Best Buddies Challenge

Every year on Washington, D.C.'s National Mall, the Audi Best Buddies Challenge kicks off early on an October morning. This year, as the sun rose over the Washington Monument, three students from Catholic University set off on a 20-mile bicycle race for a cause that is close to their hearts: friendship.

Later that day another 30 students from the CUA team walked and ran in a 5-kilometer race to raise funds for Best Buddies International, an organization that pairs volunteers in one-to-one friendships with persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

The Catholic University Best Buddies Chapter has sent a team to the challenge each fall since the race's inaugural year in 2010, but this year the team far surpassed its goals. Originally, it hoped for 10 participating members to raise $2,500. By race day on Saturday, Oct. 20, 33 team members had raised $7,813.

The level of fundraising propelled the Catholic University team into first place among the 61 chapters that participated in the challenge from the District of Columbia and the Commonwealth of Virginia. The team was recognized during the celebration following the race and presented with the Youth Cup trophy by Carolina Shriver, daughter of Anthony Kennedy Shriver, founder and president of Best Buddies International.

The team also won a meet-and-greet with Anthony Kennedy Shriver and actress Lauren Potter, who plays the role of Becky on the Fox television series, "Glee." Due to scheduling difficulties, the team was unable to attend the meet-and-greet, but team members said the chance to receive their trophy together on Saturday was sufficient reward.

The team was joined by John Craig, who walked the 5-kilometer race with junior Bernadette Poerio of Port Reading, N.J. This year, Craig is paired as a buddy with senior Olivia Hurwitz of Redding, Conn., captain of the CUA Best Buddies team. This is Hurwitz's fourth year as a member of the CUA Best Buddies chapter.

"I think my favorite part this year was seeing John Craig run across the finish line blowing kisses to everyone," said Hurwitz, who had finished the bike race in time to watch Craig's finish with other members of the CUA team. "He walked [the race], but he ran across the finish line once he saw that people were cheering for him."

Hurwitz was one of the three 20-mile bikers on the team, along with juniors Peter Kelly and Katheryne Wall, this year's college buddy director for the CUA chapter. Signing up for the bike race includes a $950 fundraising commitment.

This was Hurwitz's third year biking in the race, and her best fundraising year. Largely by speaking at her home parish in Connecticut one weekend after Sunday Masses, she was able to raise $1,575, making her the second highest fundraiser on the team next to Kelly, who raised $1,750.

"The challenging thing is standing up in front of people and talking about why this is important. You're essentially confronting a problem in society, but you want to come at it in the right way. It's a weird thing to stand up in front of people and say this is something really important to me and that we need to change," Hurwitz said.

Founded in 1989, Best Buddies International now has nearly 1,500 chapters worldwide, including 425 college chapters, and focuses on building friendships and seeking further inclusion for those with disabilities, particularly in the work force.

The CUA chapter, founded in 1991, is the second oldest in the history of Best Buddies International, after the founding chapter at Georgetown University, the alma mater of Anthony Kennedy Shriver, according to Allison Coles, state director of Best Buddies Virginia.

"This is a chapter that lives the Best Buddies mission and inspires everyone within the organization," Coles said of the CUA chapter.

Wall said Best Buddies has emphasized to her the value of "looking past the small things, the little trivial details that don't matter. Best Buddies has taught me to look beyond that and see the big picture, what's really important. Things like friendship, inclusion, and progress.""[Best Buddies] has changed my worldview. It's changed my view of friendship," Hurwitz said. "It's given me this view that friendship can't be out of pity or out of duty; we can't look at people with intellectual disabilities and think, 'I should be their friend because they need me.' We need each other."