Foreword:
Well I wasn't going to write this as it was always going to be a hard push to remember the year gone, and to not get tied up in posting too much stuff about each and every event I did in 2016. But then again I wanted to update everyone on how the fund raising went throughout the year and what was newly introduced and what worked well.
As many of you will know I started running in 2012 and it was for charity. All my years since have been centered around doing events and raising money with various success as I went with various charity running campaigns. 3 of the Best, 14RUNS and 14RUNS the Sequel to name a few.
Last year 2016 was supposed to be a step back and rest year, and I was only going to 'run for fun' as such and at a casual pace without running myself to death chasing PB's as I had picked up a bad hamstring injury in June 2015 that had not fully recovered.
I also was aware that I could not keep chasing friends and family for donations for my running exploits. This was why I set up my charity running group Run or Cake back in Feb 2015 so I could utilize a group of enthusiastic runners in a way that was mutually beneficial to us all as runners. I'll get back to this later.
2016 the year of run for fun runs....
So did I take it easy in 2016? Well if you have been reading my blogs you will know I didn't. It appears I clearly like hard runs or at least challenging ones, as I slowly one by one re entered the difficult ones I had done the year before as charity fundraising challenges.....
Hereby follows my month by month quick recap with the odd pic:
January - 17th Jan Helsby Four Villages Half Marathon at a casual paced 2hrs 9 mins with Run or Cake friends. Followed by a 9 mile walk to a train station that was actually open and almost getting hypothermia along the way!
February - 7th Feb Montane Grizedale Forest Half Marathon in a modest 2hr 26 mins for a hard trail course with 30 mph+ winds no less.
The 7th Feb was also the 1st Birthday of my Run or Cake group and we had a cracking meal out later that evening. At that point we had just broken the £2000+ raised milestone for our 5 charities :)
March - 20th March The Trimpell 20 a 20 mile run at Lancaster in 2 hrs 52 minutes with some fellow Run or Cake friends. A good day was had by all. It was tough at the end.
25th March The Calder Vale 10 Miler. A nice 10 mile hilly road race near Preston. Always a tough one but worth the cake at the end. Done in 1hr 18 minutes.
April - April was all training runs for the upcoming Excalibur Marathon.
May - 1st May was the Mad Bull Events Bluebell 10k through the lovely challenging Yarrow Park near Chorley. We had two river crossings in this event (See pic).
21st May Excalibur Marathon along the Clywdian hill range in North Wales. A very tough event which you can tell by my time of 5hrs 34 mins, an hour and a half slower than my typical road marathon. This event involves a lot of walking up big hills :)
This was also my first of 3 events for my ' 3 for PSP' charity campaign.
June - 5th June a run for fun at Llandegla Forest , a 24k event on a very hot day in 2hrs 28mins. A very enjoyable event.
12th June was the first of my new charity events for my Run or Cake group. The event was aptly called the Gru's Gruesome 10k and was through the local sand dunes range that I regularly train in. We raised an additional £300+ for our 5 charities by paying £5 each to run this event. A good tough day was had by all, especially in the pub afterwards :)
19th June and another great 10k event for fun, this time the Btr Liverpool Tunnel 10k, a run through the Mersey tunnel and up to New Brighton. I ran this one with a fellow running friend Keith.
July - 3rd July to 9th July was the 52 mile Btr Tour of Merseyside and a tough multi day event over 6 different terrains over 6 different distances in 6 different locations over 7 days (6 days of running with 1 day off in the middle). I had done this event two times before and I had a good year there this year I course PB'd on 4 out of 6 days, and it was my fastest overall time.We also had 30+ Run or Cakers at the event :)
22-23rd July was the Conti Run 24hr relay event in Shropshire. It was my 3rd year here and a great event. Sadly my looming knee problem became very apparent here. I managed 4 10k loops of the multi terrain course, but my knee was getting worse on each. Despite this a great time was had and some great times.
August - 7th August was the Hoad Hill Marathon at Ulverston in the Lake District and the second of three runs for the PSPA charity as part of my '3 for PSP' fundraising campaign.
I was very dubious about doing this as my knee was still getting sore on every training run, but I felt I could not back out as I was doing it all for charity and I was not prepared to fail. I had a great day and came in 19th place at 4hrs 13 mins. My knee at the end however was far from pleased and I now had a bad limp.
September - Well the 3rd September was my Seaside24 charity event that I had created and this was our 3rd event. I had rested as much as I could since destroying my knee at the Hoad Hill Marathon in August, and it was touch or go whether I could complete this event. The event entailed a group of 10 runners running as many individual 5k laps of my local Marine Lake in Southport. We were based at the Ramada Plaza Hotel which is where I work and they kindly gave us a meeting room as a base and provided some food and drink also. Thank you also to 51 Trattoria our local Italian restaurant who kindly provided two lots of meals for us for free (Thank You).
A great day and night was had and I managed 55 miles overall, and many off us got over 50 miles and a few over 60! We managed to raise a whopping £1400+ for our 3 charities.
25th Sept was a local 10k event again the Natterjack Running Seaside 10k around the Marine Lake ( I like the lake) this time I ran for fun again with my fellow running friend Keith again. I'm glad to say my knee held up ok.
October- Well October was a big month for me as I changed jobs as I had been struggling with anxiety for 6-9 months and had to do something about it. I chose to get a new job in a local Everlast gym on a part time basis and remain at the hotel just 1-2 days a week to ease the pressure the job involved. At present (Jan 2017 I am a lot better).
