By Margaret Carroll-Bergman — Correspondent
With 50 miles here and 12 miles there, Sheila Boyle of Concord is preparing to run a 100-mile event.
“You can’t run all day, every day,” said Boyle, 58, of her training for the Javelina Jundred, a 100-mile ultra-marathon, on October 26 and 27 in Arizona. “You never get up to that distance in a training run.”
Yet Boyle comes fairly close. She recently ran 50 miles at Great Brook Farm in Carlisle and is scheduled to run 50K in Vermont. These events, combined with shorter 10- and 12-mile races, are what Boyle referred to as “stacking” that’s helped her prepare for the 100-miler.
“I love being out in nature and exploring new places,” she said. “I never regret getting out for a run. I feel like it makes the rest of the day better.”
A family affair
Boyle came relatively late to running. Her older sister, marathoner Eileen Hamilton, 66, introduced Boyle to long-distance running when Boyle was in her forties. The two ran many races together, including Boyle’s first major race, Run to Remember, a half-marathon in Boston.
And then Hamilton got the diagnosis that made her retire from running.
After a year of symptoms, last September, Hamilton was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “ALS is a disease that affects the nerve cells that make muscles work in both the upper and lower parts of the body … and leads to paralysis.”
Hamilton is the inspiration for Boyle’s running the Javelina Jundred, a punishing race in the heat of the Arizona desert. It’s run without sleep, at times in the dark, and often takes the average runner at least 24 hours to complete.
“We all felt helpless when we got the diagnosis,” Boyle said. “Eileen is the heart of our family.”
Hamilton and Boyle grew up in a large family. There are seven D’Arcy siblings. Hamilton and her husband, Joe, live in Northborough. Boyle, her husband, Marc, and a brother, Tom D’Arcy, and his wife, Joan, live in Concord. Most of the other siblings settled elsewhere in New England. Their mother, Eileen D’Arcy, 94, lives nearby in Wayland.
Running for a cause
On average, more than 5,000 people a year are diagnosed with ALS, according to the CDC.
When another member of the extended D’Arcy family, Jean Zimmerman, was also diagnosed with ALS this past summer, Boyle decided to undertake the challenging Javelina Jundred to raise funds and awareness for Compassionate Care ALS (CCALS). After their diagnosis, the Falmouth-based organization offered immediate support to both Hamilton and Zimmerman. CCALS serves people not only in Massachusetts but nationwide.
“Knowing my sister, she’s all about helping other people,” Boyle said of her decision to run the Jundred.
“We wanted to raise money for this organization that is doing so much for her and Jean,” she said. “It’s been a group effort. The beauty of having a big family is that we have lots of friends, and people have been so generous. We’ve been blown away.”
This is not the first 100-miler Boyle has run. Six years ago, she ran the Ghost Train Ultra in New Hampshire.
“It took me just over 24 hours,” she said. “I didn’t expect to do another 100-miler, but having the opportunity to fundraise for Compassionate Care ALS gave me purpose.”
In many ways, running an ultra-marathon is like any huge undertaking in life.
“It does take some mental fortitude to stay in it when you’re not feeling great,” said Boyle. “The interesting thing about ultras is that you can be feeling terrible and then a few miles later feel great. It’s just making it through the lows and persevering.”
For more information about supporting Compassionate Care ALS, visit ccals.org/events/sheila-runs-the-javelina-jundred.
