Well That Wasn't The Plan!

It's now a year since my world record attempt and things have started to settle down again so it seems a good time to write about the experience, the build-up and the aftermath! Today I am going to blog about the build-up to the challenge and the reasons around the sudden date change and over the next 20 days I will type up my diary from the challenge itself a day at a time.

Originally the plan had been to set off in early August and finish on the 7th September - the day of the Rio Paralympic Opening Ceremony. This had been the plan for well over a year and I'd made as much progress as possible with organising the challenge but I'd been hindered in that by my former club. My former coach, JA, had told me in early 2015, that the club would give me their full backing and provide all the spares I would need for the challenge. I was told the same thing by the club president, DW, who added I should "Do what you need to do to make your dream happen". I asked if I could have Camilla, a former club committee member as my project manager and again was told to do what I needed to do to make it happen. There had been a bit of a fall out at the club over the previous weeks but I wasn't sure what the details were as I wasn't part of the 'in crowd' so I never really got given any updates of the day to day things at the club. I had spoken to DW at the 2015 Great Manchester Run and offered to travel to London to act as a mediator in a meeting to try and sort things out between the warring parties. I was told everything was ok and not to worry so I left it at that. Anyway, two weeks after I had been given the go ahead to have Camilla involved I received a phone call from DW telling me it had been decided that I now couldn't have her involved and it was down to me to tell her. I really didn't appreciate that, I'd asked permission, was given the permission but then had it removed and been told I was the one that had to deliver the bad news. Camilla is an absolute powerhouse when it comes to organising things, she’d planned to drive for the full trip and do all the cooking so it was a big blow being told I now couldn't have her on board.

I was then summoned down to London to one of the Charity's Trustee's meetings so "we can discuss how the charity and trustees can help you". Great, we seemed to be getting somewhere - or so I thought! The first meeting was cancelled because JA and DW couldn't make it. Two months later I was asked to attend the next meeting, JA and DW weren't present again so it made the point of cancelling the first meeting a tad questionable. I went into the meeting expecting it to be about how they could help me so I was in a great mood and really excited about making this challenge a success and raising lots of money for the charity which was set up to support the club. As we entered the building where the meeting was to take place the owner of the building, charity Trustee and one of the biggest sponsors of the club Paul Clark gave me a funny look and pulled the chairman of the trustees out of the room to "have a quick word". It was obvious at the time the quick word was about me but I later learned he was checking if I was safe to talk to or if I was on "Team Camilla". This is a man who runs a multi-million pound business not a 13 year old girl in the playground.

Once everyone arrived we sat through the most boring hour imaginable listening to an insurance expert chatting about all the ins and outs of the club’s cover. When the insurance man left the room Paul stood up and announced he would have to go too as he didn't want to miss a football match on the TV. I'm not easily offended but I did think what a cheeky bastard, giving me a summons to go down and talk through my plans with them, a round trip of 11 hours driving and he didn't even have the decency to listen to what I had to say. When I did get to speak to the remaining Trustees I was really shocked by their attitude towards me. I was planning on pushing my wheelchair 900 miles to raise money for their charity but from the response I got you'd have thought I was planning on shitting on their car bonnets. They started by having a go at me about inviting Camilla to be involved, when I pointed out that I’d been told this was ok by both JA and DW they seemed a bit shocked. I even offered to show them all the exact text conversation if they wanted to see it. They then moaned about the lack of time left to organise things - they would have had absolutely nothing to organise if they left me alone with the team I had put together. It was their choice to make me sack Camilla, it was their choice to make me wait to go and see them and I had been putting plans in place for 18months. After we passed that discussion I was then attacked by one trustee in particular, Brian he was nasty and aggressive:

"We'd like a doctor's note to say you are fit enough to take this on"

"What if you fail and people want their money back"

"Is it legal?"

"What if you fail? It'll make the club look bad"

"If you get ill and injured it'll look bad on us"

"If you don't finish it could harm JA and DW's reputation."

"What if you spend more than you make in donations."

