Cranfield team run London Marathon for Hearing Dogs
Date: Sunday May 13, 2007
Steve Allum, full time MBA student at Cranfield University, persuaded a team of his colleagues to run the London Marathon this year in aid of Hearing Dogs for Deaf People. The charity means an enormous amount to Steve, as he has been the recipient of hearing dog Bobby since 1995.
It was a great day out – despite missing the start completely due to the entire DLR failing at 8am!! We had to walk for over an hour once we managed to get off the train to the start – so that was 4.5 miles done before we had even gone anywhere! (We were not alone here – they reckon that between 5-10000 runners missed the start – which was a shame though as we did not get all the pre race build up which is supposed to be so special in London!)
The team all waited however for everyone to turn up and we all ran together for the entire 26.2 miles, swapping in and out of the costume every two miles to make it a real team effort.
We got great support from the crowd and other runners all the way round when they saw the costume coming and our army of supporters of both family and friends from Cranfield were there to cheer us on and deliver essential high energy foods at strategic points!
Apparently it was the hottest London Marathon on record so we all had to ensure we stayed hydrated and as cool as possible – not easy as by the time we got to the mile eight water station they had already run out of water as people were taking so much in an attempt to stay cool, we managed it though and no one passed out from heat exhaustion.
The ‘dog’ officially crossed the line in 5 hours 28 minutes and 13 seconds (slightly longer than our five hours we were aiming for – but we put that down to the heat!), but most importantly we finished as a team (ahead of a team of 20 paratroopers who we passed in the last two miles! I thought those guys were tough? They did not look amused to being overtaken by a 40ft sausage dog)
The biggest problem we had en route was clearing the slower runners in front of us out of the way of the on coming costume
It was an amazing experience though and together we have raised over £25000 for Hearing Dogs for Deaf People – which is a fantastic result.
And finally – they reckon that once you have done one marathon you will do another – NO CHANCE!