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Yorkshire runners gear up for 2010 London Marathon
The Icelandic volcano has upset the plans of a Yorkshire runner due to compete in the Virgin London Marathon on Sunday.
Colin O'Neill, of Garforth, is presently stuck in Majorca with his wife and daughter.
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But he is booked on a flight back home on Friday and is crossing fingers that it lifts off.
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Otherwise he hopes to run his own marathon on the Spanish island on Sunday!
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Colin, managing director of Taskmaster Resources of Leeds, is one of 16 athletes running for Martin House Hospice.
"He has been training very hard and is upset he might miss the London event," said Caroline Roberts, Martin House fundraiser.
"He only started running last year but got the bug after entering the Leeds 10k and then the Great North Run.
"He went out to Majorca for a holiday but also took part in a half-marathon there and he has asked the organisers to devise a marathon route for him.
"He hopes others will join him but if not he will be accompanied by his wife and daughter on bicycles."
Yorkshire's part-time athletes will mingle with celebrities like Sir Richard Branson, Princess Beatrice, Natalie Imbruglia and Gordon Ramsay who all have their pet charities.
Heckmondwike Grammar School teacher Ami Stott, 25, from Scholes, will
run as a bee.
She actually wore her costume in class to kick-start her fundraising.
"I got a lot of cheers when I walked through the school hall," she
smiled.
She hopes to raise 1,500 for the charity Phabkids.
She explained: "My mum is disabled and I have always done a lot of work
with disabled people.
"Phabkids encourages the disabled and able-bodied to work together.
"I am hoping to beat my previous times of 5hrs 47mins and 5hrs 17mins
and finish in under four and a half hours."
Mark Johnson, a mail order manager, is running to raise awareness of a life-threatening pregnancy condition.
He and his wife Suzanne lost a baby to an ectopic pregnancy – when a fertilised egg implants outside the womb.
It may grow in the fallopian tube and burst it.
Ectopic pregnancies account for one in 80 and they kill five women a year in the UK.
Mark, 32, of Green Bank, Cleckheaton, said: "At the time this happened to us, it was something we knew very little about. We then found the Ectopic Pregnancy Trust website which answered all of our questions and we found comfort and support from others who had been through this experience."
Michael Ward, a press and PR officer for Leeds Building Society, will be fundraising for St Gemma's Hospice in his first full marathon. He comes from Nidd Bank, Knaresborough.
He said: "I hope to complete the marathon within four hours. My training has gone well, even during the coldest winter for 30 years."
Martin Hopkins, a business manager in field sales at the Yorkshire Evening Post, is running in aid of Barnardo's.
And two friends from Dewsbury need help in hitting charity pledge targets for the London Marathon.
Shaun Grove and Jim Kee from Scout Hill are together taking part in the event on Sunday.
They have pledged 1,500 each for disabled children's charity Kids and need more sponsorship.
Anyone who can help should go to www.just giving.com/shaundgrove
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Weather for Leeds
Saturday 26 May 2012
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