“How flexible is the 28 days? Can you keep going if you fall behind?”

“Is your body and your health up to this?”

“What makes you think you can do this when you haven’t done anything like it before?”

On and on and on he went basically telling me I was shit and wouldn't make the finish line in 28 days. It was awful, I knew I had a couple of allies in the room but both were too timid to stick up for me so I took a massive bashing! I think they had misunderstood the situation. I wasn't there to ask their permission to follow my dreams - who are they to tell me which challenges I can and can't do? I was there to tell them that I was doing it, I was doing it at the time I had been planning on for 18 months and I was going to complete it in the time I wanted to. The things I was there to ask from the charity was if they wanted the sponsorship I raised or not? and if they did were they going to help organise the event? The meeting ended with me on the verge of tears and with one of the trustees, Tania, saying she would think about helping to organise it and she would give me a call in a couple of days once she had decided if she could help or not. Myself and one of the junior athlete's mums who was also there to talk about fundraising were asked to leave the room whilst the trustees spoke about something confidential and she could not believe how they had spoken to me and how rude they had been.

The next day I drove home from London, tired and angry. Angry at the fact I was trying to do something positive to help the charity out but I'd been left in no uncertain terms that they didn't think I was capable and they were less than interested in helping make the journey any easier for me. Obviously they didn't have any problem with taking the sponsorship money. Once home I put together a group of people to help organise things for me, thinking that when Tania got in touch I could impress her with what had already been done. I had completely the opposite reaction from these people, I asked a few people if they would help - they all agreed but more impressively I had a lot of people come to me asking me if they could help. I gave out jobs to people and we cracked on with it. I started getting radio interviews where, despite the way the trustees treated me, I sang the praises of the charity. Tania who was supposed to phone in a few days took a few weeks to get back to me but she did say she wanted to be involved with the challenge.

The next few months consisted of what I am now 99% sure was a two-pronged attempt to get me not to start my challenge. On one front I had Tania stalling at every opportunity, I lost count of the number of times a phone call finished with "I'll call you on Thursday at 6PM with an answer.". When she actually meant "I'll call you a week on Thursday at 10PM without an answer.". The rest of the team that we assembled were waiting on information that only somebody from the club or charity could give us. Marketing and media people couldn't do what they needed to do without links for sponsorship, kit couldn't be ordered without the logos, text giving numbers were needed, lots and lots of 5 minute jobs needed to be done by Tania or someone at the club/charity to allow the rest of the team to get on with the real work.

 At the same time, I had JA's friend Sue constantly sniping at everything I did and taking every opportunity she could find to knock my confidence. I ran the club's Facebook page and had taken the likes from 700 when I took over to 1900 in just a few months but nothing I did was good enough for her. I was constantly getting snotty texts, phone calls and emails asking why this or that hadn't been posted, the reason was always the same either I was not told about it or I was at work and couldn't just drop everything and put a post on Facebook right at that second. She would also be constantly mentioning how unfit I was and how far I was behind where I should be. All of the ‘In-crowd’ completely stopped supporting the Facebook page around the same time, obviously on team orders. One of the worst times was during a family meal I’d been sent four texts, three emails and had three phone calls telling me to post something on the club's Facebook immediately. Even after I’d explained I was in a restaurant for an important family anniversary they wouldn’t wait for an hour and I ended up sat in my car in the car park composing a post not about the club but about an athlete who has a paid PR person running his own Facebook athlete page dedicated to his achievements; which is never updated. I’m sure this was all aimed at making me feel unwanted and to knock my confidence for the challenge.

