I'm raising money for the Liberty Tea Rooms and Community Hub - a fantastic community cafe in the centre of Hemel Hempstead that offers a warm welcome for all, CMA debt advice, CAP money courses, occupational therapy and many reasons for our guests to feel more hopeful about their futures. We can't survive without donations from good people like you so please consider supporting our guests and volunteers by making a donation.

I got involved with the Tea Rooms last year when a good friend, who was chair of trustees at the time, took me along to meet the founders, Kerry-Ann and Owen. I was really taken aback by the warmth of their welcome for everyone they met, and how many of the people who initially came for some help themselves ended up staying to volunteer so they could help others. I felt I really wanted to be a part of such an amazing group of people and I’m now chair of trustees myself.

I’ve also wanted to get into proper fell running for many years. I’ve enjoyed running in the Chiltern Hills close to home but I wanted to try something bigger and more adventurous and so I signed up for this race. I’m comfortable with the 20km distance but I didn’t fully appreciate how big 1200m of ascent in a race would feel until I started training. So far I can manage 400-500 of ascent in a single run, but I still have some more training to do to be ready. By way of comparison, summit day when I climbed the Matterhorn in 2022 was the same amount of climbing as this run. Thankfully my friend David is running with me so I won’t be on my own!

Please do consider supporting if you can and/or praying or hoping that we have a nice cool, clear day for it!