Red Wings' Jim Nill running marathon for wife, charity

• Church group has raised $510,000 to build schools, wells in Zambia
• Nill never had run more than 10 miles in his playing days
• His goal is to finish Sunday's race in four-and-a-half hours

Bekki Nill doesn't have to wonder to what lengths her husband, Jim, would go to support her. She knows he will go at least 26 miles, 385 yards, in her name.

Former NHL player and current Detroit Red Wings assistant general manager Jim Nill will run his first marathon Sunday in Chicago to raise money to bring clean water to a community in the African country of Zambia.

Originally, Nill's wife, who is battling cancer, was training to run in the event. When the training became too difficult for her to manage, Nill committed to take her place.

"She has a real passion for the World Vision (organization) and the children over there," Nill said. "We had people from our church go over there and shared their story and it touched her. What we are doing is going over there and building schools and wells over there over a four- or five-year period."

Nill, 54, has been training with 275 members of his Northfield Church in Plymouth, Mich. Nill said about 60% of the runners on the church team have never run in a long-distance race, but they have all been training together. Their goal was to raise $500,000 and they have already raised $510,000.

"It's been amazing to watch," Nill said. "Five hundred thousand dollars will provide water for 10,000 people for the rest of their life. In this community, kids don't go school because they have to walk five or 10 miles per day carrying water buckets. And they water they get, we would never drink And this will allow the kids to go to school. This is about helping the kids over there."

After hearing the stories and seeing the photos of the community, Nill would like to go there when his church members return.

"Watching the people (in my church) commit to this has been inspirational," Nill said.

Although Nill was a well-conditioned player in his heyday, he never was a committed runner. He ran for training only, and never farther than five or 10 miles. He hadn't been running when he committed to the marathon.

"I started out cold turkey," he said. "Now, I've kind of gotten into this. It's harder on the body than I thought it would be. I thought it would be my wind that would be the problem, but it beats up your legs."

He said his group has already been talking about doing it again next year.

His goal for his first race is to run it in four-and-a-half hours.

"I just want to finish," Nill said, "and run the whole marathon."