Hello peeps. Still working hard on prep for my big long walk across Scotland, but I have the small matter of a little run coming up also. This brings its own distractions.

Most of you will know that I was lucky enough to secure a place in the Virgin London Marathon, by a complete fluke, through a Strava challenge competition with Lucozade Sport.

As soon as I knew it was legitimate, I prepared training plans and was really happy with how things were going. A couple of half marathons in late September and early October showed that progress was good.

Whilst this was all going well, we sadly lost our beautiful Bracken in October, and I decided that all the events I have planned for 2019, would be in her memory, and that I would help raise funds for Search Dogs Sussex, a team close to our hearts, and with whom Bracken trained for many years.

The team operate across Sussex, but out of county assists are common.
It’s important to understand that the vulnerable individuals that they are called out to look for, either do not know they are missing, or do not want to be found. As part of the Lowland Rescue organisation, and a registered charity, they receive no funding from central government. Much like the RNLI, all volunteers are unpaid and self funding, so donations for kit and equipment are vital for the 24/7/365 dedication they give to our community.

Training continued, every step for Bracks. A knee injury hit me in early December 2018. I stopped running, knowing fine that the rest would help, and that I could re-start training early January. All good, and in early January I got back on it. So happy, no pain. Then several bouts of the cold and flu wiped out a lot of my training, but I did what I could, when I could. It was not going well.

The Big Half in early March was an opportunity to assess where I was, and what I needed to do, but the morning after, I could hardly weight bear on my right knee, and it was time to see the physio.

Alan Laws is amazing. I told him that as a competition winner, I couldn’t defer, and if I had to walk it I would. He was pleased with progress after a couple of weeks, and after 5 weeks, he gave me the green light to run again, and advised that I wasn’t to aim for sub 4 (oh how we laughed), and adopt a run walk strategy and enjoy a once in a lifetime experience.

So here I am Saturday 20th April, and in a weeks’ time I will be chilling out in preparation for the marathon on the 28th. I’m scared, excited, worried, but looking forward to it none the less. I will be wearing Lucozade branded kit, and come the middle of the week, I’ll post some links to follow me on the VLM app.

Bracken was more than just a dog. She was NEVER just a dog. The search team used to call her Princess Bracks, but she was elevated to the rank of Duchess, by a friend in West Cornwall. Because she was. She didn’t think she was a dog, she was a furry human, but she had her cheeky moments. She will always be missed, by many.

In memory of Bracken, if you would like to help Bracken’s Search Dogs Sussex buddies continue all of their hard work, I’d be really grateful if you could consider making a donation to the team.

Text ‘SEARCH’ to 70085 with any donation amount:
e.g.
SEARCH 5
SEARCH 10
SEARCH 15
SEARCH 20

Or alternatively drop by their page to donate via paypal, and see how your donation amout can help the team

http://searchdogssussex.com/donate.php (opens in a new window)

Thank You x