Clark didn't die, or turn into a 98-pound weakling. Instead, she became so fit that she's running in her third Philadelphia Marathon tomorrow.
Clark, 33, now a vegan, is one of 25 vegans and vegetarians from Philadelphia and the suburbs running as an unofficial team tomorrow for the Humane League of Philadelphia. Vegetarians eat no meat. Vegans eat no animal products at all, including dairy and eggs.
Clark, an engineer who lives in Center City, said she's always been an animal lover, but in college took a class in which she learned about "factory farming," the mass production of animals for slaughter that she said takes place in crowded, inhumane conditions.
Clark's been a vegetarian for 10 years and a vegan for two. At the same time, she has participated in triathlons and done a "half-Ironman" course, a 1.2-mile swim, 58-mile bike ride and 13-mile run.
Tomorrow will be her fourth marathon, her third in Philadelphia. Although she's never in the front of the pack, "I've finished every one that I started," she said.
There are no other vegetarians in Clark's family, but her mother now accommodates Clark at Thanksgiving dinner by replacing butter with margarine in side dishes and using soy milk instead of cow's milk in the mashed potatoes.
Chris Price's mother does likewise. "My mom always cooks vegan for me at Thanksgiving," said Price, 28, of Fairmount, a substitute teacher in Philadelphia public schools and another of the vegans in tomorrow's marathon.
Price, a vegan for five years, became a vegetarian when he was a teen.
Two years ago, he won the national championship of the World Kickboxing Association in his weight class, 140 to 155 pounds, he said.
Nick Cooney, director of the Humane League of Philadelphia, said that over the past few years, some top professional athletes, including baseball, football and hockey players, have gone vegan or vegetarian.
Cooney said each team member will use the marathon to raise money from family and friends to help farm animals.
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