parkrunfans blog: The Hanley parkrun Half Marathon

parkrunfans blog: The Hanley parkrun Half Marathon: In case you are worried by the title, this isn't a parkrun rebellion against the 5km Saturday morning challenge. We just wanted to...

A call to arms!

Hello readers of my blog, this post may come across as a bit of a rant; its not intended to be such. More like me venting some frustrations.

As part of any fund raising campaign you try to gain as much coverage in the local media as possible and the bigger the fund raising event the more you try to push it out there and get people talking about it in the hope that it will bring in extra donations to the cause.

I got some disappointing news this week that BBC Radio Stoke are unable to give me air time as it clashes with Sport Relief and the news on the Olympic Torch relay. There are too many running news items!

When planning this years 6 Towns Run X2 I took into consideration lots of factors including trying to plan the timing around the big news items for the year. The Queens diamond jubilee, the torch relay through the city and off course the Olympics. In fact you’d be amazed at the level of planning that’s gone into the 6 Towns Run X2.

Pete Morgan (host of the breakfast show) will give me some shout outs which I’m thankful for but I’m slightly miffed that Sport Relief has pushed my endeavour out of the news.

Sport Relief does do a terrific job and raises huge sums of money and is ultimately responsible for my crazy running antics, as it was Eddie Izzard’s marathon running for Sport Relief that inspired me to do something good with my passion for running and willingness to put my health on the line for a good cause; so I’ll not diss anything or anyone that is out there trying hard to do good.

But what I want to get across is that I’m raising money for the Donna Louise Children’s Hospice in Stoke-on-Trent and that any money raised will directly affect the lives of local families who have a sick or life limited child.

I want to help to make peoples lives better and I can run ok so why not run a half marathon each day for 12 days in the hope it inspires people donate cash to the hospice and help them make every moment count and help me finish my challenge with a smile on my face knowing I’ve done something good for others.

So dear supporters, its up to us now to get the message out there and let people know what I’m doing.

So please like my face book page www.facebook.com /The-6-Towns-Run-X-2

follow me on Twitter @6townsrunner and share this blog.

If you have any media contacts then please feel free to contact them and ask for coverage. Its always been my belief that the more people who know what I’m doing the greater the chance of rising a good amount of money for the Donna Louise Trust.

I start running on Wednesday the 28^th, and if you think this is a good thing that I’m doing then lets get the story out there.

Thank you

In other news I’m relaxed ahead of the start which is just 4 days away as I write this blog.

All the hard training work is done now and I’m collecting a few last minute bits from my sport nutrition sponsor Bee Health Foods in Cheadle to help support me on the runs next week. I’m getting donations in daily at the moment which is really helping me. The T-shirts have gone down a storm and I can see me ordering more next week. So wish me luck and please tell everyone you know about my mad plan to run 12 half marathons in 12 days.

Cheers

Phil

http://www.justgiving.com/6Townsrunx2

Can you remember when you first saw the sky?

Imagine what it must be like as a new born baby to be taken outside for the first time, when your parents take you home from the hospital and you glimpse the sky for the very first time. You feel the chill of the air for the first time. It must be an amazing moment in our young lives; and something we very soon take for granted.

But when as a young new born you become ill, just as I did. Do your parents ever think “this could be the last time my baby feels the warmth of the sun or sees the outside world”?

At about 8 weeks old I started crying 2 hours after a feed.

I was taken to the doctor who said it was probably colic.

At three months old I started passing blood in my bowel motions and went to the Accident Unit, from there my parents had to take me to Bucknall Hospital and I stayed in their isolation ward.
The next day I was transferred to Cheethams Childrens Ward at the City General Hospital.
I wasn’t to see the sky for another 3 months.

My Mum now takes up the story:-

I used to catch the 10 o clock bus to the hospital and stay with you all day until your Dad finished work, he would stay about an hour and then we went home for our tea.
We kept asking what was wrong with you but they kept saying that until they were sure they didn’t want to say anything.

You were put on a drip which started out in your arms, then your legs and finally in your head.

You had bloody diarrhoea most of the time and you were losing a lot of weight until one nurse suggested that you be given ‘Bengers’. This was something like Complan and overnight you gained 8 ounces.
Sometimes we could not see the blood but it was still there, they call this occult blood because its hidden.

