At 61, Dr. Bob is running the marathon for Tanzania

At the sprightly age of 61 years old, Santa Monica pediatrician Bob Hamilton is running the L.A. Marathon this month – and he’s subjecting himself to this grueling pain just to raise funds for medical missions in Africa.

“You just do it,” Hamilton said. “You have to keep moving or you become inert. It’s an opportunity to further the cause.”

Then, with a mere 10 days to recover, he’s leading his 23rd group of doctors, nurses and other volunteers into the most desolate corners of the earth. Twenty-two brave souls are heading to Mwanza, Tanzania, March 25 – Apirl 6 where they’ll diagnose patients and hand out free meds, toys and reading glasses.

At his age most doctors are thinking only about visiting the golf course, but Hamilton shows no signs of slowing. His Lighthouse Medical Missions has become a regular contributor to health in West Africa. A container of food and supplies recently arrived there from Hamilton and crew.

The marathon “is a lot of fun, though the last 10 miles is pretty painful,” he said. Last year, Hamilton raised $30,000 in sponsors for his run.

This year, 10 friends are joining the Lighthouse Medical Mission marathon team. Most are not avid runners and will be following Hamilton’s “Biblical Creation Jubilee Marathon model,” a term he coined. Since he’s a Christian, he devised a doable marathon strategy adapted from principles in the Bible: You run for six minutes and rest and walk one minute (based on the seventh day in which God rested during Creation). After six cycles, you rest and walk for seven.

Do his patients do a double-take when they learn about out his alter marathon ego?

“They’re not shocked – at least not to my face,” he said. “They have enough manners to not say in front of me, ‘Oh my God!’”

Maybe they’re not shocked by his marathoning because they already know his commitment to Africa. Since 1998, Lighthouse Medical Missions has given hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of medicines away, dug wells, built buildings for schools and churches, even shipped over vehicles for the local pastors who function as the logistics coordinators for the medical teams.

Just about everybody who enters his office for treatment gets an earful about either joining or team or donating. The sixth annual Walk to Africa walkathon raises $125,000. Since medical mission team members pay for their own flight, food and housing, almost 100% of that money goes directly to benefiting needy Africans.

Lighthouse Medial Missions brushed with ebola a year ago when they ran clinics jointly in The Gambia and Guinea Bissau. Ever the adventurer, Hamilton seems drawn to difficulty. Nevertheless, he scuttled plans to run a clinic for Syrian refugees in Lebanon over concerns of becoming the next ISIS beheadings.

“It was the right decision,” he said. “It is worrisome to be in that part of the world right now.”

And there is acute and chronic need elsewhere.

For the first time in his life, Hamilton will actually take a day or two out of his breakneck schedule to see some animals on a safari. After 20 trips to Africa, and he’s finally going to see an elephant on a safari?

That’s a man who’s focused on his mission.