In a moment of madness I decided in June this year to undertake an indoor rower challenge.

At that point the longest time I had rowed for was two hours (26km) on one occasion five years ago, and my regular sessions for the first six months of 2017 were no more than 10km, and all too often circa 30 minutes.

So, for reasons I still don’t quite understand, I decided that a 12-hour challenge for charity was the obvious decision to make, as a marathon just didn’t seem enough, given that everyone seems to be going further and further in everything they attempt these days!

Once I had made my mind up, it seemed fitting to pick the first anniversary of my very good friend, Jamie Kinnier’s, death from diabetes on 20^th December. Also, diabetes runs in my family so this is an additional reason for choosing Diabetes UK as my nominated charity.

I have targeted 130km or 80.7 miles (i.e. just over a triple marathon distance), and hopefully a bit more but just finishing will probably be all that I care about in the last few hours!

This will be 12 hours of actual rowing, as the few rests that I take will be discounted from the time.

Any contributions, no matter how small, will be greatly appreciated and will give me a massive boost when I’m no doubt really struggling through the last few hours!

For anyone who would like to support me in person on the day, please contact me for details, and if you want to follow my progress there are updates on Instagram just search for stuwenman 

Many thanks,

Stu