{"id":5876,"date":"2012-05-09T14:45:33","date_gmt":"2012-05-09T14:45:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tat.reddaisytrading.co.uk\/index.php\/2012\/05\/09\/haroons-marathon-effort\/"},"modified":"2012-05-09T14:45:33","modified_gmt":"2012-05-09T14:45:33","slug":"haroons-marathon-effort","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/2012\/05\/09\/haroons-marathon-effort\/","title":{"rendered":"Haroon\u2019s Marathon Effort!"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Charity Champ raises thousands for Cancer charity after running London Marathon<\/h3>\n
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HAROON Mota has taken on the biggest challenge of his life \u2013 running the London Marathon for teenage cancer sufferers.<\/strong> <\/div>\n

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It was Haroon\u2019s first ever marathon and what a run it was \u2013 completing the race in an amazing 5 hours and 11 minutes. <\/div>\n

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Haroon battled through painful cramps during the run knowing the thousands he had raised was going to a worthy cause.<\/div>\n

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The seasoned fundraiser, who has already trekked up Mount Everest and even scaled three of the UK\u2019s highest mountains in just 24 hours, raised a phenomenal \u00a36,700 for the Teenage Cancer Trust.<\/div>\n

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The former Coventry City Council worker spends his days surrounded by young cancer sufferers as part of his job as a Senior Activity Coordinator at University College London Hospital where he provides recreational and therapeutic activities to help youngsters normalise their daily lives. <\/div>\n

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Haroon, who commutes from his hometown of Coventry to London every day, says watching youngsters suffer is \u201cheartbreaking\u201d \u2013 and was determined to do his bit to help the Teenage Cancer Trust which offers vital support to cancer sufferers. <\/div>\n

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And Haroon reveals it was thought of those ill youngsters and those he has watched lose their lives which spurred him on during the grueling Marathon run. <\/div>\n

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\u201cI started the run\u00a0and thought\u00a0it was amazing to see so many runners, men, women, young and old,\u201d he told The Asian Today.<\/div>\n

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\u201cThere were so many runners in\u00a0crazy and colorful costumes and with the crowds, the atmosphere was amazing. I found myself breaking into tears at mile 8, but just remembering why I was running and passing thoughts for all those patients I have lost over the year spurred me on. It had bottled up since I started working on the Teenage Cancer ward at UCLH over a year ago and I felt a sense of relief after I let it out.<\/div>\n

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\u201cI knew I couldn’t give up, because the thought of my patients fighting cancer and never giving up, made my pain feel so insignificant.\u201d<\/div>\n

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Haroon\u2019s family were in London to cheer their charity champ on during the race. And for his wife, watching Haroon fundraise for the Teenage Cancer Trust took on an added significance. <\/div>\n

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\u201cMy wife lost her sister through cancer a long time ago,\u201d Haroon reveals.<\/div>\n

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\u201cShe was only aged 9 when her sister past away at the age of 14. It was only up until last year when I started working on the Teenage Cancer Ward that I began to understand what this meant to my wife and her family. So going a step further beyond my work to raise money and complete the London Marathon is something my wife is really proud of.\u201d<\/div>\n

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Haroon has surpassed his original fundraising target of \u00a35,000 with the figure now standing at \u00a36,700 and rising.<\/div>\n

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\u201cThe support has been great and MesmerEyez.com have donated a huge \u00a3900, giving me a massive boost right from the start. I’d like to say a big thank you to Coventry Muslim School who raised \u00a3400 with a bake sale and non uniform day.<\/div>\n

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\u201cStoke Park School in Coventry, my former employers, also the school where I did my A levels, have raised \u00a3750 through a non uniform day.\u201d<\/div>\n

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With his first marathon well and truly under his belt Haroon is already planning his next fundraising initiative and he isn\u2019t planning on doing it alone!<\/div>\n

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He says: \u201cI thought that the London Marathon would be my first and last marathon, especially during the run, as I was thinking “I’m never going to do this again”. But after returning home and watching the highlights on TV, and reminding myself of what I achieved I feel very tempted to give it another try. <\/div>\n

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\u201cI’m hoping to run the Coventry Half Marathon again in October, and intend on making it an annual habit. This year, I’ll be recruiting locals from the community to join me, running the 13.1 miles on 14th October to raise funds for Coventry Muslim School, a very small private girl\u2019s school, which could really do with some funding. \u201cI’ve had almost 30 people express an interest in joining me, so I hope they all agree to sign up when I start recruiting. 2012 is a great year to embrace change and to try living a healthier, more active lifestyle. With Coventry hosting Olympic Football at the Ricoh arena too, it would be great if the Asian community could be part of sporting events that the city has to offer. I really enjoyed the event last year, and was amazed at how little the Asian community was represented in this event. So I’m hoping that I can change that his year by encouraging others to join me.\u201d<\/div>\n

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Donations are still rolling in for Haroon\u2019s London Marathon fundraiser. If you would like to contribute you can donate online at justgiving.com\/run4tct or text “HTCT85” & amount “\u00a3” to 70070.<\/em><\/div>\n

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Charity Champ raises thousands for Cancer charity after running London Marathon HAROON Mota has taken on the biggest challenge of his life \u2013 running the London Marathon for teenage cancer sufferers. It was Haroon\u2019s first ever marathon and what a run it was \u2013 completing the race in an amazing 5 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5876"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5876\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}