Kentucky football signs inspiring recruit – a boy with cystic fibrosis

Fletcher Page | Courier Journal

Show Caption Hide Caption Kentucky football signs Luke Klausing, a kid living with cystic fibrosis Kentucky football signs Luke Klausing, an 11-year-old kid living with cystic fibrosis.

LEXINGTON, Ky. — Kentucky football signed a wide receiver from Louisville on Wednesday, a day before players report for training camp.

Luke Klausing didn't hold back confidence at a ceremony in front of family and future teammates.

The Wildcats will "definitely," beat Tennessee this season, Klausing said, and he's most looking forward to "beating Florida."

Klausing has yet to have media training, a UK spokesman joked, but he did catch his first touchdown pass and kicked field goals Wednesday at Kroger Field.

That's because Klausing is an 11-year-old living with cystic fibrosis, an inherited life-threatening disorder that damages the lungs and digestive system.

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Klausing, one of an estimated 30,000 patients with the genetic disease in the United States, was diagnosed in 2007 when he was just six days old. He wakes up at 6 a.m. for hour-and-a-half treatment sessions every morning and takes roughly 40 medications throughout each day, his father Joey Klausing said. There's another round of treatment in the afternoon after school and another after football, basketball or soccer practice before bed.

"He's had about 4,000 days in a row," Joey Klausing said. "So that's why we're so devoted for a cure. We want to beat this thing so Luke and other kids don't have to deal with this throughout the rest of their lives."

In 2015, the Klausings and two other Louisville families with children with cystic fibrosis – the Foushees and Sweeneys – started Cure CF, a charity to help raise money and organize people and families affected by the disease.

The organization's first event, a pizza and craft beer dinner, raised $60,000. And since then, Cure CF, which has no employees so 100 percent of proceeds go out, has raised more than $1 million. The group pledged more than $300,000 of a $5 million project to help build a cystic fibrosis respiratory center at Norton Children's Hospital in Louisville.

"A lot of kids have to go to Indianapolis or Cincinnati for treatment," Joey Klausing said. "So we said, 'Why don't we start something here?'"

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The family, Luke's mother Jessica Klausing said, remains positive about life and committed to the charity because of encouragement from the CF Foundation.

"They know what they're looking for in a cure," Jessica Klausing said. "They know the genes they're looking for."

Added Joey Klausing: "For a long time we didn't really have a light. You're just in the tunnel. But we can see where they're getting some gene therapy that's actually working. We're getting closer to a control. We're close to that."

Kentucky football, Jessica Klausing said, provides a break from the disease. Joey, from Louisville, and Jessica, a Maysville native, each grew up as UK fans. They fell in love on a football field while attending Centre College, where he played and she worked as a trainer.

They married and moved to Louisville, where he's an attorney and she's a nurse, and made trips to Lexington and around the south each Saturday to watch the Wildcats.

"It just became something we loved together, then loved as a family," Jessica Klausing said. "It's just kind of part of us. It's just kind of in our blood."

So, Luke Klausing inherited his passion for blue and white. The family, joined by sister Emma, have season tickets at Kroger Field and have watched Kentucky play at Vanderbilt, Louisville and the 2016 Taxslayer Bowl in Jacksonville.

"You still have to do the treatments, have to pack everything up," Joey Klausing said. "But it's nice to be able to get away and be immersed in the pep rallies, pre-game, the band playing, the Cat Walk."

That's why Luke and his family said they were excited when Team IMPACT, a national nonprofit that connects children facing serious and chronic illnesses with college athletic teams, approached with the idea of signing a letter-of-intent with Kentucky football.

This season, Luke will attend practices, games, dinners and events as a member of the Wildcats' team.

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Kentucky players C.J. Conrad, George Asafo-Adjei, Zach Johnson, Lonnie Johnson Jr. and Walker Wood attended Luke's signing ceremony Wednesday and practiced with him after.

"I can't even imagine how I would feel if I was in his shoes," said Conrad, a senior tight end. "But we look up to him. He inspires me, seeing all the work he has to do every single day. He can't take a day off."

Kentucky's bye week this season — October 13 — is an important date for the Klausings. That's when Cure CF will host the annual craft beer and pizza event in downtown Louisville, on Washington Street under the Second Street Bridge.

"Someone's dollar is going to be the one that gets the cure," Joey Klausing said. "It may be the millionth dollar that we get from (Kentucky booster) Joe Craft or it may be the single dollar that we get from you later today. It's going to be that one dollar that gets the cure, so every dollar adds up."

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