It’s that time again when everyone is asking for sponsorship for the Great North Run in September so I figured I’d get in there early.  I never normally ask for sponsorship but this time I’ve decided to run for the National Autistic Society.  I already have my place secured so I don’t need to raise a specific amount to guarantee entry.  I’m doing this more for personal reasons as a great friend’s son was recently diagnosed with Autism and it also runs in my family.  I’m also doing this for a little bit of financial motivation (More on that later).  I’ve always wanted to complete the Great North Run in under 1h 30m but have failed twice so far, once by around 7 minutes and last year by around 2.  In my defence last year I was training for a marathon and just used the Great North Run as another training session.  If you know me I’m definately not built for running but do have the knack and more importantly, enjoy it.  In order to complete this half marathon distance in under 1h 30m involves an average pace of 6m 51s and currently my last 5 mile run averaged around 7m 40s so I’ve got some serious training to do.

So, what is the financial motivation for this?  Well,  For every £100 donated I’ll stump up £50 (Up to a maximum of £250) if I fail to beat 1h 30m.  I’ll be going off the official time by the Great North Run organisers and will post my time up when finished.  So, to sum it all up:

If I get £300 worth of donations and I fail, then I’ll top that up with £150

If I get £700 worth of donations and I fail, then I’ll top that up with £250

If I get £130 worth of donations and I fail, then I’ll top that up with £100

You get the idea.  So dig deep everyone and pray that I fail.  Once again, for the people who know me, I hate loosing and I’m tight so bring it on!!

My employer (VMware) also have a scheme whereby they will gift match the donation amount and send it to the charity on your behalf so once the race is over I'll apply for that and hopefully double the amount the charity will get.

Thanks for taking the time to read this and hopefully donating.

Michael