Content

Sin City Sally on the Strip

On the 7th December 2008, Senior lecturer of nursing Sally McConville, from Wolverhampton University donned her running shoes and took to the strip for the Las Vegas Marathon.

Here is her story:

It was one year ago I decided it might be fun to enter the Las Vegas Marathon to raise money both for Compton Hospice and the new build of a village hall in Blymhill – the small rural village where I was born and bred and most of my family still live.

Why Las Vegas? – well at 47 years of age, fairly new to running and never done a marathon before, it had to be somewhere memorable.

I started asking for sponsor money for Compton because of the wonderful work the staff carry out on a day to day basis, and Blymhill Village Hall Fund – unless you know of Blymhill you may not be aware of the need for a new village hall but the existing one was built as a temporary structure back in 1947 so you can imagine that it is need of updating and modernising. It is a building well used by the local community and surrounding Parishes.

My training started slowly but I kept building up until I could run 3 hours non stop and still remain standing at the end – however the thought of running 26.2 miles was quite daunting!

Finally the time came for the big event. I made my way to the start point at 06.00a.m. The atmosphere was electric with over 12000 runners at the start point. Music was playing and there was a fantastic firework display to see us off.

Being Las Vegas there were over 200 runners dressed as Elvis and a run through wedding chapel at mile five. 47 couples either tied the knot or renewed their vows at this point and wedding cake was handed out at the water station.

4 hours 59 minutes and 13 seconds later I crossed the finish line. I initially felt disappointed with my time but when I discovered that out of 11,255 people who finished the race I was 2502 I felt a whole lot better. Not bad for a first attempt.

What about the fundraising?? Well so far I have raised £2300 and money is still coming in so I am hoping to top £2500. The money will be divided equally between Compton and Blymhill.

Las Vegas is a wonderful surreal place and this was an experience I shall never forget and I am so glad that I was able to raise so much money in the process.

Anyone want to join me for the next one??

Compton Hospice would like to congratulate Sally on her excellent achievement and would also like to thank Sally for raising so much money.

If you have any further questions about Compton Hospice and Fundraising, please call 0845 225 5497 or contact us. We will do our utmost to help with your enquiry.

Top ↑