Special Olympics’ special event coming to Peters Township

The UNcathlon is coming to Peters Township.
For its fifth year, the fitness-oriented event to benefit Special Olympics will be held Sept. 19, with registration starting at 10:30 a.m. and competition at 12:30.
The site is Peters Township High school, in the hometown of UNcathlon co-founder Shannon Barry, who is treasurer of the executive committee of Special Olympics Pennsylvania’s board of directors.

Harry Funk/The Almanac
Harry Funk/The Almanac
Shannon Barry speaks about his experiences while recovering from injury.
“We’re looking for some teams,” he told members of the McMurray Rotary Club. “We’re looking for people who are interested in helping us make this event in Peters Township as successful as it possibly can be.”
He served as guest speaker during a recent meeting of the club, of which he is a former member, at Valley Brook Country Club in Peters.
The day of the UNcathlon – the event’s name incorporates the theme of “unified play, unconventional fun and unforgettable experience” – participants have a go at 10 physical trials that test speed, strength and endurance.
“Come out. Get a good workout in,” Barry said. “You’ll find that all levels of fitness are represented there.”
Along with participating, members of the community can help the cause by providing corporate sponsorship opportunities and other forms of donations.
Barry and Chris Weiss, another Peters resident, came up with the idea for the UNcathlon while running together on local trails.
“As we’re running, it’s a therapy session. You’re talking about things that you’re experiencing professionally,” Barry, a financial adviser, said. “What we’d here over and over again is that employers were having a really hard time engaging with their staff in terms of wellness. And they were absolutely fumbling the ball when it had anything to do with, how do you make this a more diverse workforce?”
Their solution was to host an event, “a team-based corporate decathlon with a couple of months of training leading up to it that focuses on fitness and wellness.”
Weiss was on the Special Olympics Pennsylvania board at the time, and after he pitched the concept to the chief executive officer as a fundraiser for the organization, the inaugural UNcathlon was held in 2017 in Pittsburgh’s Schenley Park.
“It was wildly successful,” Barry said. “The twist that the CEO of Special Olympics put on it was he wanted one of the Special Olympics athletes to participate alongside the corporate team with each event.”
After three years of live competition, the UNcathlon took place virtually in 2020.
“The UNcathlon was supposed to launch last year in Philadelphia, and then the idea was that we were going to take it to the rest of our regions throughout the state,” Barry said. “And COVID’s put a hold on that.”
But the hope still is that the UNcathlon can catch on throughout the country.
As far as his own fitness, Barry showed the Rotarians the medal he earned by completing the 2013 Boston Marathon, which unfortunately was marred by terrorists’ bombs.
His road to distance running came about in part because he now is an 18-year cancer survivor who at one point volunteered to counsel other patients.
“They inspired me to start running, and I was like Forrest Gump. I was a guy without a cause,” he said. “I just started running and running and running, and before you knew it, I was training for marathons and doing better and better, and along the way meeting great people.”
A couple of serious knee injuries, though, made pursuing the avocation impossible while giving him some new perspective.
“For the first time, I understood what this means,” Barry said as he displayed a handicap parking placard, “what it’s like to have a disability, what it’s like to want to something but not have the physical ability to be able to do it. And that’s when I realized, Special Olympics is that for these people, these 19,000 people across the state that we serve.
“It is an absolutely vital organization, one that’s inspired my children, one that’s inspired my family, one that’s inspired my colleagues and friends. It’s an amazing way to experience what it’s like to not be able to do something that you want to do.”
For more information, visit give.specialolympicspa.org/event/the-2021-uncathlon-to-benefit-special-olympics-pa/e341979.

Harry Funk/The Almanac
Jessica Kury records Shannon Barry’s presentation.