Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

The aim was to record the worlds fastest time for the 2012/13 season in the O/60 Lightweight category on the Concept Indoor Rower.

Unfortunately my row unravelled after only 10K and forty minutes rowing, leaving 32K which became a survival row. I suffered, others suffered and the £3000 total raised on Saturday 16th was hard earned by everyone. Thank you South Wales, Gwent, Newbridge, the staff and The Blistering Rowers for the warm hospitality.

Currently 2hrs 50mins 25 secs, this is still held by Joe Keating from London, who was ten minutes ahead of the rest of the world. I'm now five minutes back at 2hrs 55mins 22secs. A second target was the world record. This has stood, since 2005, at 2hrs 47mins 45secs. The record is held by another Brit from York and is proving an elusive nut to crack. It has stood since 2005. This will be my third attempt in two years.

The Charity event organisers have kindly allowed me to "enter" their marathon fundraising event after the Dutch Championship was cancelled. The charity is an excellent cause and with a lot of help we can make this an event/challenge worthwhile for Leukaemia Research. I have joined the team - theblisteringrowers - on this website.

My row is dedicated to the memory of Geoff Waterfield. Geoff was the the Teesside Steel multi union chairman when the closure of iron & steelmaking was announced for Teesside. With an enourmous amount of enthusiasm and sheer hard work for over a year, he was instrumental in bringing Teesside Steel to the attention of SSI who bought the mothballed site. They brought back to life a fully integrated steelworks - a global first. Tragically, Geoff died in August 2011, aged 33, of leukaemia, eight months before the plants came back on stream.

Feel free to donate after the event - but it's double if a record goes !!

Many thanks. Julian.

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