I have never been a natural runner (or any kind of runner for that matter) so when Leigh Ann O'Shea mentioned in November she was thinking of signing up for the Marathon of the North on 6th May 2012 my response was 'of course you should go for it, I couldn't possibly run 26.2 miles but you could definitely do it'. At this point, the furthest I had ever run was 3 miles and this was a huge achievement for me. Then I started thinking...'why couldn't I do it? If other people can run marathons why couldn't I?' I thought of my brother Craig, who after losing almost half his body weight ran the Paris marathon in 2011 and how proud and inspired I was by his achievement. By the end of that day I had called Leigh Ann and told her to sign herself up and I'd be doing it with her!
I then set about recruiting the 3rd member of our team, Leanne Wilkinson, who has lost over 7 stone through sheer hard work and determination and I thought this would be a perfect challenge to help get her to her final goal. Many people said she was ridiculous for even contemplating a marathon...so of course she signed straight up! We also recruited our 4th member Katheryn along the way, so that’s Liane, Leigh Ann and Leanne (we know!) and Katheryn making up Team Marathon of the North...

I thought long and hard about who I want to fundraise for as there are so many great causes that rely on fundraising and finally decided to raise money for the STAR charity. STAR is a small charity set up by Claire Huntley, a Superintendent Radiographer at James Cook Hospital, to assist with future developments within the department of Radiotherapy and Oncology to benefit their patients and families. Claire works tirelessly to promote this cause and I am confident that any money raised will be gratefully received and put to good use.

So... on 2nd January training began. We devised a training programme and boy have we stuck to it! We have trained in all weather conditions and despite a few hiccups along the way, things are going to plan. As I mentioned before, I am not a runner. It doesn't come naturally (and when I'm done I may be fundraising for a knee replacement so keep your credit card handy!) but one thing I do have is determination. Lots of it. My initial goal when signing up was just to complete it, nothing more, nothing less. However, as training has progressed I have started to set myself some targets and I would love to finish it in 4 hours 30.

This is a massive challenge for all of us taking part and we would love to raise as much money as possible for our chosen charities. All donations are gratefully received and even the smallest amount will make a difference. All we ask is for a donation towards our charity and you can sit back and let us do the hard work. It's not going to be pretty and 26.2 miles is a bloody long way but no matter what we will complete it and we will dine out on it for years to come!