Mia: Celebrity Soccer Challenge

When Mia was 5, her family adopted her older brother, Garrett, an 8-year-old Thai-American orphan.  The two were close, supporting each other and competing with each other on the field.  In 1996, despite his declining health, Garrett was at the Olympics to watch his sister win gold.  A year later he passed away.

“I learned so much through him — about perseverance, about grace, about dignity.”  Now she is taking what she learned and spreading the word to others.  She began the Mia Hamm Foundation to support research on bone marrow diseases and cord blood technology.  The foundation began hosting an annual soccer match, the Garrett Game, where players from her college years and professional career would come to play and support the cause.

In 2008, Mia and Nomar revamped the event and renamed it the Mia Hamm & Nomar Garciaparra Celebrity Soccer Challenge.  This year, the game will be held in Washington DC on July 31.  Kickoff is at 11:00 giving fans who watch Barcelona and Manchester play the night before plenty of time to recover and make it to the event.

For only $23, the celebrity game between “FC Mia” and “Nomar United” sounds like a great event for any sports fan.  Kobe Bryant, Alex Morgan, Ali Krieger, Heather O’Reilly, Tobin Heath, Eddie Pope, Jeff Green, John Carlson, and Pep Guardiola will all join in the festivities.  Additionally, a number of members of the press will be taking the field with the sports celebrities.

At halftime, bone marrow donors and recipients will be honored and throughout the event fans will be able to register with Be The Match, an organization that matches donors with potential recipients.  In the past three years over 400 people have been registered at the match as potential donors.

The need for bone marrow donors from ethnically and racially diverse communities is especially acute. Mia Hamm Foundation and the National Marrow Donor Program® (NMDP) are committed to diversifying the NMDP Registry of potential bone marrow donors and cord blood units. The NMDP is a non-profit organization that facilitates unrelated bone marrow and cord blood transplants as a single point of access. Corporations, non-profit organizations and civic groups across the country are working to educate the public and support bone marrow disease research and treatment efforts.

In addition to an entertaining match, the event is for a great cause.  If you’re in DC and you go, let me know what it was like!

-HD

July 28, 2011 | Categories: Futbol, Soccer | Tags: Alex Morgan, Ali Krieger, Barcelona, Be The Match, bone marrow, bone marrow donor, Celebrity Soccer Challenge, cord blood, Eddie Pope, FC Mia, football, Garrett Game, Heather O'Reilly, Jeff Green, John Carlson, Kobe Bryant, Manchester, Mia Hamm, Mia Hamm Foundation, National Marrow Donor Program, NMDP, Nomar Garciaparra, Nomar United, Pep Guardiola, soccer, Tobin Heath, Washington DC | Leave a comment