It's terribly simple. A straight 100-mile cross-country race. No overnight stops, no helpful vehicles to carry your kit, just a strung-out bunch of odd-bods and obsessives and a whole lump of Southern England.
The 100-mile race is the blue-riband (or purple bandage if your feet end up iodine-stained) event of the Long Distance Walkers' Association. http://www.wessex100.org.uk/ Traditionally done by slightly scary people with whiskers and walking poles, it's recently been thrown open to genuinely alarming individuals for whom marathons just aren't long enough. Not as long as the Marathon des Sables, nor as likely to leave bits of desert in your socks (unless your mapreading goes horribly wrong), it is one of very few events worldwide that takes place over this distance without a break. (The MdS takes place over 5 days.)
I desperately hope to finish it inside 24 hours, my fantasy is to break 22 hours, and if I could threaten 20 then I'd be in with a shot of a top 5 place. Although if I'm strictly honest, my biggest dream of all is to be left with at least 3 toenails on each foot by the end.
The Thames Valley & Chiltern Air Ambulance Trust is a cause horribly close to my own heart. It's not just because I've watched their military equivalent saving lives and limbs in Iraq, and think that the same "Golden Hour" emergency cover should be available in this country to everyone. Get a casualty to hospital in an hour, and they've got a good chance. Leave it beyond that, and things go downhill fast.
But Ii's more because I got through two seasons this winter - one watching the Shiplake Under-14s play rugby and one running away from the Southern Shires Bloodhounds - without seeing it called out once. And then, just after the end of the season, at a hunter trials when the rider was flown away on a back-board after an horrific fall, I saw it used in anger.
She's now walking and back in the saddle, rather than tyring to conquer physiotheray departments and wheelchair ramps.
The Emergency Golden Hour really is just that - precious and golden, but only an hour long. And if my sore feet and your generosity mean that just one person gets to Casualty a few minutes early rather than a few minutes late, that's worth a whole lot of my toenails. And, I'm sure you agree, the odd fiver or two.
You don't need to be told about Justgiving - it's all made so simple that there really are no excuses. It's quick, easy and totally secure, and only a click away. It’s also the most efficient way to sponsor me: Thames Valley And Chiltern Air Ambulance Trust gets your money faster and, if you’re a UK taxpayer, Justgiving makes sure 25% in Gift Aid, plus a 3% supplement, are added to your donation.
I really pray that you never have to call them out. But if you ever did, I'd hope even more that they were still there to come at all.
Thanks for your patience, and thanks for your support. But most of all, thanks for clicking on the sponsorship link now.
