Hotel Spa
Today Martine, my wife is representing PSC Support at a British Liver Trust event in Northamptonshire. Whilst she’s “working” at the BLT event I’m in our hotel room watching the Spa Belgium F1 GP qualifying on my iPad (gotta love Sky’s F1 coverage and their Sky Go mobile viewing BTW) and been researching online to find somewhere to go for a ride. I’ve also been thinking about my goals and motivations to climb Kili.

Tick Tock…
I haven’t booked the climb yet but my current thinking is to go in Sept ’13 by which time I’ll be 42. September next year gives me 12 months to get fit, prepare and fundraise along with the fact that Sept is still in the more desirable “dry season” in Tanzania. One of my motivations for the climb is certainly a desire for a new “project” to aim at and focus on. I do sometimes miss some of the recreational activities I used to do like my flying or skydiving but I found they didn’t balance with family life or studying for my MBA. With my studies completed in ’11 I think there might be some space for a little adventurous project like this. I know I’m not getting any younger so why not just crack on and do it now? I joked to Martine that doing “Kili” would be cheaper than buying a Porsche or many other stereotypical “mid life crisis” acts!

Lightening The Load
To paraphrase a joke from the English comedian Roy “chubby” brown: “I’m not fat; I just have a problem with my feet. I can’t keep them out of the pie shop”. Starting from a weight of around 17 Stone (108 KG) I have begun watching what I eat / drink as well as getting into some regular exercises as I’m going to need to lose some weight . I’m targeting myself to get down to 14 Stone ( 89 KG) for the climb. It would be nice to look in a mirror and feel a bit more positive about my body shape. Even at 14 stone weight my body mass index would be “overweight” but considerably more favourable that my current “obese” 😦

Cashing in
So whilst I clearly have some personal reasons to attempt Kilimanjaro I also see it at a chance to draw awareness and raise fund in support of those, such as Martine who suffer from Primary Sclerosing Cholangitis. PSC Support, the UK charity that helps anyone affected by PSC and raises money for research is a small, volunteer based organisation that has a big job to do. If I can help pull together £4K from my friends, colleagues, acquaintances, family or blog  vistitors then we can all make a tangible, positive difference to the work and research PSC Support does. There is a donate page on this site if you’d like to help, thanks.

Right, Jenson Button of McLaren has just got pole for tomorrow’s race so I’m happy chap and now off for a ride. Bye for now.