The 29th October was a big one for me as it was the Snowdonia Marathon a tough 26.2 miles of road with 2500+ ft of climb as you circumnavigated Mount Snowdon.
I had seriously cut back on the running to preserve my knee as much as I could. I was down to one training run a week and my longest training run was 16 miles.
This was my 3rd and final run for the PSPA charity and my final one of my '3 for PSP' fundraiser. I again couldn't back out as I wanted to see it through til the end. I actually had a stormin day and came in at 4hrs 1min, which was 35 minutes quicker than the previous year! Go figure, hardly any training and I pulled of my best run of the year.
I managed to raise over £700+ for the PSPA charity thanks to generous friends and family :)
November you will glad to know was my official rest period of the year to mend my damaged body and have a well earned rest from long runs or races. I did however win a Runners up award in the Merseyside Running Community Awards in the 'Charity Fundraiser' category for the 2nd year running. Very proud of that and I thank everyone that voted for me, and well done to the winner and the other runner upper :)
December - Well the start of Dec was mainly rest, but I came up with a new fundraising idea that I could put to my Run or Cake group and also to fellow running friends. It was called the '12 Days of Christmas & Reflection'.
The idea was that for everyday of the 12 days of Christmas you would commit to run/walk or cycle whatever distance you felt like and use it as 'me time' to chill and relax for half an hour during the madness of the festive period. The idea was to reflect on all that we have to be thankful for at this time of year, and not to get too caught up in the me,me me...I want, I want, I want commercialism of Christmas. We have a lot to be thankful for as individuals and it was a time to think about the charities we fund raise for throughout the year and the people the charities help.
To take part in the 12 days campaign the participants paid a voluntary £12 each or whatever they could afford. We raised an outstanding £700+ for our 5 charities, which for a last minute idea was a great result and a great end to the year!!
2017 and the future...
Well what does 2017 hold for me? I honestly don't know. My knee is looking like it has Meniscus tissue damage and likely a tear. This is likely to need surgery to fix properly as a long long waiting for it to heal itself very slowly is not a viable option for me.
I can still run short runs on it but no more. I have pulled out of two 50 mile events I was planning on doing in 2017 as part of my running advancement. Obviously it is not going to advance in 2017. I am still signed up for several trail and hill marathons again, so I am playing it by ear as to whether I can do them or not.
I was looking at advancing my run blogs and looking at hosting a run club for newbies in my local town, but with my now inability to run all year I have had to drop that.
I'm looking at improving my health and fitness by leaning toward a plant based diet as much as possible, so lots of fruit and veggies. Trying to avoid dairy where I can and meat for health purposes and because lets face it, it's cruel and it's destroying the climate and the planet. If you follow my Running With Gru Facebook page you will of seen I have started to post and share a lot of stuff about diet, plant based etc and various documentaries about what the modern day diet is doing to us all.
Fundraising recap
A quick recap of the charities I/we fund raised for in 2016 and many of which we still fundraise for with Run or Cake.
THHN - Torbay Holiday Helpers Network a charity for families of seriously ill children.
Mind - Mental health and awareness charity.
Alder Hey - Childrens Hospital.
Claire House - Childrens hospice.
MAMA Academy - Supporting Mums and Midwives to help babies arrive safely.
PSP Association - Progressive Supranuclear Palsy - Working for a World free of PSP.
CLFoundation - Community Link Foundation - Local charity 'Making a positive difference'.
The charity events I created in 2016, or have continued from previous years and I currently host on Facebook.
The Gru's Gruesome 10k - A local run event I created for the Run or Cake group. We raised an additional £300+ for our Run or Cake charities.
The Seaside24 - A yearly charity event I created to raise money for several different charities each year. We raised over £1400 in 2016 and a similar amount in 2014 and 2015.
3 for PSP - An additional charity campaign that I ran as an individual despite saying I wasn't going to in 2016. I was approached by a customer at work whose partner suffered with PSP (Progressive Supranuclear Palsy) which is a debilitating disease/condition that affects the brain. They asked for my help in fundraising for the charity that raises money for research into the condition as it at present has no known cure. Who was I to say no? I managed to raise over £700 with the help of friends and family by dedicating and doing my 3 hill marathons for that cause.
http://www.pspassociation.org.uk/
Run or Cake - My ongoing charity running group on Facebook. We have currently raised just over £5400 inc gift aid by committing to pledging a certain amount of runs each week on a weekly basis. If a runners fails their pledge that week, they have to pay a 50p forfeit to our fundraising page in place of the money they may well of spent on a well earned piece of cake had they actually completed their runs. It is a private group of upto 100 runners who are like family to each other.
Run and Cake is going to be the new Facebook sister page to Run or Cake (Run or Cake will remain private and capped at 100 members). Run and Cake will be open to all as a general running community, fundraisers or just friends. Watch this space it launches 8th Feb 2017.
Run and Cake page can be found here.
Final words.
Apologies for going for so long, but I wanted to get this all down before I forgot.
Just a massive THANK YOU to you all for following my blogs, for supporting me, for donating to our charities, for being at my various events and taking part as a runner or supporter. Thank you to all that have donated and thank you to all the #cakers who continue to amaze me daily with their kindness, commitment and compassion for others.
God bless you all, and please continue to follow my exploits in 2017 and beyond.
See you in 2017
