Southampton Half Marathon 2015

 

The Southampton Half Marathon (and also the 10K run) took place on Sunday 26th April.

Karl Swanbrook from the Daily Echo was running for Leukaemia Busters.  He says:

The run went fantastic and was an absolute honour to run for your charity. To be a part of the first Southampton Half Marathon was something that I will always remember and will continue to do each year that we have it on our doorstep. I have entered half marathons before, and none of them match up to this one.

Running through and past historic parts of Southampton made it all the more special, as it was my hometown. Up until Sunday, the furthest I had run was 11.5miles, so it took a little bit more to run the extra 1.6miles to reach the 13.1mile distance of the Marathon.

I finished the Marathon in a Personal Best time of 1hour and 46mins (only half an hour after the first place!)

The whole event was perfect and very well organised. The general public really lifted each runner to put that little bit more in, and boy did they do their job well.

It was an incredible honour to have raised money for Leukaemia Busters, and I am only sorry it was not more. When we were first approached about running the marathon, there was no mention of having to do so for a charity, it was out of pure love of running that each of the Daily Echo team were approached. With one week to go before the big day, I asked whether I could raise money for a charity because knowing that I would finish and knowing that my love for running could help someone / some people by raising money – I wanted to do something that would help, especially a local charity.

Leukaemia has affected many age groups of my family, and I felt that your charity was the one that instantly touched me to do something.

I will be running many more marathons and hope to one day be accepted for the London Marathon, and I will ALWAYS now run for your charity.

Karl raised a total of £326.18.  Thank you Karl from all of us at Leukaemia Busters