Children at Court Farm have been helping one of our teachers to prepare for the London Marathon.
Manpreet Johal, the schools Curriculum Lead, is taking on the gruelling 26.2 mile challenge this weekend in aid of the Birmingham Hospice, so far raising over two thousand pounds in donations.
Inspired by Mr Johal’s efforts, Court Farm held its own ‘Marathon Challenge’ this week, with children completing different distances based on the digits 2 and 6, with some of the younger age groups running 2.6 laps of the playground up to the older years taking on 26 laps, whilst some challenged themselves to run non stop for 2 minutes and 6 seconds.
There was also a special assembly on the World’s oldest marathon runner Fauja Singh, a British Sikh who only took up running at the age of 89, and completed the full marathon distance when 100 years old. Showing the children age, young or old, is no barrier to being active and challenging yourself.
Mr Johal says seeing the children be inspired and giving their all has been a welcome boost for him ahead of his own personal efforts this Sunday: “Distance running is hard and the training has been long and intense but the children have kept me going throughout and it’s been great to see them get so involved in it. Many of them can’t believe I’m going to run so far but they know why I’m doing it and why it’s important to support Birmingham Hospice. They provide such amazing care and have supported people connected to the school recently, so it’s really special for us to give whatever we can back to them.”
Despite being an active runner for many years, Sunday will be the first time Mr Johal has taken on the marathon distance, and he’s well aware just how difficult it’s going to be:
“I’ve been running for ten years, completing over 200 parkruns with Sutton Park parkrun being my regular challenge, but going from 5k to 26.2 miles is something else. The training has been a self-discovery journey that I have learnt a lot about myself and how I can challenge myself to keep going. Which I think is really going to be needed, not just to finish on Sunday, but I’ll be back in work teaching on Monday morning!.”
If you’d like to support Mr Johal and the Birmingham Hospice, follow the link here https://2024tcslondonmarathon.enthuse.com/pf/manpreet-johal
