Haas Sr, Jacobus Joannes Haas is his Dutch name. He was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease about 5 years ago and it has been hard for the family to watch him struggle, as his memory fades. 

Nelson says she did her run on Saturday to honour her grandpa and acknowledge his struggle with Alzheimer's by running 87km, one kilometre for each year of his life to date. 

"I had a vision earlier this year, it was really strong to me, I just thought I had to do that for him, because he is going downhill really fast, then all of the races started getting cancelled and I had more time to train and it was getting obvious to me that I should do that." 

She ran 87.5 kilometres and raised $1,550.Nelson explains why she decided to run that last half kilometre.

"Well I was about a half kilometre away from home and I figured, I may as well run it in."

She says she wouldn't have been able to do this without the help of her husband Dan and her friends Mickey and Cricket Scott.

"I have a friend who can run ultra distances, so I asked if he would be able to do it with me, so Mickey did the whole distance with me and his wife helped us along the way, bringing us food and water to refuel us as we did the distance." 

During the run, Mickey and Amanda ran through Embro, Hickson, Innerkip, Oxford Centre and then back home. Nelson says they raised more money then they thought they would and she wanted to thank everyone who donated. 

You can still donate to the cause through her Facebook page. 

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