The London Marathon

Tomorrow is the London Marathon and tens of thousands of people will be setting out on one of the biggest challenges of their life. The pressure to reach the finishing line is enormous and the physical challenge to the body is immense. I am in total awe of anyone who runs a marathon, let alone one with such a high profile and that is televised.

Everybody wants to be fit but finding the motivation to get out there in our running shoes is the hardest thing for most of us. Setting ourselves a goal of physical challenge on a certain date is one of the most effective ways of getting us into action. We have to plan our training over several months so that we don’t let ourselves, or our friends and family, down on the day. Getting to that finishing line is crucial.

In 2000 our Slimmer of the Year, Jeanne Mitheaux, had lost an amazing 12 stone – and then she discovered running. She was a school teacher and her pupils were so proud of her achievement that they wrote to me. Her weight loss was extraordinary.

That year Jeanne ran the London Marathon and I went along to support her. It was an extraordinary experience and the emotion I felt as almost tangible as I watched thousands of exhausted folk, from the really young to the extremely elderly, push themselves to the limit. I was crying as folk who were obviously beyond exhaustion, at the point of collapsing, looked as though they wouldn’t make it to the finishing point twenty yards ahead of them. It was heartbreaking to witness the pain in their faces. The crowd shouted out their names to encourage them for those last few feet to achieve their dream. When they finally swayed and staggered and then literally fell over the line, the cheer from the crowd was deafening. It was a privilege to witness such extreme human determination and perseverance.

When Jeanne ran over the line, still with fuel in her tank, I was proud beyond words. I imagined how different she must have felt when she was carrying around twelve stone of excess weight and here she was, having run 26 miles and feeling fantastic.

Our in-house PR Manager, Linda Parker and her husband Tony are running on Sunday for the first time. They are nervous and excited but after they have completed the event, they will feel that all the hours spent pounding the streets over recent months were worth it. They will have completed a very significant and memorable challenge and raised a lot amount of money for charity. They will feel on top of the world and no doubt they will be looking for their next challenge, after a very long hot bath.