Running. And running

I've gradually been getting more interested in running.  I started off going to the gym to lose a bit of weight and get a bit fitter for when R made an appearance.  I didn't see the point of the treadmill.  I tried the treadmill one day, could barely run five minutes, didn't see the point.  I tried it again another day, could barely run ten minutes, started to vaguely see the point.  But didn't want to go anywhere outside where I could be seen.

Now a charity I've done a lot of work with in the past are one of the official charities of the 2013 Virgin London Marathon.  I was approached to run for them and I volunteered.  So now I've got the challenge of running a marathon.

Actually, this is pretty exciting.

I'm having to take training a bit more seriously.  From the stage where I was massively overweight and unfit I can now run 11k.  I'm slow- very slow- but I can do it.  It is such a buzz to be able to do something I couldn't ever do before.  I want to do more, more, more.  I'm still overweight and unfit but I can do things other people can't do.  People seem genuinely impressed at me managing the distance.

I still think that I am very possibly completely mad for agreeing to do this, although bizarrely I now find the fundraising target more intimidating than the distance.  I know I can do a quarter marathon a full nine months before the event.  If I keep training I'll be fine, I'm sure I will.  Extremely slow, no doubt, but that's not my target.  My target is to get round the course, I don't care too much about the time, I know I'm not at the level of the good amateur runners who can run it in less than four hours.  If I get round in five I'll be ecstatic.

My first challenge now is to run the Great North 10k next month.  I'm doing it for me but asking for sponsorship for a fantastic charity- the Freeman Hospital's Childrens Heart Unit Fund- as an excuse to get some cash for them as much as anything.  I'm running for my own pleasure- something I never thought I would do a year ago- but want to make some money for a deserving cause too.  That place saved my sister-in-law's life on more than one occasion, it means so much to my family.

The obligatory sponsorship link for that is here:  http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/arctictroll
As for the big event, the London Marathon, I'm running it as part of a team.  The charity is YouthNet, an online charity supporting young people, and I've done work with them for 12 years now.  Both working with them in terms of raising money and awareness, or just sharing my knowledge, but also as that dreaded term "service user".  The community helped me when I was at my lowest, it probably kept me alive, and now with my family it's time to repay the favour.  They're developing a new project to help people- young and old- combat loneliness using social and online tools in conjuction with Age UK and I just think the whole thing is fantastic.  I'm running the marathon as a team of "young runners" (flattery gets one everywhere, I've not been called young for years now!) who have used the service in the same way as I have.

Again, anything you might be able to spare would be wonderful.  I'll be asking several thousand times more in the next nine months, don't you worry (and don't you DARE block me either), but the link's here: www.virginmoneygiving.com/team/TheSiteRunsForIt.

In the meantime, this blog I think will mostly become a whingefest about how hard the training is.  I want to keep the optimism for posterity; well, for a 20 mile run in the snow in November, anyway.