December 2, 2025 • 8 mins
The Ugly Sweater Fun Run is coming soon. Tavi Wallace, the ultrarunner who knows no limits, brought Dream Factory CEO Tommie Kendall along to describe its amazing work for children with dire medical needs.
Tavi loves shining light on incredible compassionate pursuits, and how runners can help!
Tavi loves shining light on incredible compassionate pursuits, and how runners can help!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Theerro News Radio eight forty whas Terry miners here. One
of my favorite running people in the whole universe is
in the studio with me, Tobby Wallace. Great, see you again.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Hi, Terry, Thank you for having You're.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Always doing amazing stunts, amazing things. Tommy Kendall's also here,
CEO of Dream Factory. Good to see you brought it. Hey,
you glad to be here, you bet you. I know
you've got an event coming up. But I have to
talk to Tobby about what she's done every year. Here
we are, we're down to the last month of twenty
twenty five. She never lets a year go by where
she hasn't done something just outrageously awesome. So what was
(00:34):
your longest run this time?
Speaker 2 (00:36):
Oh, this year? Fifty miles?
Speaker 1 (00:39):
A fifty miler. Yeah, that's child's play, right, I mean.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Wow, No, it was hard, of course it is.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
Where'd you do the fifty miler?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
It was the run under the stars, So it was
a night race.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
It was super weird at seven pm to seven am
kind of thing, so you just run throughout the night.
It was in Paducah, making it even worse. It was
on a four hundred meters horse track.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
So we just did Oh my goodness, you just kept circling.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yeah, like a hamster wheel.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Oh that is really wild. Oh that that had to
play messes with your mind.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
Right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Luckily I think it was every two or three hours
they would switch the directions. We got to switch go counterclockwise.
Gave us a popsicle, little incentivizing Wow.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
And then weren't you involved in one of those what
did hundred and what was it? So many fifteen hours
of something or other? Or was that that was another
thing that you'd done? That an clear water?
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Yeah that was the end.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Well, yeah, that's coming up on That was like the
first thing I did this year. So it was January
of this year. Yeah, coming up on a year.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
What did you do there? Again?
Speaker 2 (01:40):
I ran a.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
Three hour and fifty five minute fifty k so it
broke four hours in the thirty one mile distance.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Yeah that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
It was hard.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
Yeah. You get blistered up from that kind of work,
don't you.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Yeah, especially with the humidity down there. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
So are you doing that again this coming January is
or another one?
Speaker 3 (01:58):
Are you?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Good question?
Speaker 3 (01:59):
I'm not sure this time of year January going to
the beach doesn't sound bad, We'll see.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Yeah, good idea. Yeah, give people a little bit of
advice about here comes now it's colder weather, and they think, well,
I don't mind running outside when it's warm or whatever
in the morning in the summer, but now when it's cold,
what do you do to fend off winter? When you
decide you're going to run five miles, ten miles whatever.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
To be honest, I feel like I've said this before
on the show, a lot of it is accountability. I'm lucky,
I'm grateful to have training partners that you know, will
meet me, and so it's a lot harder to bail
when you have people depending on you and you're like,
I'll see you at seven am tomorrow, you know, Seneca
bathrooms or something like that. As well as I am
a weeny, I really don't like the cold. So there's
(02:44):
something called VIP, which is ventilation insulation and then protection.
So kind of like when it gets super cold and
the weather's not amazing, kind of that tri layer Like
that's how I layer too, So I would rather be
burning up than not be able to feel my hand.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
Do you know where like sunglasses the cover your eyes
when it's really cold.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Sometimes with the wind.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Yeah, you have. You would have to because ice particles
can form along like the bill of a hat.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yes, and it turns you're sweating and.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
It turns into ice crystals and then you just have
to break them away. And you're thinking, am I nuts?
What am I doing here?
Speaker 2 (03:15):
And yes, I am nuts?
Speaker 1 (03:17):
Yeah, clearly I mean to be able to do some
of the amazing things you've done. So what is this
next event that's coming up? Tommy?
Speaker 4 (03:24):
Well, do you want to talk about the self to
have you? And then we'll talk about the drink factory?
Speaker 3 (03:28):
Yeah we can. We'll collapse on this, so I'll be quick.
I feel like I've been talking. But the Ugly Sweater
Fun Run and Walk. It's a non competitive, non timed,
always going to be free fun run that's on Sunday,
December twenty first, at nine am. It's historically been at
eight am, but the people said, can we sleep in
a little bit? Yeah, so yes, it's at nine am
this year. Everything else is going to be the same.
(03:50):
You have a two and a half of five or
a seven and a half. Choose your adventure, choose your distance,
option to run and walk. It's just been this is
the ninth year going. It's just been like a silly
event that there's no competition. Just make some new running friends,
talk to someone you haven't talked before.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
That's your pace.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
It's a great altitude. And then are you the beneficiary?