In March I wasn't invited to the Lisbon Half Marathon, a race JA has close ties with and a race I had been invited to 7 times in a row. It became obvious that it was no coincidence that I wasn't invited when slower athletes from my club appeared on photos at the race and then they, the coaches, some volunteer cyclists and Sue travelled south after the race for warm weather training. Warm weather training after the Lisbon race had actually been something I suggested the previous year as a good pre track season boost for the club. I’d spoken to Sue on four occasions the week before she went to Portugal, I had spoken to several of the athletes involved too and not one of them mentioned the fact they were going. Who doesn't mention the fact they are going abroad to do a race and then go warm weather training in the next few days when you are talking to somebody about racing and training? Definitely team orders again. I was upset and hurt by it, JA was supposed to be my coach – I hadn’t had any training programme from her since she found her new favourites 18 months earlier but she was still supposed to be looking out for me. The athletes involved were supposed to be my team mates, more than that, they were supposed to be my friends.

Even after all of this I was still aiming to do my challenge and raise money for this charity, looking back I should have taken the hint and jumped ship but I didn’t. Like a goofy Labrador I just kept trying harder and harder to please them.

Eventually Tania decided to travel north to meet with myself and Carly, the lady I had coordinating the volunteers up here. I paid for afternoon tea at a nice local country café for everyone and the meeting started ok but ended with Carly and Tania having a slanging match over the table. It was both highly embarrassing and extremely entertaining. The snobbish, southern, rich tory girl versus the common as muck, northern, skint, Jeremy Corbyn groupie. One with a disabled daughter, the other with an incurable lung disease. Both trying to play ‘Top Trumps’ with how difficult their lives were. I didn’t know if I should laugh or cry. This was my dream and I had two gobshites going at it in a fancy café with everyone looking. Even my dad, who is the master at saying the wrong thing at the wrong time in the wrong place was sat there shocked into silence. The meeting/verbal MMA match resulted in Carly pulling out of the organising group, which caused more delays whilst I got everything back from her and replied to emails she’d been ignoring. Thankfully my dad and a good friend Elouise stepped up and took on more work organising.

All of this fannying around had got us to June. 11 weeks to go and not much sorted for the trip, I’d been inspired by some friends who had run an ultramarathon the day before to try a long push. I did 30 hilly miles in Rossendale, in very hot conditions with no food or water with me. Doing this training session was key to giving me the confidence to deal with what was to happen next. I had never pushed more than a marathon before that day and I had never pushed more than 22 miles in Rossendale with it being so hilly. I seemed to cope with the mileage really well, so well that I felt fine to go out that night on a date. It wasn’t our first date but I was still on best behaviour – I’d been single for nine years at that point and although it was early days I was smitten. Whilst on the date my phone rang in my pocket, I felt bad that I hadn’t switched it off like I normally would on a date. I went to take my phone out of my pocket and switch it off but I accidentally answered the call. I noticed it was Tania and as calls from her were like hens’ teeth I decided to excuse myself and take a quick call.

Tania had phoned to tell me the three sponsors she had managed to find so far were pulling out because somebody else was going to do the challenge before me. That somebody else happened to be Justin, a lad I considered to be my best friend at the club. Oddly he is the chairman of the club and he had planned on stealing my challenge to raise money for his own charity – not the one connected to the club he was chairman of! Tania went on to accuse me of stealing Justin’s idea and trying to do it in secret! What a ridiculous thing to say when I’d been asking the charity and the club for help for well over 18months. She then suggested I did a different challenge at a different time. I honestly wanted to stick my fist through a door but I was sat in front of my date trying to be all respectable. I didn't even swear - bloody miracle! I ended the conversation by saying I was very disappointed in Justin, JA, DW and the club in general and that the phone call had confirmed that they had been undermining everything I had been planning. I told her I would have to consider my future at the club but in reality I had already decided enough was enough. I just about managed to hold it together for the rest of the date but my mind was working overtime.

Everybody at the club knew what I was planning and they had all known for well over a year so there is no chance people hadn’t mentioned it to the chairman! Also, I suspect Tania was helping Justin by giving him my route and logistics – I don’t believe he had suddenly organised this challenge at this time just out of the blue. He was aiming to scupper my plans.

