Kelly Walsh knows what it is like to lace up and hit the pavement. She does a half marathon each year, but this month she did the run of a lifetime, getting the chance to be a torch runner in the Special Olympics World Games in Germany.
“To be selected for the final leg for the Torch Run was something that like, I even have goosebumps now thinking about it, because it was a life-changing, eye-opening experience,” Walsh said.
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WATCH HEREThe only runner from Connecticut, Walsh, the director of public safety for two Hartford HealthCare campuses, joined 93 other torch bearers from different countries. They ran for four days through Germany to bring the Flame of Hope to the opening ceremonies in Berlin.
“Everybody was smiling,” Walsh said. “It's contagious. You can't not smile when you're around athletes and then seeing what we're there for.”
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SIGN UP The mission of Special Olympics is to raise awareness and promote inclusion. Walsh has been involved ever since she was in high school, and throughout the years that she worked as a police officer in Avon.
Now at Hartford HealthCare, she is getting public safety officers involved in local runs.
“They're already asking, ‘when are we doing it next year?'” Walsh said.
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Walsh is part of the Special Olympics Law Enforcement Torch Run Council for Connecticut. She has been waiting to run in the World Games since 2019, before the arrival of COVID-19.
This month, at the first international competition since pandemic lockdowns, Walsh continued to raise awareness, this time teaching the tradition to German law enforcement officers who do not have local runs in their country yet.
“You would see some of the officers throughout Germany starting to cry because they didn't know what this was about,” Walsh said. “They were overcome with emotion, but they were also very sad that their department hasn't done this yet. So they were crying like, this is what we're here for, is the athletes.”
The German officer on Walsh’s team now plans to come to Connecticut to learn how to organize a torch run.
“Then I offered to go back with her at some point and help her do her torch run in Germany,” Walsh said.
That police officer got the chance to place a medal on their team’s athlete to cap off the games in Berlin.
“Once you do that, it kind of like sparks it of, ‘Oh my gosh, this is what this is about.’ So he asked her and then after that, she was all emotional as well. And it was just, it was great. Like that brought it all together,” Walsh said.
A competition defined by hugs, high fives and the spirit of inclusion for athletes and the guardians of the Flame of Hope.