Speaker 4 (04:08):
Yeah, so Tavy approached me this year about the Dream
Factory being a beneficiary. It is a free event, which
is a really cool concept. So basically the runners will
have an option of donating to the drink Factory. The
Dream Factory, we're actually celebrating our forty fifth years. So
we were started in nineteen eighty in Hopkinsville, Kentucky. There
was a girl named Tammy Keill who want to go
to Disney World. Our founder, Charlie Hunault, granted her dream.
(04:32):
She was diagnosed with cancer. She passed away a few
months after that trip, but she did lay the seed
for what would later blossom to the Dream Factory. Our
national headquarters is actually located here in Louisville. I have
no idea. I mean, I've heard about that from my
whole life. It seems like and there you go. Yeah,
I went in to Saint Matthew's area and so you
raise money and then this is what happens. Children who
are imperiled by medical issues and so forth, and they
(04:55):
can ask for a wish to be granted. Yeah, we
have probably about sixty percent. One of our dreams are
a Disney World. There's an amazing place there called Give
Kids the World. That's where they stay when they go
to the theme parks. So that's about sixty percent of
our dreams. We do have thirty two chapters spread across
the country. Like I said, our headquarters here in Louisville.
We do have a local chapter as well. The really
(05:16):
cool thing about us is all donations to the Dream Factory,
where at ninety six percent goes directly to our mission.
We only have three and a half employees for the
whole organization across the whole country, so we're volunteer based.
So like I said, ninety six percent goes directly to
the mission.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
You can't really beat that, yeah, right, And so you
get request via what email and people tell you their story.
Speaker 4 (05:36):
We have a whole process, so if you go to
our website click on refer a child, that's the start
of the process. We have an application we have. Every
chapter has their own board they approve dreams. Once the
dream is approved, there is a process in there also
where we have a medical authorization form that's completed and
things like that.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
I see. Yeah, so that's how these things are verifying. Yeah,
and then obviously it takes money. So these various events,
these supportive measures like Toppies run and anything else that
comes up that can be of help at least shining
a light on you. If it's not a fundraiser, at
least lets people know about the process. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (06:13):
So this this event really I look at us two fold.
One is, you know, obviously the revenue that generate is
going to go directly to our dreams. But then also
just bringing awareness to the community, you know, just letting
people know, hey, not only do we have a presence
here in Louisville or a our national headquarters is here
in Louisville. This is how you can get involved with
the Drink Factor. So we'll looking forward to this event
(06:34):
and also just partnerships in the future moving forward.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
How many dreams are made to come true per year?
On average?
Speaker 4 (06:40):
Last year were granted two hundred and six Oh my goodness,
My go is within the next five years when we
celebrate our fiftieth anniversary, tored to be up to three
hundred and sixty five dreams, so we can say we've
granted a dream a day, and we have a whole
plan in place so we can accomplish that. That involves
starting new chapters and proving our existing chapters and a
whole lot of things. And that's and that's part of
(07:02):
what we're doing in this partnership with Tavy as well.
It's just our whole mission is to grant dreams. So
that's everything we do. That's the focus. Where do people
find you online? Www dot dream Factoryinc. Dot org. That's
our national website. You can refer a child, you can
volunteer with us, you can look at ways to opening
new chapters if you're not if we're not in your area,
(07:23):
and then also you can make a donation. So everything
you need is on that website.
Speaker 1 (07:27):
Dream Factoryinc. Dot org. That sounds about right, doesn't it.
That is right? And then your Ugly Sweater Run you.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
Said, is yeah, you can tell Tommy's had to talk
about this before.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
You did a really good job. Yeah, the Ugly Sweater
Run once again.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
That's going to be on Sunday, December twenty first, at
Cherokee at nine am.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
You can run or.
Speaker 3 (07:46):
Walk, dogs, strollers, all that everything welcome.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
So that's so awesome. Well, congratulations on the making all
these dreams come true, because that's that's the thing, you know,
just to people get into these channel situations in life
and you're you're helping them escape for a little while.
Speaker 4 (08:04):
Yeah, it's not only impacted the dream child, it's also
impacted the whole dream families.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
We have a lot of stories and.
Speaker 4 (08:09):
You know, uh, to show the ways that we've impacted
so many people across all of our communities, but especially
here in Louisville. We've had some really cool unique requests
recently as well. We had one request come in where
a child wanted to sleep with wolves, and when it
came in, we were like, I don't think we're gonna
be able to do this one. We did some research
and there's a place in Canada where you can sleep
with wolves.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
So we are working on that dream right now.
Speaker 4 (08:32):
So we have a lot of unique It was.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
A legit request. It wasn't just a prank.
Speaker 4 (08:36):
No, it was a legit request and we are working
to fulfill that request.
