I'm Oona, one of the players on the Great Britain Women's Senior National Baseball Team. I fell in love at first pitch in 2015 and I now play AAA with Essex Baseball, women's league with Belles Baseball, help out with the University of Essex baseball team - and represent the Women's GB Team.

Throughout the years I've seen so many amazing women take up playing. When I started, there were barely a dozen University teams with maybe a collective five girls playing across those teams. By 2017, we had enough girls to play the first all-female baseball game in the UK. In 2024, we are going into the fourth year of a Women's League and over 40 women training relentlessly with GB all winter, already in preparation for European Championships in 2025.

And that's what this is all about. Baseball is growing fast in the UK, it has been made an Olympic sport, and our fellow GB teams have achieved some incredible successes at competitions like the WBC and European Championships - all of which has inspired us to compete, set ambitious goals, and make travel plans that will put us in the best possible position to take gold in Europe in 2025. All of which also costs money.

The Great Britain Women's Senior National Baseball Team are not centrally funded. The women fund the majority of travel out of pocket - we are all ordinary people working and studying while also funding elite athlete travel.

This is where you come in. I have signed up to run the Edinburgh Marathon on 26th of May to raise money for myself and the team. I have never run a marathon and I have only just started training (which is terrifying) so what I'm offering is a Pay What You Can for My Suffering to help me and the whole pride do a summer tour in Canada to prepare us to hunt silverware in 2025. Everything raised will be split 50/50 between me (i.e. My Suffering) and the whole team. Even the price of a coffee stacks up.

Thank you.