One day when we got home I couldn’t settle and so we came back to the hospital and you were just lying there shivering.  You’d had a high temperature all day and so the nurses had put a fan on you.  That was the night we nearly lost you.

One day I went to our GP and told him that I wanted to know if my baby was going to die because you did not seem to be getting any better and no-one would tell us anything.  He seemed quite upset by my question and offered me a cigarette and both of us smoked a cigarette in his surgery!
He phoned the hospital and asked the consultant if he could tell us what was wrong and what the outcome might be and it was only then that they started talking about a milk allergy.

Then your consultant went on holiday and a different consultant was doing the ward rounds instead and one day he just said that he thought you should come home.

You were at home for a couple of weeks and you got a chest infection and ended up back in hospital for two weeks. 
Then you got diarrhoea again and this kept happening, you would come home and then have to go back in.  I think you spent almost 6 months of your first year in hospital.

 It was several weeks before we were told that you were allergic to milk.

I can now drink milk and am a perfectly healthy individual but I’m one of the lucky one’s. I got better, some don’t. Some children are not so fortunate and this is where the Donna Louise Children’s Hospice is so vitally important.
They help to make sure that each child has a full and happy life for as long as they are with us; and this is one of the main reasons I’m willing to put my body on the line and run 12 half marathons in 12 days for them.

The work they do is some of the most valuable and if through my running I can help them continue this work and help others through difficult times then it will be worth all the aches and pains I’ll go through as I push my body beyond what its capable of and run 157 miles over 12 days.

If you’d like to support me then please have a look at my JustGiving Page http://www.justgiving.com/6Townsrunx2

And remember to look at the sky and try to imagine what that must be like if it’s the first time you’re looking at it. Life is amazing and so are you.

Thank You

A short biography of the 6 Towns Run

I run in Stoke-on-Trent, it’s a city in Staffordshire and for people who aren’t familiar with Stoke-on-Trent it’s actually made up of 6 individual and quite unique towns.

In 2010 the city celebrated its centenary having been formed by a federation of the six separate towns in 1910. The settlement from which the federated town (it was not a city until 1925) took its name was Stoke-upon-Trent, where the administration and railway station were located. After the union, Hanley emerged as the primary commercial centre in the city and is now the city centre. The Towns are from north to south, Tunstall, Burslem (known as the mother town), Hanley, Stoke, Fenton and Longton.

 In March that year while at home in front of the TV I watched a Sport relief program about Eddie Izzard who is a hilarious comedian that I love. Though this program was no joke as Eddie had taken it upon himself to run 42 marathons in 50 days with just 5 weeks training!

 It inspired me and I immediately started thinking what I could do within my home city. The year before I’d ran the Tree Tops 10k which is a charity race for the Donna Louise Children’s Hospice in Stoke-on-Trent. I raised £100 for them from that race.

So it was easy for me to say “hey how about I run an endurance event for the children’s hospice”!

And so as part of the year long centenary events I developed the 6 Towns Running challenge and mapped out a half marathon distance run through each town careful not to over lap too much with the other towns and created The 6 Towns Run. 6 half marathons in 6 towns in 6 days!

It was a huge success and I raised just over £1000 for the hospice.

Throughout 2011 I always had it in mind to do another charity run in 2012 and by October / November time I’d decided I’d bring back the 6 Towns Run and run 12 in 2012.

As the Donna Louise Hospice is the only children’s hospice in North Staffordshire and South Cheshire and with twice the amount of half marathons to run this time I could take the 6 Towns Run out to new places.

So I’m very pleased to be running through Newcastle-under-Lyme, the Staffordshire Moorlands and South Cheshire as well as running new routes through Stoke-on-Trent and revisit some of my original 6 Towns Run routes too.

I started training at the beginning of December 2011 and now as I edge ever closer to the start date of 28^th March all I can say is “bring it on. I’m about as ready as I’ll ever be”

Please support me and help make this worthwhile http://www.justgiving.com/6Townsrunx2 please give what you can.

I’ve been working so hard to achieve this and I promise you that no matter what condition I’m in; if I have to crawl, hop or drag myself around. I will do this and complete 12 half marathons in 12 days (157.2 miles).