Racing to End Malaria: London Marathon 2012

A guest post from Peter Lighting who ran the 2012 London Marathon for Malaria Consortium raising over £1200!

I had wanted to run the London Marathon for ages and had applied in the ballot unsuccessfully for the last four years. So I was very excited when the Malaria Consortium's Finance Controller Stella Helps (who lives round the corner from me) told me she could get a place through the charity. I told her it was a dream come true. She didn't seem to believe me.

Thanks to the generosity of my friends and family (and also very kind donations from the good people who work with me at the Royal Bank of Scotland) raising money wasn't too difficult. Also it obviously helped that it is a great cause. I raised about £1200 in donations, including over £300 from a dress down day organised by the department I work for at the Royal Bank of Scotland, Trading Business Unit Control (BUC).

Training started for real at the beginning of 2012. I thought I'd add a bit of pressure by telling everyone I was going to do London marathon in less than three hours. So I had to do some training and I had to be organised. I started keeping a spreadsheet of all running I'd done. Apparently I've run 438km since the start of the year. I also thought it would be interesting to record all alcohol drinks I consumed. Apparently I've had 345 units.

On the morning of the marathon I felt pretty good. I went out a bit fast, doing the first half in an hour and 25minutes. It all felt nice and easy and was great to see my friends and family on the way. The second half turned out to be a lot harder and I had to ignore my friends and family. I hung on and finished in two hours and 58 minutes. After about half an hour of shaking, blurry vision, feeling sick and wanting to cry, I made a full recovery and went for a few drinks.  It was a great day.

Photo: Peter Lighting with his medal and mum, Liz.

To find out how you can get involved in fundraising activities to support the work of Malaria Consortium, take a look at our fundraising page or contact us on [email protected].