Hello, I'm John.

Thanks for coming to my London Marathon fundraising page. Back in September, I set myself a tough target for this one, run it in a time of 3hrs45. I didn't completely realise then how tough it would turn out to be but I also didn't expect to be as committed as I am now to achieving it. Net result being....I'm still well on track.

**** Update 20th March ****

My original target has been met! I've never raised this much for any event before and I was daunted by the task to start with so I can't thank everyone who's supported me enough. I'm amazed by how many people who don't even know me have contributed! But...there's still 5 weeks to go so I've increased by target a bit to give 250 more people a chance to part with their £1 :-)

**** Update 6th March ****

Vote for your favourite colour jelly baby. www.onethousandonepounds.com/jelly_babies.html

**** Update 23rd Feb ****

Yesterday I did my first warm up race on the road to FLM, The Sussex Beacon Half Marathon in Brighton. It was the first event I've run for nearly a year and the improvement during that time was really hi-lighted when I beat my record, going under 1hr40 for the first time. You can see all the pictures here. Next stop is the Reading Half Marathon at the end of March.

So.....sponsorship. This year I'm trying something different. I'm attempting to reach past the people I know and hopefully get 1000 strangers to donate £1. So there's no pressure to sponsor more than the last person, or thinking that whatever you can spare is not worth it.....all I'm asking for is one round pound.

Every little helps apparently but a little only helps if it's multiplied by a lot. Although everyone's always being asked to give their money to charity, my thinking is £1 is change to one person but 1000 of them is a fair bit to Diabetes UK. Unfortunately I don't know that many people so I need help to spread the word. Please can I also ask you to tell 2 other people about this campaign. Start with the person sitting next to you right now. You can find out more and read my training diary at www.onethousandonepounds.com.

You'll quickly notice the gaping flaw here when you click the Sponsor Me button: the minimum amount that Justgiving can accept is in fact £2, which nicely destroys my concept. Or does it? Maybe you could combine assets with a friend or business partner, donate for them and get them to pay your bus fare or something. Alternatively, if you feel slightly stung by suddenly being asked to give double, you can contribute via PayPal (details are on www.onethousandonepounds.com.) I'm sure you'll find a suitable way around it, I hope you do because I'm keeping my snappy campaign name.

Thanks for coming here and reading this. If you don't know me and want to leave your email address, I'll try and write back because I'll be sincerely grateful.

Please be one of the one thousand. Many thanks again.
John