Hello, my name is Katie Napoli and I am a long-distance runner for Team Danny under the organization of PPMD. I am very family oriented, organized, and adventurous. Running has always been a passion of mine and my career as a runner began about six years ago. However, I first decided that I wanted to make a change about eleven years ago when my cousin Danny Garofalo, who is six months older than I am, was three years old. At this young age he was diagnosed with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. From then on, our relationship as cousins and best friends grew. Now, we began to build our team, Team Danny and over the course of eleven years our team has raised over $330,000. With research, my family found an organization called PPMD which stands for Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy. This organization is the largest non-profit organization in the United States that focuses on finding a cure for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. Their help gave us knowledge and expectations of what it is like to be a boy with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD). We slowly realized how much we all have in common; we all have hopes to one day find a cure. We started to look at all of the possible fundraising that we could take part in with the other teams under PPMD. Now, we run every January in the Walt Disney Marathon weekend where we are proud to wear our colors. Danny's case of DMD progressed and he was wheelchair bound at the age of eight. The following year, I began running more frequently and that's when I found the motivation and the passion that I have towards running. From then on I have been a devoted runner- I am not saying that I enjoy every run but what fuels me is who and why I am running. It's all about finding the passion and drive in doing what you love.


This blog will be devoted to answering as many questions as possible and creating a clear analysis of what Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy is as well as personal running experiences, genetic information, donation information, short clips of interviews and educational videos.