Thank you for visiting my web page. I am running in this years London Marathon in support of the Elimination of the Leukaemia Fund (ELF).

My name is Don, I am 60 years of age, retired and live in Suffolk with my wife Carol and daughters Adeline and Elli. We have a dog, Santos, who is my running partner, and two cats.

I consider myself very fortunate to have been able to retire relatively early while still fit and active. Life in general has been pretty kind to me and I have had a good innings so far. Now I feel I would like to give something back. During my career, successfully undertaking challenges has given me great satisfaction, and therefore, whatever charitable activity I undertake, it also needs to pose some sort of personal challenge for me. Out of this thinking was born the idea of raising money by running the London Marathon. Although I played football for many years, I have never done any endurance running, and therefore a twenty six mile run for charity seemed like a good idea! And so, last November, I contacted CRunCH, the charity runners clearing house, to see if one of the charities supported by the Flora London Marathon had a last minute place available.

Many years ago, David Hammond, a promising young technical assistant who worked for me, developed Leukaemia and sadly died after about 18 months suffering. Then, some years later, Claire Dilley, a close friend of my daughter developed the disease, but thankfully she recovered after an extensive and painful treatment programme. Finally, only a few years ago, leukaemia struck much closer to home when my elder sister, Jean, was diagnosed with the disease at the age of 60 – she died 6 weeks later. So when ELF (via CRunCH) offered me a place in the London Marathon, it seemed almost as if fate had played a hand. It felt as if ELF had chosen me rather than the reverse.

We moved to Suffolk about two years ago after I retired and as a “retirement project” we spent the next 18 months converting on old barn into our future home. This was a great challenge and was all-consuming both physically and mentally – that was until we moved-in last September.

After the typical house moving hassles we settled down and relaxed for the first time in ages. A few months later I started to get a bit restless. Now, with the barn finished, there seemed to be something missing -- I began to realise I was in fact retired! And therefore, as they say, “now it was time for something completely different”.