Well its official, I am now entered into the Virgin London Marathon 2013 so theres no turning back now!  Given my medical history especially the past year or so where I’ve had knee surgery which confirms that I need a full knee replacement and had severe allergy/skin problems I must be insane to be doing this but its something that I’ve always wanted to do, and I’ve been entering every year for years and finally this year I got accepted!  Luckily I was able to defer until next year due to injury but I can’t do that again so next year is it!

I have no illusions though – I will be walking the entire course and it will take me (at best) 8.5 hours and probably at worst over 10 so I’m not expecting there to be much of a crowd or even official people/photographs by the time I get to the end.  What I do hope to achieve though is the feeling of satisfaction for having completed it (might not feel that on the day!), and raising money (hopefully a lot) for charity which is going to include my Dr cousins charity in Zambia to help those who are orphaned or made destitute by HIV/Aids.  I shall probably also raise money for another charity at the same time but I can’t at the moment decide between Cancer Research or Alzheimers Society. Hmmm…

I’m already in training by doing the Midnight Walk for our local Martlets Hospice (http://www.justgiving.com/Caroline-Sturtridge) which is going to be 13 miles which is a good test.  I’m following their suggested training plan for it as much as I can and once we’ve done the walk, I’ll speak to a personal trainer friend about extending my training for the Marathon.

When I’ve completed the Marathon, I’ll then think about going on the knee replacement waiting list.  Its a bit scary though, so will see if the training helps it!