I got home at just gone midnight after the date and there was no way I was going to sleep, I started planning my next move. I was awake all night doing sums to see what options I had the funds for. I text my good friend Ed the next morning once I had a skeleton of a plan. Ed is very switched on and knows me well enough to tell me to shut the fuck up if I am talking bollocks. He was angry about what the club had done to me but he was working. I went to see him that evening and we discussed everything I had planned, he agreed with me and came up with some cracking ideas to help make it happen. That’s it we were off, I was going to Lands End in 6 days time. I could have cried when he said he was going to drive the first two weeks of the trip with me. He was telling his bosses that he was taking the time off work. I didn’t yet have a vehicle to drive but I planned on getting a tow bar fitted to my car and buying a caravan if I needed to. There was so much to organise and not enough time to do it. I hadn’t done the training I had planned and there was no time to do it. I didn’t have the spares I needed, no volunteers, nowhere to stay each night, no food or supplements …. etc etc.

The next day I let a very small group of people know what was happening and that it needed to be kept secret. I wanted to set off and do the first 5 days in secret in case Justin decided to try and chase me down. I knew I could trust these people 100% all of them helped to get things ready. I chose a new charity to support, The 53 Foundation, who help disabled people get active. Dave and Amy from The 53 Foundation were really keen on the challenge and gave off such positive vibes – a welcome change from months and months of negativity from the original charity/club. I phoned Camilla and apologised for the way I had treated her, I asked her to be involved and she jumped at the chance and her advice was going to be valuable to me. Elouise took joint control of organising the group with myself, she was to take the reins fully when I was on my way and I have no idea if the challenge would have happened without her. My dad and sister worked hard helping me with the route, ordering spares, trying to get sponsors and logistics. Other friends worked on gathering PR and media contacts ready to go, campsite details and lots of other things that needed to be done. With 4 days to go my dad turned up at my house to say he’d been offered a motorhome as sponsorship, I could have kissed him. Then I realised he hadn’t told them we now needed it in 4 days not in 10 weeks and he hadn’t told them we needed a six berth to get the right number of beds. I’m not brilliant at asking for things but I phoned the motorhome company and explained what had happened and they seemed to like the idea of backing the underdog. We had a nervous wait whilst they tried to move things around to give me what I needed but in the end Marquis Leisure did us proud. We also got MyProtein on board, bags of supplements and kit for myself and my support riders. Talking of support riders my friend Nick had decided to take unpaid leave from work also for the first two weeks which was a massive boost for me.

With a couple of sleeps to go my house looked like a bombsite, there was spares, kit, food, medical supplies, clothes and more stored in my tiny bungalow but the team had done it. We were ready to go and collect the motorhome. The morning before I was due to start the challenge Ed, Nick, Dad and I drove to Preston to pick up the Motorhome. The guys at Marquis showed us all how everything worked but there was a lot to take in! It was nice to see Ed and Nick seemed to click, they hadn’t met before and are very different people. Once we drove back to my house we packed the camper full of the supplies. It took a long time to get everything in, the original plan was to take a car too but with the time change some of our support drivers could no longer make it. Cramming a month’s worth of supplies, spares and kit plus 3 wheelchairs and a bike into a motorhome was tough but we managed it in the end!

As Ed, Nick, my dog Bonnie and I set off on the journey south the nerves really kicked in. I was about to set off and push a wheelchair the length of the UK, without the training or the preparation I needed or the volunteers, cyclists, massage therapists, meals and campsites I planned to have along the route. I was in a Motorhome with two of the best mates a bloke could ask for who had both took unpaid leave to help me chase my dream. I was so nervous that I would let down Ed, Nick and the other people who had helped get me on my way. I just kept reading a quote over and over again on my phone “It’s better to try and fail than fail to try and wonder what if”. I didn’t tell the lads how nervous I was, we just kept chatting and driving and driving and driving... When we got to Summerset I assumed we were nearly there! How wrong was I? The West Country goes on and on and on, I was starting to realise just how far this challenge was going to be. It took around 8 hours to get there. We arrived at the campsite after it had closed so we just parked up in the dark and got some kip ready for the big day in the morning.