Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

To everyone who donated, bought raffle tickets, came to the quiz night, donated items to the raffle, helped me organising it all and for everyone for just being around I thank you from the bottom of my heart. We have smashed our targets x

Final London Marathon update

So, 72 hours ago we were on our way to our starting point at Maze Hill to the end of a journey that started in June 2021 and finished together on 2nd October 2022. It has taken a while to comprehend the enormity of what we have achieved and I think it will still take some time. The support has been amazing from people that we know and also complete strangers that we have met on the way. Thank you to each and every one of you who has been there for us both and supported us along the way in many different ways. Becky, it has been a complete honour, thank you. We dreamt, believed and achieved

26th September training updatet - today we completed our last long training run. Where have the last 16 weeks gone?! We are both suffering with colds and not feeling great but we got out there today. There a lot of things starting to make it even more real now, adverts are appearing on the TV for the marathon, deciding when and how to pick up our numbers with the train strikes and also a bit of sadness (?) about no more early Sunday mornings. What started off as 2 of us has ended up with 6 of is running together and 3 of those have signed up for the virtual London Marathon. Apparently we have done everything we can now for Sunday and have been told to enjoy the 26.2 miles that are ahead of us. We have got this ! X

11th September training update - we have 3 weeks left!  yesterday we completed our longest run to date, was supposed to be 20 miles but was just over 21. I felt really comfortable and could have carried on (good job as I will need to soon).  Becky had planned a lovely route again and running past places that you usually only see when driving gives you a completely different take on things. The weather was almost what I think are my perfect running conditions. We now start to taper down and rest a bit before the real thing, yikes!  We now talk about how we are going to miss our early morning weekend runs and are talking about stoll meeting up once a month to carry on. We have been so lucky with the weather we have had so far and maybe running in the winter won't be so appealing !

4th September training update - well this week has definitely been a challenge and it appears others have also felt the same. Thursday I had a bit of a tumble and skid along dry dirt, but I got back up again and completed the 5 miles as' 'Hal' instructed. Run with Hal is the app we are using for our training programme, sometimes he is nice to us and other times he is a right b######.  I now have a nice bruise and scabby knee (maybe too much information!).  We are all starting to struggle emotionally and physically but we know that the end is in sight.  Knowing that other people feel the same is reassuring on a funny kind of way! Today I just made the 630 start for our run having overslept.  We completed 14 miles although saying a half marathon is perhaps slightly more impressive. The conversation on our runs now sometimes turns to what we will do next .....

28th August training update - the training has been continuing even without the updates. Today's run was 18 miles, which is our longest run yet. We started at 630 and finished about 1045 and were rewarded with a ice cold bottle of water, bottle of coke and o had an ice.lolly.. as we get further into the training and less days until the marathon it is getting harder both mentally and physically.  We have a great team of other runners with us who have all now signed up for the virtual marathon.  Sometimes we chat together and sometimes we don't talk, but we are all there supporting each other making sure we get the job done.  The water from the showers  this morning along the sea front was very welcome , we did strange looks from people out for their Sunday morning stroll!

7th August training update - so today Becky and I completed 15 miles.  I have been on holiday for 2 weeks so my training plan had to be changed! So, today we a hard one but we bloody well did it!  So proud of both of us for running the the furthest we have ever run. It was difficult but this was never going to be easy x

4th July training update - so we completed a 10 mile run on Saturday evening.  the first 5 miles was OK but after that i just wanted to stop, which of course is not an option.  After mile 6 it was quicker to carry on till the end rather than go back, so that is what we did.  Stairs are still a bit tricky today!

26th June training update - I think we are now in week 4 of the 16 week training programme. Today we ran 9 miles and with some help from some awesome friends we got round and walked the last 1 mile back to our cars. No one said this would be easy, but the miles are.going up and next weekend it is a 10 mile run.  Becky is fab at planning the routes, which is better.for.me as I prefer not to know where we are going. I come along with the wit and bad songs to keep us going. So far it has worked really well !

When you receive a text message from a friend that reads 'i need to ask you something that i could only ask you' you start to get concerned about what this request might be.  I replied pretty quickly just to make sure everything was Ok and the reply was ' would you run the London marathon with me?', I think i replied with something like 'oh is that all, phew, yes of course' and as they say, the rest is history.

It is now 16 weeks until the marathon and therefore it seems a good time to start up this fundraising page as training programmes have also started as well.  So on the 2nd October I will be running 26.2 miles with Becky, who is incredible.  St Wilfrid's is a local hospice who cater for end of life and also respite care.  Becky has unfortunately lost both her parents over the last few years but St Wilfrids have been there for her mum and dad and her family and helped them all through this very difficult time.

So to be doing this with Becky and knowing that the money raised will help many more families is an absolute honour  xxx