Marathons with Meaning

UW alumnus Peter Kline gives kids with disabilities the experience of a lifetime.

By Tamara Linse

Peter Kline is the founder and sole operator of Marathons with Meaning (marathonswithmeaning.com), a program dedicated to making running more accessible for people with disabilities. 

Kline is also a UW finance alumnus (1975) and senior vice president, wealth management adviser and portfolio manager with Merrill Lynch Wealth Management. Marathons with Meaning is not a nonprofit organization, and he uses his own money to fund it.

Kline didn’t begin running until later in life. “I was overweight, 52, and I’d never done it,” he says. He tried a 10K and loved it so much he was hooked. But it wasn’t without a lot of training and a lot of pain: “I tried a marathon, and I did horrible. It was the most miserable, painful experience I ever had. It took me three years to qualify for Boston Marathon.”

Eight years later, the idea for Marathons with Meaning was sparked when Kline met a young woman whose spinal column was crushed after a tree fell on her. He saw how hard it was for her to navigate the world and society with this disability, though her mind was not at all affected.

At that time, Kline was getting tired of being a stand-alone athlete. “Running is very much an individualistic sport,” he says. “So, I thought, ‘Why don’t I try to include somebody else and take them along?’” He contacted a children’s hospital and the Make-a-Wish Foundation, and soon he was including rider-athletes in his marathons. And the rest is history.

Kline has now been running with rider-athletes for 12 years — over 70 to date — in marathons all over the world. “The kids have just been an amazing blessing,” he says. “They love it, and it changes their lives. It changes their parents’ lives, and it changes the other runners. Everybody is empowered by it.”

Some of the kids who are rider-athletes are very sick, some are nonverbal, and some are physically disabled but very sharp mentally. For example, one young woman rider-athlete is extremely physically disabled — can’t use her arms or legs — but she has a Ph.D. in marine biology and speaks three languages. “I never judge the disability or the person’s ability,” Kline says. “They’re amazing, and they inspire us.”

What advice would Kline give others? “Reach out. Don’t look the other way when you see someone not as well off. If you don’t know how to love unconditionally, then you’ll never understand love.”

He adds, “Giving is the selfish thing because you get back 10 times what you’ve given. It’s not always money and shouldn’t always be money. What good are you doing for society and for people in general?”

Kline doesn’t take donations for Marathons for Meaning and funds everything himself, including equipment, travel and race registrations. “If you want to give money, give it to the University of Wyoming. I really support that,” he says. “Would you rather have the gift come from a cold hand or a warm hand?”

Kline has also been a generous supporter of the UW College of Business with his philanthropy.