Adam Waters
Adam - London Marathon - Sense
Fundraising for Sense
Story
Dear All,
Thank you, thank you , thank you so much to all of you for all the support I received in my quest to run the London Marathon!
I am delighted to let you know that I completed my first marathon in 3 hours 56 minutes and 29 seconds and raised well in excess of the 1500 gbp target for Sense (http://www.sense.org.uk). I genuinely believe that without your support, I would not have achieved either of my targets for which I am truly grateful.
Here is a short summary:
The walk - Seconds after completing the marathon I was required to remove the time-chip from my shoe laces. This turned out to be rather more difficult than the marathon itself. Having been assisted by a member of staff who caringly removed the chip for me and who I now believe has regained her sense of smell, I quickly realised I had acquired a new and very peculiar walking style. I like to call it 'The John Wayne'.
23 mile marker - My legs were weary and my moral was wavering. What I needed was another round of my supporters to urge me on and then.......stumbling along, I noticed a crackle in my headphones and then a loud distorting screaching noise....the last thing I needed! This was followed by the realisation that my headphones were fine, when out the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of Michael, Sandy and Ruth all having been struck by the stick of insanity. It was a most amusing sight that kept me going those last few miles. Equally amusing was the fact that both Sadie and Rosa somehow managed to sleep through the mayhem of thousands of supporters and the shrieking insanity of la famille Bourne.
Toddler linguistics - Sadie is very advanced for her age where language and speech is concerned. However, since putting the finishing medal around her neck, she now repeatedly says 'daddy was running, daddy was running, daddy was running......'. She now has a skewed view of what running actually means, despite my many attempts to clarify that what I was doing at 23 miles could be called a number of things aside from running. The words staggering and stumbling come to mind.
Never say never - The last three miles truly was a mental battle. During those three miles I continously urged myself on, repeating 'got to finish, no walking, got to finish, no walking' along with the promise to NEVER run a marathon again..................... Here is an extract of what I received in my email on Monday morning:
"Dear Adam Leighton Waters,
Thank you for entering the ballot for the 2010 Virgin London Marathon" !!!!!!!!
Thank you for entering the ballot for the 2010 Virgin London Marathon" !!!!!!!!
Thanks again to all of you. Here are some photos:
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Pre-marathon2009 text
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On 26 April 2009 I will be running the London Marathon.
Aside from surviving the event I am aiming to raise as much as I can on behalf of Sense (http://www.sense.org.uk/ National Deafblind and Rubella Association). If you can help in working towards my target of 1,500GBP I would be very grateful.
Here are some of the things I have learnt along the way in the build up to the marathon.
Half-marathon - In preparation for the big day, I ran my first half-marathon four weeks ago in The Hague. I was very pleased with my time of 1hr42mins. I was a little less pleased with the fact that I had inadvertently only loaded 4 songs onto my ipod shuffle and listened to the same 4 tunes over and over and over....and over again. What scares me is that it wasn't until about an hour into the race that I realised.
Baby Rosa - The kind event organisers decided to stage this event 4 weeks after the brith of my beautiful newborn baby Rosa. I have learnt that lack of sleep, emotional joy and stinky nappies dont enhance a marathon training plan.
Fund Raising - Unfortunately I am the fund raising manager for my marathon campaign. In true Adam form, I have left this until the last minute and am relying on everyone else acting quickly. In future I will be more organised.....or will I? Sorry.
Anyway, enough bla bla bla from me....
....nearly.
If you wish to donate, please do so quickly.
If you know anyone else who might be interested in donating funds to Sense for my efforts, please send them my link http://www.justgiving.com/adammarathon.
If you don't have a credit card but would like to donate, please contact me directly at adamwaters@gmail.com
If you would like to see pictures of baby Rosa let me know and I'll send you a link to view them.
This marathon run is dedicated to Ruth, Sadie and Rosa.