Teacher and her pupil face test (From Warrington Guardian)

Teacher and her pupil face test

A YOGA teacher and her pupil will be stretching themselves even further this year when they test their stamina in the London Marathon.

Training partners Jan Clews, of Littler Cross, Winsford, and Tim Gerrard, of Stretton Walk, Kingsmead, met through yoga classes Jan holds at Northwich gym LA Fitness.

They both applied for the gruelling 26.2-mile run separately and only discovered their shared goal when Tim, 43, told fellow gym members he had got a place with the charity Children with Leukaemia.

Jan, 42, had not applied with a charity, but decided to join Tim in running to raise money.

She said: "Rather than just running, which will be an achievement for myself, I'm raising money for Children With Leukaemia as well.

"We're on a mission to raise as much money as possible - we'll have to finish the race even if we've got to crawl."

Tim added that another incentive to complete the marathon in April is the television cameras.

He said: "You can guarantee that at the bit where you start walking, you will be on TV."

The pair will follow a rigorous training programme designed by their personal trainer at the gym, Paul Conner.

Tim said: "Paul is excellent and is the reason why I got into running - he's got half the gym running."

Gym members will be joining Jan and Tim when they undertake a variety of runs and half marathons in the run-up to the big one, bringing the two some much-appreciated support.

Jan said: "Doing yoga makes you fairly fit anyway - it's the mileage that's the problem and the amount of time that you've got to stay on your feet and run."

To kick-start the fund-raising, Tim and Jan have set up a bank account at the Northwich branch of Barclays.

For anyone wishing to donate, the account number is 23935272.

Tim has a website dedicated to his marathon run and you can pledge support to his cause on it. To see it log on to www.bmycharity.com/

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gbebbington@guardiangrp.co.uk