When I was at school I wasn’t a natural runner, in fact given the option of hiding in the school toilets for two hours or running across a muddy field I would usually take the former. As I got older, wiser and understood the need for health and fitness, nothing changed, I would still have taken the toilets if anyone had suggested going for a run!

Then I turned 40 and the realisation hit me that I was actually getting older, (plus I had put on a couple of pounds). Even more worryingly it struck me that if I didn’t do something quick I was going to be beaten in a race by a 5 year old girl! 

I very clearly remember my first run, I decided to do a mile, I got to the top of our lane (about 100 meters) and was so exhausted that I was about to turn round and walk back home, but I didn’t. I realise now that this was the very moment that I became a runner and my kids would never beat me in a race, (well not for a few years anyway!)

Over the last 5 years I have run many miles, and as the addiction has increased so has the yearly milage. In all those years I have always been happy that my race distances were 10k's or half marathons, but recently I’ve started to feel that I need to add at least one full marathon to my running portfolio. For me the greatest marathon in the world is the London Marathon, so in 2016 that is the one I'm going to compete in.

Of course when I say compete, I don’t mean compete like Mo Farah! I am only competing against my own personal goals, and I have set myself two. The first is to complete the race in four hours or less and the second is to raise as much money as I can for The Children's Trust charity along the way.

To achieve the first I intend to train hard and luckily I have a very good friend (Adam) who is also doing the race with me. Together we will push each other to get out and run through the winter when it's the hardest, and we will get in the required miles that it takes to smash the four hour mark. 

To achieve the second, Adam and I have combined our fund raising efforts to raise the maximum amount money for one charity, (The Children's Trust). This is an amazing charity that supports children born with brain injury or children that have acquired brain injury. A shocking fact is that, each year over 40,000 children are left with some level of brain injury through accident or illness!

So although I am asking you to sponsor me, what I am really hoping is that through this page you will donate generously to The Children’s Trust, it’s a really worthwhile charity, that hopefully nobody reading this will ever need!

Thanks very much in advance.

Shaun

To find out more about The Children's Trust visit www.thechildrenstrust.org.uk

We have created a team page 'Northern Soles' that you can visit by clicking below, here you will see our combined fundraising totals.

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