<p><br />April 2012 will see the result of many months of intense training. I will line up in Morocco with 800 of the worlds maddest runners to compete in the 2012 Marathon de Sables. It covers 151 miles run over 6 days across the Sahara, equivalent to 5 1/2 regular marathons. In addition competitors have to carry everything they will need for the duration on their backs in a rucksack (food, clothes, medical kit, sleeping bag etc).</p> <p>I'm happy to be running with seven other people for Yorkshire Cancer Research. All money raised will go directly to the charity as I intend to buy everything I need myself.</p> <p>The aim of this site is to document my training in the time leading up to this event and to be a lasting personal diary on this amazing journey. I hope that one day Jacob and Keane can read this and for it to inspire them to see that anything is possible if you dont give up. Boys, this is for you....</p> <p>"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat." Theodore Roosevelt -Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>About the Charity</p> <p>Yorkshire Cancer Research (YCR) was founded in 1925, to fund research into the causes and cures of cancer. YCR is the most successful regional medical research charity in the UK. We fund internationally recognised research, which focuses on a variety of cancers including: breast, bowel, cervical, non-Hodgkin Lymphoma, ovarian, prostate, skin, and genetics of cancers, to name but a few.&nbsp;<br /><br />YCR is not a regional division of a national charity - it is an independent charity, based and operating in Yorkshire only. We are still, however, at the very forefront of the international fight to find a cure for cancer.&nbsp;<br /><br />Yorkshire Cancer Research raises its money in Yorkshire and spends it in Yorkshire at its five centres of excellence based at the universities of Bradford, Hull, Leeds, Sheffield and York and their associated teaching hospitals.&nbsp;<br /><br />Yorkshire Cancer Reserach is a member of the Association of Medical Research Charities (AMRC) - a membership organisation of the leading medical and health research charities in the UK.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Visit their website for more information:&nbsp;<a href="http://www.yorkshirecancerresearch.org.uk/">http://www.yorkshirecancerresearch.org.uk/</a></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Your details are safe with JustGiving &ndash; they&rsquo;ll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they&rsquo;ll send your money directly to the charity and make sure Gift Aid is reclaimed on every eligible donation by a UK taxpayer. So it&rsquo;s the most efficient way to donate - I raise more, whilst saving time and cutting costs for the charity.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Thanks</p> <p>Scott</p>