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| Travis "The Yeti" Worley and John "Batman" Munger Travis Worley has been an active member of the Will to Succeed Foundation Board for 4 years. He is very passionate about the Foundation's cause and feels that protecting battered and abused woman and children within our city is a calling everyone should take seriously. Travis was runner up for the 2005 Leukemia and Lymphoma Society's Man of the Year, and served as a committee member in their 2006 campaign. Hhe was awarded the 2006 Kindest Kansas Citians medal by the Stop Violence Committee organization, an honor in which he was chosen out of over 5,000 essays, written by area school children. He is a devoted family man spending most of his time with his wife Nichole and his 5 year old daughter Samantha. John Munger is an Alaskan native who lives in Kansas City. He has an 8 year old son, Kyle. John is a nationally ranked racquetball player and also enjoys sand volleyball. John attended the University of Kansas. These two are paddling to raise money for Operation Breakthrough. *Team Operation Breakthrough's Adventures in Canoeing *  John Munger and Travis Worley present the canoe and trophy to Sister Berta I just wanted to write a few words about the Adventure we were honored to be a part of over a four day period in Aug. 2006. We started much like the other teams with high hopes of glory and finishing in first place to bring back a cup for the Kids of Operation Breakthrough and a ton of cool stories to share. John and I had been working out for about a month on trying to get in shape for the race, but little did we know the difficulties that faced us on the Missouri River. Still, looking back on the race, I am thinking about doing it again next year and I know John is doing the same. I just had the best time reading the Journal of Christina and Edie and how they strategized against us and planned on passing us and did so on different occasions. Fact is, we owe a lot to them for pushing us everyday and without their continued determination, I don't know if we would have finished in time. Everyday I would tell John that they have got to be tired, because I can't move. But they just kept on coming after us and would not give up, it was incredible to compete against them. In a race like this all Macho stuff aside, it doesn't matter if you are male or female, anyone can beat anyone out there. Luckily we had packed an MP3 player and speakers onto our canoe that kept us entertained, the DVD player even came in handy when we were moving through the night, trying not to run into any wing dikes in the fog. I believe that the loud music coming from our canoe definitely might be the reason we did not see much wildlife, but who can substitute songs from Footloose, Top Gun and Rocky when you are tired. This brings me to Ben Morgan, our faithful companion, who like us had more time in a boat after the first hour into the race than he had his entire life was working on finishing his goal. Without his Wife and little girls cheering us on, we would have had a hard time pushing ourselves, and we looked forward to every stop so we could hear about their stories and night's adventures. Ben did a great job and has earned the respect of all competitors of this race, and the respect of John and I both. Finally, we owe Dawn Keller for not allowing us to fail. She was our companion over the last two days of the race and helped us by talking to us during the day, and yelling at us during the night. She was a coach and good friend, especially for someone who could have left our little group at anytime to chase the record time. My favorite memory of her was on our last morning after passing our stopping point in the fog, and looking for a sand bar for a couple of hours, Ben was able to find us possibly the largest sandbar I have ever seen right next to the Boone Crossing bridge. We quickly learned that Dawn needed 90 minutes of sleep or else, so we all laid down and crashed. When the alarms went off 90 minutes later we quickly arose knowing we were close to the finish and that the girls were hot on our heels. But we had one problem, Dawn was still asleep. So Ben and I just looked at her covered in her emergency blanket and pondered over who should wake her. Now if you have ever seen Dawn in her river outfit you will notice that she has a very large knife that is connected to the outside of her vest, and she has no problem telling you she knows what to do with it. Anyway Ben and I began our conversation about who should wake her up and I told him I was not going to do it, and he responded the same way. So since we were both afraid to touch her we decided to back up a few feet and yell until she woke. Yep, just like we thought she jumped when she woke up and both of us jumped along with her, it was like waking a sleeping Grizzly, we did not know what to expect. Happily, she woke up in a great mood and we had probably the best 12 miles of the trip just laughing about our adventures and good times we had experienced over the past few days. Like the girls I would agree that this was the most difficult physical, emotional, and mental challenge I have ever faced in my life. But it was worth every minute when we hit the finish line. |
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