Speaker 1 (08:40):
No dream too, Tobby, great Sea again, buddy, you too.
Tommy Back in a minute on news Radio Wait forty
w u h S
Theerro News Radio eight forty whas Terry miners here. One
of my favorite running people in the whole universe is
in the studio with me, Tobby Wallace. Great, see you again.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Hi, Terry, Thank you for having You're.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Always doing amazing stunts, amazing things. Tommy Kendall's also here,
CEO of Dream Factory. Good to see you brought it. Hey,
you glad to be here, you bet you. I know
you've got an event coming up. But I have to
talk to Tobby about what she's done every year. Here
we are, we're down to the last month of twenty
twenty five. She never lets a year go by where
she hasn't done something just outrageously awesome. So what was
(00:34):
your longest run this time?
Speaker 2 (00:36):
Oh, this year? Fifty miles?
Speaker 1 (00:39):
A fifty miler. Yeah, that's child's play, right, I mean.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Wow, No, it was hard, of course it is.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
Where'd you do the fifty miler?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
It was the run under the stars, So it was
a night race.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
It was super weird at seven pm to seven am
kind of thing, so you just run throughout the night.
It was in Paducah, making it even worse. It was
on a four hundred meters horse track.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
So we just did Oh my goodness, you just kept circling.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yeah, like a hamster wheel.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Oh that is really wild. Oh that that had to
play messes with your mind.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
Right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Luckily I think it was every two or three hours
they would switch the directions. We got to switch go counterclockwise.
Gave us a popsicle, little incentivizing Wow.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
And then weren't you involved in one of those what
did hundred and what was it? So many fifteen hours
of something or other? Or was that that was another
thing that you'd done? That an clear water?
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Yeah that was the end.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Well, yeah, that's coming up on That was like the
first thing I did this year. So it was January
of this year. Yeah, coming up on a year.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
What did you do there? Again?
Speaker 2 (01:40):
I ran a.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
Three hour and fifty five minute fifty k so it
broke four hours in the thirty one mile distance.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Yeah that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
It was hard.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
Yeah. You get blistered up from that kind of work,
don't you.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Yeah, especially with the humidity down there. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
So are you doing that again this coming January is
or another one?
Speaker 3 (01:58):
Are you?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Good question?
Speaker 3 (01:59):
I'm not sure this time of year January going to
the beach doesn't sound bad, We'll see.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Yeah, good idea. Yeah, give people a little bit of
advice about here comes now it's colder weather, and they think, well,
I don't mind running outside when it's warm or whatever
in the morning in the summer, but now when it's cold,
what do you do to fend off winter? When you
decide you're going to run five miles, ten miles whatever.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
To be honest, I feel like I've said this before
on the show, a lot of it is accountability. I'm lucky,
I'm grateful to have training partners that you know, will
meet me, and so it's a lot harder to bail
when you have people depending on you and you're like,
I'll see you at seven am tomorrow, you know, Seneca
bathrooms or something like that. As well as I am
a weeny, I really don't like the cold. So there's
(02:44):
something called VIP, which is ventilation insulation and then protection.
So kind of like when it gets super cold and
the weather's not amazing, kind of that tri layer Like
that's how I layer too, So I would rather be
burning up than not be able to feel my hand.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
Do you know where like sunglasses the cover your eyes
when it's really cold.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Sometimes with the wind.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Yeah, you have. You would have to because ice particles
can form along like the bill of a hat.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yes, and it turns you're sweating and.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
It turns into ice crystals and then you just have
to break them away. And you're thinking, am I nuts?
What am I doing here?
Speaker 2 (03:15):
And yes, I am nuts?
Speaker 1 (03:17):
Yeah, clearly I mean to be able to do some
of the amazing things you've done. So what is this
next event that's coming up? Tommy?
Speaker 4 (03:24):
Well, do you want to talk about the self to
have you? And then we'll talk about the drink factory?
Speaker 3 (03:28):
Yeah we can. We'll collapse on this, so I'll be quick.
I feel like I've been talking. But the Ugly Sweater
Fun Run and Walk. It's a non competitive, non timed,
always going to be free fun run that's on Sunday,
December twenty first, at nine am. It's historically been at
eight am, but the people said, can we sleep in
a little bit? Yeah, so yes, it's at nine am
this year. Everything else is going to be the same.
(03:50):
You have a two and a half of five or
a seven and a half. Choose your adventure, choose your distance,
option to run and walk. It's just been this is
the ninth year going. It's just been like a silly
event that there's no competition. Just make some new running friends,
talk to someone you haven't talked before.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
That's your pace.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
It's a great altitude. And then are you the beneficiary?
