The BUPA Great North Run took place on Sunday, 30th September 2007 in Newcastle. The sight of 50,000 participants heading across the iconic Tyne Bridge as they made their way from Newcastle to South Shields, must have felt both inspirational and emotional to the many onlookers.
This event is the world's biggest half marathon and is so much more than just a 13.1 mile journey. We can marvel at the excellence of the elite runners but the biggest celebration surely must be the achievements of the thousands of unsung heroes running to raise much needed cash to help support their chosen charities.
The ladies race was won by American Kara Goucher in a time of 1:06.57 in her debut at the distance. Winner of the men's race was London Marathon Champion Martin Lel in a time of 1:00:10. But in among the throng of runners was Martin Kelso of HBOS plc, who chose to run for FAB Research. Martin, who is based in Edinburgh, completed his run in an impressive 1:51.
Martin admits to being neither a keen nor gifted athlete at school but increased his exercise activity in his 40's - mainly as a way of losing weight and improving his physical and mental wellbeing. He started off on the running machine in the gym and over the past four years has moved onto 10k and half marathon races. Says Martin, "The beauty of running is, it is simple, it requires little in the way of equipment and you always have a consistent benchmark to measure progress."
We asked Martin how he felt the race went on the day:
"I am by no means competitive but I enjoy the challenge of improving my personal performance. 2007 was my third Great North Run and the time of 1.51 was a personal best and a four minute improvement on last year. The race went well although I was concerned that I seemed to be going too fast - and so it proved - the period between the 11th & 12th mile was grim - I hit the wall or possibly it hit me. It took me almost 11 minutes to run that mile compared to an average of just over 8 minutes for the previous 11 miles. The sight of the finishing line is always good but I was not too tired and recovered quickly to enjoy the moment."
We are enormously grateful to Martin for selecting FAB Research as his chosen cause. It is down to the genuine and good heartedness of remarkable people like him, that so much can be achieved. Thank you Martin!