For Jeff Maher, the 2025 Sydney Marathon represented more than just 26.2 miles. At 58, this Kansas City native combined a love of marathon running and staying active with a deeply personal mission: honoring his late mother, Jean, who passed from pancreatic cancer at the same age he is now, raising awareness for the disease, and sharing the journey with his family. With his wife, Tracy, and son, Matthew, joining him on a 2 1⁄2-week trip through Australia and New Zealand, Jeff completed his seventh World Marathon Major, a milestone that made this marathon as much about connection, reflection, and family legacy as it was about endurance and goals.
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A Life in Motion: Discovering Running and Chasing the World Majors
Jeff was raised in Kansas City in a large family of five siblings that valued activity, competition, and the joy of sports. ‘I grew up playing all the ball sports,” he recalls, smiling. Staying active was second nature in his adolescence, thriving in environments that encouraged movement and teamwork. Athletics were a foundation, shaping his discipline, resilience, and approach to life. Yet, it wasn’t until he reached his 40s that Jeff discovered his love for marathon running, an adventure that would redefine his relationship with fitness, challenge, endurance, and his body.
His first attempt at long-distance running was with the 2007 Chicago Marathon. He convinced his wife, who had grown up in the Windy City, to run alongside him, embracing the challenge together. Unfortunately, extreme heat forced the race to be officially canceled halfway through, but Jeff and his wife wanted to finish the full stride, walking the rest of the way with many breaks. He remembers thinking to himself, “That wasn’t the experience I wanted.”
His wife decided that one marathon was enough, but Jeff wasn’t satisfied or finished. Five weeks later, he teamed up with his training team back in Kansas City, running the Route 66 Marathon in Tulsa, and finished in four hours and eleven minutes, shaving off almost two hours from Chicago. Despite a part of him telling himself he was done, Jeff found the experience exhilarating. “I thought, ‘Now I’m done,” he said after the accomplishment in Oklahoma, but he kept going, saying, “running is addictive.”
What began as a personal challenge soon became a broader journey. Jeff became hooked not just on running itself, but on pushing his limits, beating past times, and chasing new milestones. He began running marathons for charity, including his first experience supporting Jumpstart for Early Education. He ran Boston during the tragic 2013 bombing year, capturing the emotional significance of the race and the resilience of the community.
Over the years, he participated in the other World Major Marathons—Berlin, London, and Tokyo—each one marking not just an athletic achievement, but a commitment to his health, well-being, and sense of purpose. Jeff “felt done” with marathon running, though, after running alongside the first woman to complete the Boston Marathon in 1967, Kathrine Switzer, interviewing her with a GoPro throughout the course in 2017. He felt that experience was a good way to end his ten-year journey with marathons.
But, in 2020, in the midst of COVID, Jeff faced a personal health challenge—he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS), a neurological disease often called the “snowflake disease” because it affects everyone differently. His desire to keep running came back in an instant. “Can I run again?” he asked his neurologist, as it was the way he stayed active and healthy, concerned about how MS might limit his endurance and mobility.
Fortunately, his symptoms were manageable – some numbness in his right arm and hands and minor vision issues – but that wouldn’t stop him. “Physically, I feel great. I’m in good shape,” Jeff says. With infusions done to suppress the harmful cells every six months, he felt like his diagnosis was a sign to continue running after his brief pause. He resumed training and used the World Majors as a personal challenge to maintain fitness, health, and motivation.
After Tokyo last year, Jeff thought he had completed his goal of all of the World Majors, but when Sydney was announced as the seventh, he knew he had to go to the Land Down Under. He found new inspiration also when his son expressed interest in running the race with him.
Though his son got into the general lottery and he didn’t, Jeff discovered Project Purple and realized it was the perfect opportunity to combine his love of running with a meaningful charity and cause. “This was the perfect confluence of my desire to run the race and a great charity to run it for,” Jeff expresses. Sydney represented a personal dream deferred from his honeymoon plans decades ago, now paired with a cause deeply personal to him and his family.
Carrying His Mother, Jean’s, Legacy
Jeff’s mother, Jean, was a guiding force in his life, shaping him and his five siblings with her combination of discipline and warmth. “Mom was the alpha of the parents,” Jeff says. “She basically ran the house.” Her influence extended beyond the household—she balanced running a home of six children with professional work as a secretary, handling the chaos of family life with extraordinary organizational skills.
“She had incredible drive. I remember she would load up the station wagon with all those kids to go to the grocery store…pushing two carts around and managing six kids. I couldn’t imagine seeing people doing that today,” he laughs. She also made all the wedding dresses for her daughters and their bridesmaids, a testament to her industriousness, creativity, and care.
Jeff remembers his mom as being extremely social and fun to be around. “When I think about her, and I think of my memory of her,” he says, “she really enjoyed my friends, and getting to know my friends. She just had a very good nature about her, and people that I brought over the house wanted to hang around and talk to her and be with her.”
Her strength became most evident during her battle with pancreatic cancer in 1994. Diagnosed at Stage 4, she was given an expected lifespan of just nine months. “When she first told us, she was like, ‘Oh, don’t worry. I’m gonna beat this.’ That was her bullheaded mentality,” Jeff remembers. Despite her courage, the disease progressed rapidly. She endured chemotherapy, lost her hair, and eventually required a wheelchair, and there was nothing that could be done to “eradicate the issue,” in the words of Jeff.
