About IWillAgain.com

I Will Again.com is a web community of support for Athletes overcoming, accident, illness, or injury by providing a forum for athletes to share their story, their goals and progress, and to allow others to share in their revival through encouragement, advice, mentoring, and prayer.

What is an Athlete?

Its easy to think of the great athletes – Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Michael Phelps, but there are very few of those, and many more of us. Webster’s defines Athlete as “a person who is trained or skilled in exercises, sports, or games requiring physical strength, agility, or stamina”. That’s a very broad group – and note that it doesn’t really address how good an athlete is. Athlete comes from the latin word Athleta - “to contend for a prize”, I like that – that’s all of us – what prize are you contending for?

How IWillAgain.com Came to Be

My name is Mark, I am 47, father of three. My wife, family and I live in Austin Texas. On January 10, 2008 while I was running (training for the Austin ½ Marathon) I was hit and run over by a truck that ran a stop sign. You can read my full story on IWillAgain.com. While I was in ICU, my family and friends kept vigil at the hospital and through a wonderful website - Caringbridge.org. You can read my story on Caringbridge at my Caringbridge website markhagerfamily. Over 400 people signed up to be emailed when my Caringbridge website was updated, and during my 2 months in the hospital, there were 22,000 visits to my website. People had a genuine interest in following my progress.

While I was in the rehab hospital, two of my friends brought one of their friends - John - to the hospital to meet me. He had been in a terrible car wreck a year before, and came to offer me encouragement and I remember him talking with great delight that he would in the very near future be released by the doctor to golf again. This was a very big deal to him.

I left the rehab hospital on February 22, and then the real work/struggle began. John followed up with me several times by phone and then later we met for lunch on several occasions. Our ability to talk about shared experiences had an amazingly positive impact on me emotionally. Around the same time my brother had a friend Dan, a runner, that had been in a terrible accident a few years before, call me at home. Again, he brought me encouragement and real insight and hope into what I could expect during my recovery.

I ran again for the first time on July 4^th, 2008 – a mile. I had set a goal for myself to run a 5k (The Great Land Run in Enid, Oklahoma) in September, which I accomplished. Then I quit running, in fact I quit doing much of anything – except lying on the couch. Running was painful, I hurt – really hurt – all the time. had in a sense thrown in the towel.

In December, on a Friday, I received a call from a friend, Paul, who suggested we run a 10k together – the Capitol 10,000 in Austin. This was quite a boost for me. The following day, I picked up a copy of Runners Word that featured the story of Matt Long (IWillFoundation.com), the NYC firefighter who had been hit by a bus while cycling. I was simply inspired. I set a goal for myself to run a Marathon before the end of 2009. I began running the following Monday.

While I was running my first post accident 10K, I thought to myself – people have no idea what a big deal this is to me, all they see is a middle aged man with an odd, slow gait finishing a 10K. I should have a shirt that tells them, I may be slow – but only 14 months ago I was dead in the ICU, and only 9 months ago I was in a wheel chair!

Since then I have ran five 5Ks, two 10Ks, one ten-miler, one 1/2 marathon, and am registered for my first Marathon in November 2009.

What was the difference? For me, it was being inspired & and encouraged by athletes who had already over overcome similar circumstances, support form family and friends, and setting goals.

The thought of a website began to gel in my mind. What if there was a web community where athletes can tell their story, voice their goals, let their friends, family, and other athletes follow their progress and provide them encouragement and inspiration, gain inspiration from other athletes who are overcoming accident, illness, or injury to achieve their goals again and again, and go on to help and mentor other athletes who were experiencing similar challenges.

So here it is - IWillAgain.com. Athletes tell your story, voice your goals, provide inspiration, encourage and mentor other athletes. Friends and family, follow your athletes, encourage them, pray for them, push them to greater things, and champion their success.