{"id":182572,"date":"2026-03-07T23:16:36","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T23:16:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/182572\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T23:16:36","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T23:16:36","slug":"man-with-cerebral-palsy-participates-in-gate-river-run-with-help-of-friends-family","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/182572\/","title":{"rendered":"Man with cerebral palsy participates in Gate River Run with help of friends, family"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Friends and family pushed a 29-year-old man with cerebral palsy through parts of the course at the 49th <a href=\"https:\/\/www.news4jax.com\/topic\/River_Run\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.news4jax.com\/topic\/River_Run\/\">Gate River Run<\/a> on Saturday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">They said the effort allowed Jake to share the speed, noise and finish-line thrill of the race.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">\u201cFor us, it\u2019s always been about that there\u2019s so little that he can do, but racing while being pushed is the funnest thing,\u201d his father, Ron said. \u201cHe looks forward to these races. He loves when the crowd cheers his name&#8230;\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">Tracy said they\u2019re not just running together, they\u2019re pushing Jake. <\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">\u201cWe\u2019re definitely all motivating each other,\u201d Tracy said. \u201cThis is my first time doing this&#8230;the cheers are awesome.\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">Christopher said the spectators are what keeps them going as they push Jake.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">\u201cWe do it for him, it\u2019s so fun,\u201d Christopher said. \u201cWe appreciate all the spectators and everybody, it keeps us going.\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">\u201cJake\u2019s in front of us pulling us along the whole time. It\u2019s a great experience,\u201d Brian said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">Tracy said it makes it more than a race for them.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">\u201cSomething bigger than ourselves, I see this all around the country. I run major marathons across the United States and I just get so much cheers from them,\u201d Tracy said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">They said they plan to keep looking for the next city event, coming back to the Gate River Run area and signing up for half-marathon push teams in the fall. <\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">Ron urged other families of children with disabilities to seek out opportunities. <\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">\u201cExplore every angle. Take chances,\u201d he said, adding that the smiles and joy make the effort worthwhile.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 by WJXT News4JAX &#8211; All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Friends and family pushed a 29-year-old man with cerebral palsy through parts of the course&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":182573,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[82384,116,118,117],"class_list":["post-182572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-gate-river-run","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182572"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182572\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/182573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}