COLUMBUS, Ohio — Renee Moore said she would barely be able to sleep Friday night. She knew she would simply be too excited for the 2022 Komen Columbus Race for the Cure Saturday morning.
“After not being able to do it in person, to be able to get out there and see all the people and the vendors and to do the walk and see all the supporters, it’s great,” she said.
Moore first took part in the event back in 2007, the year after she was first diagnosed with breast cancer. It was detected by a mammogram.
“It was enlightening to see all the survivors who were like five-year survivors, ten-year survivors,” she said of her first race. “I kept saying, I want to be like them, I want to be like them. So it was inspiring to see all the survivors. It just made me want to do everything I can to be one of those survivors. So here it is 16 years later, and I am one of those survivors.”
For all of the years she’s been involved in the Race for the Cure, there has been one person always by her side – her biggest supporter and only son, Marcus Moore.
And he’s hard to miss on race day. He always dresses up in a colorful costume, memorably going as King Tut one year.
“I’m basic, he goes all out,” Moore said. “I never know. It’s always exciting to open up the door and see what he’s going to be, so I look forward to it.”
This will be the first year Marcus Moore, who’s a Columbus firefighter, will have to miss the event, however. But that is not stopping his mom from keeping her streak alive.
“It’s a celebration of life,” she said. “If we can do it, if we can go through all the chemo and all the radiation, then you can do it, too, and there’s always support to help somebody else to get from where they are to where we are.”