I have always been a huge advocate of exercise, it has benefited me throughout my life as a way of keeping fit and giving me thinking time to relax and solve problems. I have always run and loved it.

On the 4th September 2025 I had a health assessment which would subsequently prove to save my life. I had no symptoms, but following a series of tests through the autumn, I was diagnosed with a bicuspid aortic valve. This is the valve that does the heavy lifting in your heart and I was born with two cusps rather than the required three. It was leaking and with every pump only 30% of blood was getting through. I was baffled, I was asymptomatic and was still running. I did the Shrewsbury half marathon at the end of September 2025 and came 7th in my age group, I was regularly bashing out sub-21 minute parkruns – a fit and healthy 50 year old.

Put simply, due to my training my heart had grown bigger on one side to compensate for the regurgitation, my engine had built itself up to deal with the poor flow. This meant I wasn’t feeling any different. The problem was, my heart was starting to struggle and with age, I was on a direct course for heart failure, not a heart attack, failure. Wow!

At the end of November, following a TOE, I was referred for surgery, fairly urgently. It was terrifying for me and my family, but we didn’t have a huge amount of time to think. I would be having open heart surgery to remove my dodgy valve and replace it with a bionic, mechanical one.

Hundreds of questions go through your mind, here’s a selection … What is the failure rate? (2% death rate), How long does the valve last? (Over 100 years if you look after it), Will I need medication? (only anticoagulant tablets to stop clotting on the valve), Will I ever run again (Probably, depending on how it goes and your recovery, could be a year or so).

On 13th December 2025 I walked into hospital and under the care of Mr Bhabra and his team, underwent surgery. I came around in ICU, having felt like I’d been hit by a bus. This would be my home for the next couple of days before going to the cardiac care ward. The surgery was a success, I had a shiny new valve safely sewn into my heart and a long wound down my sternum where my chest had been cracked open.

The care from the team at the hospital was fantastic, I was encouraged to move around from day one and build up to painful shuffling laps of the ward with all my monitors/cannulas/heart probes attached (I counted 12 entry points at one stage).

The days, weeks and months that followed were hard work and I couldn’t have got through them without the support of Helen, the boys, friends and the support from a great Exercise Physiologist at Have a Heart Wolverhampton. RSM were also fantastic, my clients and teams were being taken care of.

I worked hard, but walking for even a few minutes made my heart rate spike out of the allowed range, so progress was slow, one day at a time. There is the dual challenge of a healing sternum and a healing heart. My aim, with the support and guidance from Chris at Have a Heart, was to run again at some point. After walking most days and building up to 6 miles of walking, my first run happened on 1st February 2026 – a walk to warm up, 2 minutes very slow running, 2 minutes walking (repeated 8 times) and then a warm down. It was so hard, I was nervous, my heart rate needed to be controlled and my sternum needed to stay intact. I might tick like the crocodile in peter pan (the mechanical heart valve), but I was a runner again.

I pushed on from there, steady and a number of firsts. First 5k, parkrun, 10k and finally, and amazingly, my favourite distance - the half marathon. I completed the Great North Run on 13th September (nine months post-surgery) and came full circle to complete the rather hilly Shrewsbury half marathon on 27th September 2026 in 1:45.

Onto my next challenge, the Rome Marathon in March 2027. I have only ever done one other marathon, Birmingham in 2017. It is a very long way and even though I am fit, at my age and with my condition and medication, training and completing this is a massive undertaking.

Charity fundraising is something I don’t do very often or take lightly, I don’t like asking for money. I think I have a decent case to make an exception here, and would welcome your support!

I am supporting two small charities who work hard at what they do on limited resources.

Have a Heart Wolverhampton – Chris and his team were instrumental in my recovery. They help people, one to one, day in day out through their heart recovery. Chris took the time to get to know me and what I wanted to achieve and took care of me, pushing me forward and holding me back. They always need to maintain and buy new equipment. I was particularly frustrated with one of the aged exercise bikes which reset when it was bored part way through my warm ups.

Heart Valve Voice – Phill and the team there are passionate about raising awareness, championing screening and early intervention and supporting people living through and dealing with heart valve issues and disease. I was lucky my issue was spotted, many people have BAVs without knowing until they get symptoms, which typically means a longer road to recovery. Early detection and intervention is life changing.

Please give what you can and I’d love to hear your messages of support!

All donations go to the charities and the funds will be split equally between the two charities.

The target is arbitrary, 5,000 is the roughly the average number of surgical aortic valve replacements in the UK each year.

Before and after …