This is the letter I sent to my friends on July 31.

Dear All,
Hi This is Yuka.

Trip to California made me skip two weeks of training, but I had agreat run in Napa Valley in high-class residential area where superbhouses look down to us up from the hills. We also enjoyed our run inMonterey along the turquoise sea. I am running 10 miles (16km) thisweekend, which would become another record for the longest run in mylife if I could run to the end.

While I was away from home, Martha, Carol, Otto and Phil had kindly made contributions through my AIDS MARATHON website. Many thanks! This made the amount of donation to $275 dollars. My goal for July is to reach $525 so I would appreciate if those who have not made donationswould consider doing so this month.There may be those who have donated but not mentioned above, it isprobably because of the time lag in process- it takes at least 5 days for your donations to appear in my participant's account. So let meknow if your name is not listed after a few weeks. Unfortunately a credit card with a foreign bank account would not be accepted on thewebsite, but is accepted by sending in the form. Let me know if youneed the form.

Some of you may start worrying or wondering if I would ever be able toraise $3400 by September 25. I am aware that I am bit slow and behind,so I am planning some events in coming months. I will keep you posted!Take Care,Yuka IwatsukiP.S. Please see below for how to make donations and why I am doing it,especially for those who received this for the first time!I have uploaded the recent photo of my pace group athttp://runningyuka.blogspot.com/