03/09/2026
Contemplating life before he realised what he signed up for 😮💨
September is Blood Cancer awareness month, and we thought it would be the perfect time to get you up to speed on how Alex’s training for the London Marathon is coming on. To show you how grateful he is for all of your generosity in helping him get closer to his fundraising target, he’s used some of his remaining energy to power up the old brain and put it into words himself:
Sub-30 5K. ✅
Something that genuinely didn’t feel remotely realistic when I started all of this.
I’ve been pretty quiet with the running updates for the last couple of months. The pub has been absolutely relentless over the summer, so posting about training has taken a bit of a back seat.
But the training itself hasn’t stopped.
The last two months have included a bit of everything - shin splints that forced me to back off for a while, trying to drag myself through runs during the heatwaves, and plenty of sessions that definitely weren’t pretty.
But there’s been some proper progress too.
My long runs are now up to 15km, I’m averaging around 30km a week, the shin splints have settled down and, most recently, I managed to set a new 5K PB and finally break that 30-minute barrier.
For plenty of runners a sub-30 5K probably isn’t particularly exciting. For me, it feels massive.
Every little milestone like this makes London feel slightly less ridiculous than it did when I first signed up.
The next big target is the Lincoln Half Marathon, and then the real work towards London begins.
Most importantly, none of this has changed the reason I’m doing it. I’ll be running the London Marathon for Blood Cancer UK, in memory of my Grandad Francis.
I’ve been quiet on the fundraising side as well, so that changes from here too.
There’s a long way still to go - both in miles and fundraising - but we’re moving in the right direction.
Road to London is properly back. ❤️
