**** LATEST UPDATES AT END SO PLEASE SCROLL DOWN ****
Over the next 3 months I will be competing in several indoor rowing competitions for Lifeblood: The Thrombosis Charity. Never heard of Lifeblood? Well, Lifeblood is a small UK charity that is doing extremely important work in stopping potentially life threatening blood clots through education and research.
I have been a competitive indoor rower since 2001 and am a member of the aptly named Old Wrecks Indoor Rowing Club! I'm no superstar but I have twice been the bronze medallist in the British Indoor Rowing Grand Prix and my best placing at the World Indoor Rowing Championships has been 8th. I have not rowed competitively for two years as in 2008 and again in 2009 I had deep vein thrombosis following air travel that ended up in my hospitalisation with extensive, multiple blood clots in my lungs.
After coming out of hospital the last time in April 2009 my lung function was so severely reduced that I was not able to walk more than the distance between two lamp posts without stopping to get my breath back. I was struggling with doing everyday things so getting back to rowing looked a distant if not impossible goal at the time. However, things have really improved and after being put through a whole raft of tests at the end of December 2009 the doctors gave me the all clear to start exercising again. I am now on medications for life, I probably have some permanent lung damage and I'm never going to break any world records but at least I am alive!
I started back rowing in January 2010 and I am now rowing around 65km per week. I will be competing in the Cornish Indoor Rowing Championships on Sunday March 7th 2010 which is a 2km race distance and on Sunday April 25th I will be rowing a full marathon (42,195 metres) both events in aid of Lifeblood.
Thrombosis (blood clots) is a leading cause of death in the United Kingdom, yet most people have little or no understanding about its causes and effects and how it can be prevented. Lifeblood: The Thrombosis Charity was founded in February 2002 with the mission of increasing awareness of thrombosis among the public and health professionals and to raise research funds to improve prevention and treatment of venous thromboembolic disease.
Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page. All donations will be very gratefully received no matter how small and don't forget to gift aid. I will be posting progress reports and updates on this page so please pop back and see how I've got on.
Karen
****MARCH 2010 UPDATE****
On Sunday March 7th 2010 I completed my first 2km race back after my illness at the Cornish Indoor Rowing Championships (see new photos attached). For the indoor rowers amongst you I was hoping for a sub 9 minute time and had planned a 2.12 pace. Well, I smashed that and ended up with an average pace of 2:07.7 and a total time of 8:30.6. Still a long way off my sub-8 minutes target but cutting 27 secs off my best 2K time this year was fantastic and Cornish Champion to boot! So now I have switched my training focus to the marathon on 25th April - lots of metres and low heart rates. I thought the interval sessions for the 2K were bad but at least they are over relatively quickly!!!!! I'll keep you all posted on progress.
****APRIL 2010 UPDATE****
On Sunday 25th April Karen Hambly and Megan Brown each completed a full marathon row of 42,195 metres at Medway Park Leisure Centre. The training and race plans worked! I stuck to the schedule I had set and completed the marathon in a fairly respectable time of 3 hours and 25 minutes and 39.3 seconds. Megan completed her marathon in an amazing time of 3 hours 4 minutes and 53.2 seconds which placed her second in the World Online Ranking for our age group for the 2010 season and was only 6 minutes away from the World record! Way to go Megan. The photo is Megan and I before the start of the marathon. Thank you everyone who has donated to the fundraising as I am very pleased to report that we have not only met but exceeded our fundraising target.
****JUNE 2010 UPDATE****
It took a few weeks to recover from the marathon row at the end of April and I think it will be quite a while before I forget how I felt the day after! So with the marathon completed it was time to move on to training for the usual competitive distances of 2000m and mile. All went fine in May as I made the transition in training and by the end of May I had even broken three personal bests from 2003 which was I was really chuffed about. Everything was going so well there had to be a catch!! Well the catch came in the form of sudden chest pain and shortness of breath and after seeing my GP and being scolded for not seeing her sooner it resulted in an admission to hospital where I was stuck on oxygen and had all sorts of blood tests taken. End result was, yes you've guessed it, more lung clots. So two steps forward and one step back - here we go again. At least all my rowing training has meant that my lung function was good prior to this episode so that acted as a bit of a buffer this time round and took the edge off the symptoms. I was in and out of hospital for a couple of weeks the beginning of May during which time I had a filter put into my vena cava vein that should stop any large clots getting to my heart and lungs again. I still need to take anticoagulation medication for life as well but it is reassuring that if I do get more clots I have this extra layer of protection now. So no rowing for me at present and I will be off work until mid-July which as those of you who know me will appreciate is going to be tough but this is only short term and healing time is essential to my recovery. As the song goes 'I get knocked down but I get back up again' so you won't be too surprised to hear that this week I entered the British Indoor Rowing Championships which are being held the end of November 2010.
This fundraising page is being kept open until at least 31st December 2010 so for those of you who would like to support me in my recovery and my return to rowing for the British Champs I'd really appreciate it if you would make a donation to Lifeblood: The Thrombosis Charity
Many thanks
Karen
