The Transplant Games are for athletes who've received a second chance thanks to an organ donor.

Our Mackenzie Spinks spoke to some Kentucky athletes who've been through quite a journey to get to the big games.

Tom Williams has been training hard on his bike for weeks leading up to the Transplant Games.

It's hard to believe, but just over five years ago he had an incurable lung disease, idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.

His only hope was to receive a new pair of lungs from a donor on.

January the 5th.

I got my call and on the six hour received my transplant.

And then the next year was really tough.

I mean, it was a real tough year of recovering, and it's rejection and pneumonia and all the things that, you know, that I was able to get through.

And then every year got a little bit better.

And I started pushing myself.

Rehab was fantastic.

After his recovery, Williams learned about the Transplant Games.

This year will be his first time to the games he's chosen to compete in a 20 kilometer bike race.

Looked at all the events and I said, well, I want something that will challenge me and so look like the the, the 20 K bike ride would be about the most challenging thing I would enter, and that's why I signed up for it.

Williams says training for the competition hasn't just improved his health, but he's found meaningful community on the second Chance at Life team.

The fellowship is just fantastic.

It's just it's so helpful.

People have no idea what you're going through and unless, you know, you've gone through it yourself.

And so being able to talk to people about the experiences they've had and the bumps in the road and how you got through it has been very, very helpful.

Sally Wilson is the team's manager.

She's an organ recipient herself, but her first time to the games was as the mother of a donor.

After seeing another family member donate her eyes after death.

Wilson's son, Jimmy, knew he wanted to be an organ donor when he got his license at 18 years old.

He came in and said, I signed the back of my license to be an organ donor.

And I said, are you very sure about that?

And he said, yes.

He goes, I'm not gonna need them.

But then six months later, after he got his license, we lost him in a car accident.

And he was brought here to the UK and, you know, he was, Made that decision a lot.

Left a whole lot easier for us because we already knew that he wanted to be.

He was a funny person.

He's a jokester.

Loved his church, loved his youth group, loved football.

So in his memory and keeping his memory alive, I participate in the Transplant Games.

Wilson says the team has become her family and that the competition is high energy, fun.

But it's also an emotional experience.

I was hooked the first two days in 1998 when I went, you know, seeing all the recipients.

Knowing that my son helped one of them and, you know, just seeing that they've got all this energy and knowing that one day they were just laying in bed not knowing if they were going to live to the next day.

And now they're out there playing basketball.

You know, these were very sick people, very sick people.

Some just living day to day waiting for an organ transplant.

And now they're out there compet It's just amazing to see.

Both Wilson and Williams say the mission of the Transplant Games is to show the world that organ donation really works.

You know, running a 20 keep by crowd right now.

So it really happens to show people what you can do if you work hard, and that life can be very rewarding after a transplant.

So if you can convince one people, one person, two people, the value of being that a donor and what the end results are, and you found somebody, it's going to take good care of the gift that you've given them.

Then it's hopefully it's a motivator.

So there will be more people that will be on the on the donor list.

It's the most generous thing that you can possibly give in your whole life.

It is quite a gift.

Well, that was our Mackenzie Spink reporting.

This year's Transplant Games of America begins in three weeks in Denver.