In her final days, her faith provided solace and perspective. Jeff recalls an unforgettable moment: “Being Catholic, she had a lot of her beliefs. In the last few days, she couldn’t open her eyes, but when I was in her room on the day she died, she pointed up to the corner of her room and said, ‘Look at the angels!’” Jeff thought she was hallucinating with the amount of morphine she was on for managing her pain, but then the hospice nurse pulled Jeff aside and said, “She’s seeing what she’s seeing. She very well may be seeing the angels.” This experience immediately comforted Jeff, knowing his mother was finally at peace.
Jean’s fight against pancreatic cancer left a lasting mark on Jeff. Her courage, resilience, and determination became a model for how he approaches challenges in his own life, including his MS diagnosis and running. Participating with Project Purple allows him to carry his mother’s legacy forward, and he has included the names of his mother and other loved ones on his race bib, ensuring that each mile is a tribute.
In particular, one of his close friends, with whom he ran marathons, Kathleen, passed from pancreatic cancer last year. Jeff was dedicated to running also for her, and for other friends and their loved ones who have passed. “Anyone who has ever done a long endurance event knows there are going to be dark times in the race when you hit that proverbial wall, but when you look down at your bib to see who’s on it and why you’re doing it, it gives you that drive,” he explains.
Training, Family, and the Sydney Adventure
Training for Sydney was as much a family endeavor as a personal challenge. Jeff’s 24-year-old son, Matthew, who had never run a marathon before, committed to running alongside him. “It’s really cool ‘cause he’s never been someone I’d call a superstar athlete,” Jeff says. “So for him to say, ‘If you’re going to run Sydney, I’m going to do it with you’—that was a massive statement.”
Despite some setbacks, including breaking his ankle from a ladder fall in May and missing ten weeks of training, the father-son duo restarted their training together in mid-July. Matthew has since walked an 18-mile overnight walk for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention in New York City. “We’ll probably finish in 5:45 or 6 hours, but we know we’ll get it done,” Jeff predicted before leaving.
Since his MS diagnosis, Jeff has carried a mantra with him: “No Bad Days.” For him, it’s about choosing to enjoy the run no matter the pace, especially after setbacks like his recent injury. Rather than focusing on time or speed, Jeff leans into the joy of the experience, making each marathon a celebration of resilience and memory. His family often wears No Bad Days t-shirts at races in support of Jeff, turning the motto into a family tradition and a way to honor Jean’s legacy. In Sydney, that reminder to embrace the moment guided every stride.
The marathon was also part of a larger family adventure. Jeff and his family turned their trip to Sydney into a vacation, also spending nine days in New Zealand, blending the marathon adventure with kayaking, snorkeling, bungee jumping, and skydiving. Yet for his son, the Sydney Marathon was what he was looking forward to most. Running alongside his father in honor of his grandmother, whom he never met, was a meaningful, emotional experience. Their shared journey reinforced family bonds while allowing Jeff to honor his mother and others affected by pancreatic cancer.
Jeff admits that this race was about completion, not competition. “I took pictures, videos, and enjoyed the journey,” he says. The race thus became a metaphor for life itself: perseverance, reflection, fun, and community intertwined with personal growth.
Hope On and Beyond Race Day
For Jeff, Sydney represented a culmination of decades of running, personal hardships, and meaningful cause work. Crossing the finish line was a moment of reflection, relief, and pride. “It will be interesting,” he predicted before he left for the adventure. “I know there’ll be some sort of relief. I know I felt that when I finished the sixth World Major in Tokyo.” However, Jeff was more excited for his son than for himself. “It will be a much bigger accomplishment for him to complete it than for me, and so I look forward to celebrating that with him,” he said.
Project Purple added a layer of significance. “I’ve always been a person who tries to do three or four steps more than the average, so no matter who I am raising money for, I feel like I need to give it my best shot, not only in training but in the fundraising side,” Jeff admits. Running for an organization devoted to pancreatic cancer awareness allowed Jeff to not only raise money for the disease that took his mother from him, but also allowed him to connect with his community on a larger scale.
When he posted his donation page earlier this year, Jeff reflected on the countless messages he got from people who have had similar experiences with loss. “It was amazing to me that so many people came back and said, ‘I lost my dad to pancreatic cancer,’ or ‘I lost my mom,’ or ‘I lost my aunt,’” he says. Jeff was dedicated to carrying these stories from friends on his 26.2-mile stretch.
Reflecting on the advances in the field since his mother’s passing, Jeff notes that he is not well-equipped with the intricacies of the statistics and changes in the research field when it comes to pancreatic cancer. Thirty years ago, when his mom passed from the disease, Jeff admits that when he heard someone had been diagnosed with it, he would immediately think in his head, “Gosh, this is going to be an uphill battle for someone trying to survive it.” But, he says that he has heard stories of people surviving it for much longer than his mom had to live, which gives him hope.
Coincidentally, Jeff even worked for the same company that the founder/CEO of Project Purple, Dino, did, contributing to the interconnectedness of the entire situation. “There’s a lot of irony. There are a lot of things at work here that bring it all together…to have completed this seventh one in a place I always wanted to go, for a charity like Project Purple, it’s the perfect spot for me to be doing it,” Jeff explains when asked what this race meant to him. He hopes to continue raising awareness and inspiring others to find their own reasons to push forward.
If you’d like to run or participate in an event of your own for Project Purple, visit our events page.
