Bridport: Plumber started London Marathon in West Bay (From Bridport and Lyme Regis News)

Bridport: Plumber started London Marathon in West Bay

11:00am Saturday 28th April 2012 in Local News By Rene Gerryts

Bridport plumber Gordon Childs wasn’t content with starting the London Marathon at Blackheath – he started his run from West Bay.

Mr Childs, 30, set off from West Bay last Monday to run to the 182 miles to London in time for the race.

He made it in time to run around the capital on Saturday but got knocked over by a bicycle and, combined with his bruised and battered shins, didn’t think he’d finish in under seven hours.

Mr Childs said: “I ran a marathon every day until I got to London on the Friday in time to run around London on Saturday and do the race on Sunday.

“I am paying for it a bit now though. Where I was running for so many days and through horrible conditions with the weather so bad all my shins are bruised and battered from the pounding.

“I thought I was going to struggle on Sunday because on Saturday I got knocked over by a bike.

“I dusted myself off and dug deep and managed to do it in four hours 44. I didn’t think I’d be able to complete it in under seven hours.”

No stranger to running Mr Childs would have been aiming for a time of under three hours – if he hadn’t chosen to run to London first. His training consisted of running 15 miles every day.

He added: “I run all the time anyway but not that far. I just had to train myself to run on tired legs all the time.”

Mr Childs was raising money for CLIC Sergeant because his 16-year-old nephew Matthew Gardener suffered with cancer in 2008. He is in remission now but his uncle wanted to repay the debt to the children’s cancer charity and hopes to have raised £3,000.

Runners' efforts boost charities

Tired but triumphant the West Dorset marathon contingent can hold their heads up after all successfully completing the race and raising thousands.

Bridport Round Tablers Simon Miles and Simon Wakely were raising money for the Children’s Wish fund and between them managed around £7,600.

Mr Miles said his first ever marathon went much better than expected and although he didn’t run it quite as fast as he hoped, he still finished in a respectable four hours 58 minutes.

Mr Wakely pulled a muscle in his knee and thought he would not even be able to enter at all so was pleased to have made it round in five hours and 18 minutes.

He said: “It was a very painful experience and my knees are like footballs but it was worth it.”

Both said the support of the crowd and from friends and family made it possible and they, in common with all the runners, said they couldn’t thank everyone enough.

John White, 61, said he was jubilant to still be breathing at the end, not to mention making it in four hours 27 minutes and raising £2,100 for the Wessex Cancer Trust.

He said passing all the wonderful historic landmarks cheered on by the crowd was a fantastic experience and catching glimpses of his support crew’s Union flag bedecked Jersey cow balloon never failed to give him a lift.

Bridport Medical centre doctor Dr Li Von Schack, having run the Paris marathon in three hours 45 minutes was in a start group that included the likes of Gordon Ramsey, said she’ll probably never do another London Marathon.

“Just because it doesn’t get any better than that!” she said.

She ran it in three hours and 55 minutes, raising nearly £5,000 for the Barrett oesophagus cancer charity campaign.

She said: “My highlight was hearing a shout from a Bridport woman saying ‘Go on Bridport GP’ when I was flagging at 23 miles.”

Nurse Lucy Woolmington, from West Bay, who was running for Leukaemia Care, managed to beat her self-imposed target in under five and a half hours.

Tired, aching but happy, Lucy, 28, who hoped to raise £2,000, said it was an amazing experience.

And former Colfox head of design Stephen Yates, who was motivated to run his tenth marathon for the NSPCC’s Childline because of the abuse he suffered as a boy said it was a fantastic day. Mr Yates, 59, from Beaminster raised £2,000 and ran it in four hours 25 minutes.