My Story
As many of you may know, my incredible Mum lost her battle with cancer at the end of June 2023. She fought with absolutely everything; her strength, courage and positive outlook (right until the day before she died) is beyond inspirational and I will forever be proud of how she tackled everything she was hit with. Without Cancer Research, and the trial immunotherapy they were able to offer Mum once chemo and radiotherapy stopped working, we would have had to say goodbye to her much sooner. They bought us precious extra time with her, and for that we will forever be grateful. I started running in January 2021, alongside Mum’s diagnosis in the height of the pandemic. My way of coping was to quite literally run away from it – when I ran, I could forget and come back to be the strong presence she needed. And ever since that day, and my first very slow 3k around our village, running and Mum became intertwined. She loved hearing about me ‘going further’, ‘getting quicker’, becoming a ‘local legend’ or setting new PB’s. From my birthday 10k to deciding ‘I’d just sign up for the one half marathon to say I could’. I always set the goal a bit further because if she could fight then so would I. When I decided I would give the London Marathon a go in 2022 (which felt utterly ridiculous of me at the time) she was one of my biggest supporters. She’d cheer me on as I cried at her down the phone saying I couldn’t do it, she’d listen to my boring running facts and nutrition stories. Now, three marathons on, I have the marathon bug but I no longer have my number one fan on the other side. When I crossed the line, with a PB of 4.09 at Berlin this September the first thing I did, out of instinct, was phone my Mum – but of course, she wasn’t on the other end. In April, I’ll be running my second London Marathon. This time in Mum’s memory and my new goal is to run a sub-4-hour marathon. This might not seem like a big deal to you athletes out there, but for me? The non-athletic, newbie runner, it’s everything. She might not be on the end of the phone when I cross the line on April 21st, but I know she’ll be watching, hopefully with a big smile (and probably a glass of vino in her hand) to see me pick up that medal, and hopefully with a big fundraising goal achieved. Please help me raise money for Cancer Research UK, so we can help give many other people the extra time we got to have with Mum. Because in that last year we became closer than we’ve ever been, we laughed, we cried, she finally told me her recipe secrets and we made sure her life was filled with love until the very end. This one will be for you Mum – Katie Smith, 20.10.1962 – 25.06.2023 – I’ll be cursing up to you on all my 30km training runs along Southbank.