Speaker 4 (04:08):
Yeah, so Tavy approached me this year about the Dream
Factory being a beneficiary. It is a free event, which
is a really cool concept. So basically the runners will
have an option of donating to the drink Factory. The
Dream Factory, we're actually celebrating our forty fifth years. So
we were started in nineteen eighty in Hopkinsville, Kentucky. There
was a girl named Tammy Keill who want to go
to Disney World. Our founder, Charlie Hunault, granted her dream.
(04:32):
She was diagnosed with cancer. She passed away a few
months after that trip, but she did lay the seed
for what would later blossom to the Dream Factory. Our
national headquarters is actually located here in Louisville. I have
no idea. I mean, I've heard about that from my
whole life. It seems like and there you go. Yeah,
I went in to Saint Matthew's area and so you
raise money and then this is what happens. Children who
are imperiled by medical issues and so forth, and they
(04:55):
can ask for a wish to be granted. Yeah, we
have probably about sixty percent. One of our dreams are
a Disney World. There's an amazing place there called Give
Kids the World. That's where they stay when they go
to the theme parks. So that's about sixty percent of
our dreams. We do have thirty two chapters spread across
the country. Like I said, our headquarters here in Louisville.
We do have a local chapter as well. The really
(05:16):
cool thing about us is all donations to the Dream Factory,
where at ninety six percent goes directly to our mission.
We only have three and a half employees for the
whole organization across the whole country, so we're volunteer based.
So like I said, ninety six percent goes directly to
the mission.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
You can't really beat that, yeah, right, And so you
get request via what email and people tell you their story.
Speaker 4 (05:36):
We have a whole process, so if you go to
our website click on refer a child, that's the start
of the process. We have an application we have. Every
chapter has their own board they approve dreams. Once the
dream is approved, there is a process in there also
where we have a medical authorization form that's completed and
things like that.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
I see. Yeah, so that's how these things are verifying. Yeah,
and then obviously it takes money. So these various events,
these supportive measures like Toppies run and anything else that
comes up that can be of help at least shining
a light on you. If it's not a fundraiser, at
least lets people know about the process. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (06:13):
So this this event really I look at us two fold.
One is, you know, obviously the revenue that generate is
going to go directly to our dreams. But then also
just bringing awareness to the community, you know, just letting
people know, hey, not only do we have a presence
here in Louisville or a our national headquarters is here
in Louisville. This is how you can get involved with
the Drink Factor. So we'll looking forward to this event
(06:34):
and also just partnerships in the future moving forward.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
How many dreams are made to come true per year?
On average?
Speaker 4 (06:40):
Last year were granted two hundred and six Oh my goodness,
My go is within the next five years when we
celebrate our fiftieth anniversary, tored to be up to three
hundred and sixty five dreams, so we can say we've
granted a dream a day, and we have a whole
plan in place so we can accomplish that. That involves
starting new chapters and proving our existing chapters and a
whole lot of things. And that's and that's part of
(07:02):
what we're doing in this partnership with Tavy as well.
It's just our whole mission is to grant dreams. So
that's everything we do. That's the focus. Where do people
find you online? Www dot dream Factoryinc. Dot org. That's
our national website. You can refer a child, you can
volunteer with us, you can look at ways to opening
new chapters if you're not if we're not in your area,
(07:23):
and then also you can make a donation. So everything
you need is on that website.
Speaker 1 (07:27):
Dream Factoryinc. Dot org. That sounds about right, doesn't it.
That is right? And then your Ugly Sweater Run you.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
Said, is yeah, you can tell Tommy's had to talk
about this before.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
You did a really good job. Yeah, the Ugly Sweater
Run once again.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
That's going to be on Sunday, December twenty first, at
Cherokee at nine am.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
You can run or.
Speaker 3 (07:46):
Walk, dogs, strollers, all that everything welcome.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
So that's so awesome. Well, congratulations on the making all
these dreams come true, because that's that's the thing, you know,
just to people get into these channel situations in life
and you're you're helping them escape for a little while.
Speaker 4 (08:04):
Yeah, it's not only impacted the dream child, it's also
impacted the whole dream families.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
We have a lot of stories and.
Speaker 4 (08:09):
You know, uh, to show the ways that we've impacted
so many people across all of our communities, but especially
here in Louisville. We've had some really cool unique requests
recently as well. We had one request come in where
a child wanted to sleep with wolves, and when it
came in, we were like, I don't think we're gonna
be able to do this one. We did some research
and there's a place in Canada where you can sleep
with wolves.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
So we are working on that dream right now.
Speaker 4 (08:32):
So we have a lot of unique It was.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
A legit request. It wasn't just a prank.
Speaker 4 (08:36):
No, it was a legit request and we are working
to fulfill that request.
Speaker 1 (08:40):
No dream too, Tobby, great Sea again, buddy, you too.
Tommy Back in a minute on news Radio Wait forty
w u h S
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