Alan has been a supporter of The Christie Charity for a few years now, ever since his younger sister was diagnosed with bowel cancer while she was 7 months pregnant. After her daughter was delivered early, Alan’s sister was referred to The Christie for chemotherapy and radiotherapy.

Thankfully, this treatment was a success and Alan’s sister is now doing well, meaning she’s able to care for her young daughter. Alan was incredibly grateful for his sister’s treatment at the hospital, and he wanted to give something back to show his appreciation.

Alan really wanted to push himself with his fundraising, so he signed up for The Christie Challenge to complete 6 fundraising activities in 12 months. So far, Alan’s Christie Challenge has included a marathon in Limassol in Cyprus back in April 2024 and the Nashville marathon in October 2024. He’s got further marathons planned for France and the UK, and he’s also planning an Ironman triathlon – made up of a 3.8km swim, a 178km bike ride and a 42.2km run!

Before taking on The Christie Challenge, Alan had never completed a marathon and hadn’t entered a full-distance Ironman triathlon so he knew this would be a real test. His first marathon in Limassol went well and he managed to finish in 3:24:26.

For his second marathon in Nashville, Alan did even better, with a 21-minute personal best of 3:03:34. Even more incredibly, Alan finished in 7th place overall at the Nashville race!

So far, Alan’s fundraising has managed to raise an amazing £810 for The Christie Charity and he’s still raising more throughout the rest of his Christie Challenge.

“Taking on and deciding what the 6 events were going to be over a year can be difficult, but from the outset of knowing I was going to attempt something, as a proud member of the British Armed Forces, I knew it had to be tough. I have friends that have accomplished some wonderful and amazing feats throughout their lives, and I had to do something here too.

“Making each event a challenge was something I was also keen to do and adding the interesting locations to some of the events would make it an appealing read, which would hopefully add more interest to gain more sponsorship for The Christie as ultimately, I am doing this for them and all their amazing staff and patients. 

The Christie Charity will always have a special place in my heart and the more I can raise throughout this 6-event challenge and future events will go some way of giving back to them and what they gave to me when saving my younger sister. I will be forever grateful, and I will continue to push my body to the limits throughout the remainder of this event challenge!

Alan Lea, Christie fundraiser

The Christie Challenge is to complete 6 different fundraising activities over the year. Whether you want to do a sponsored run, organise a bake sale or host an online quiz night, you can get involved.

If you want to help The Christie Charity keep moving, sign up for The Christie Challenge.

A photo of Christie Charity fundraiser Alan Lea wearing a medal after completing the Nashville marathon.

You can also read Alan's full report of what it was like to take on the Nashville Marathon below.

“My race plan for this event had gone to plan until the week prior to the event. This was mostly due to the long hours in work and the inconsistency of my final preparations and diet. I think it’s fair to say my own food choices in America were not the best, but it was difficult not to overindulge!

“Despite this poor final prep, I was able to get away well from the start line, which was a showpiece – the American national anthem sung live, DJs and 1000s of people. Me and my colleague Chris managed to get through the crowds and to the very front. We were concerned as the race had a mixture of 6.15km, half marathon and full marathon racers all starting at 7am. 

“We thankfully got away well without too many short distance runners passing us. Getting to the front was a beneficial tactic as I knew after 13/14km into the race I would again meet the half marathon runners due to the route for this marathon. So instead of having to pass or go around people twice, this meant I would only have to do this once.

“My pace throughout the first half of the marathon was actually pretty good and higher than I’d planned, but I put this down to the excitement of the event and the amazing support on the route. I actually ran a 2nd best ever half marathon during this race. This was incredible as I’d ran a few fast sessions in the build-up, but this turned out to be much faster – even with the cheeky Nashville hills!

“At around the halfway stage, I caught up with a guy from San Francisco that I had been following for approximately 5km. We had a great chat about the event, and he was also on his second ever marathon like me. We were both running at a very similar pace so decided to help each other out, and his plan was to start to try and pick runners off who were ahead of us as motivation. So, we set out to catch the next racer who was around 300m ahead. We caught the guy pretty quickly with the extra motivation running as a duo had given us. As we passed the guy, we realised he wasn’t even in the race and was a Nashville local getting his Saturday morning mileage in before work! Thankfully, we were still able to have a short laugh about this before moving on. 

“We headed off for the next guy a little further ahead – he took a couple of kms to catch up to. We continued in the same way for a further 7kms until my newfound friend was losing his legs and couldn’t hold the pace any longer. I still felt quite good at this point – now about 30km into the race, I used an energy gel and pushed on for the next person in the race (still not knowing the position I was in). At this stage, we had started to head around the Cumberland River, which was a long section of the race on the riverbank with a 6km stretch out and back along the same pathway. This meant you would see the leaders coming the other way at some point along this part of the race. 

“Heading along the river was picturesque and beautifully peaceful. There was none of the Nashville hustle and bustle here: no music, no crowd, no traffic stops or even a banner. This element of the race was brutal on the mind – if you were carried by the music or screaming from the crowds of people, this was no longer in the race. You had to grit your teeth, smile and push on hard to maintain the pace.

“At the 35km point, I started to feel my legs weaken, and my grit and determination wavering. I was unable to stop the slight wobble and delayed reaction in my legs. This was the point I’d rehearsed my mind for: the wall. The dreaded part of the race where your body starts to give up and to ask you and scream at you to walk. 

“With 7km to go, I had to keep going. I kept reminding myself time after time as to why I was here, what I was doing and who I was motivated by to complete this race. My mind had taken control over the rest of this race, for all but the last kilometre. My body wasn’t able to communicate with me to tell me that I was in so much pain in my until after the race had finished. The race was all in my mind, and I pushed into the final kilometre, where I could see another competitor in front of me as we entered the final stages of the Cumberland River section. In turn, 100s of other racers went past in the other direction heading out along the river. 

“My mind was set to catch this guy. I could see he was also struggling, head bobbing up and down as he ran. I’m not quite sure what my running style was at this stage. But entering back into the city of Nashville, I went after him. As I climbed up onto his shoulder with 200 meters to go before we entered the stadium, he reacted and ran away from me but I had to beat him. We entered the stadium together, but I gave it everything that I had. My friends were all there to cheer me on and they were screaming at me, I didn’t have far to go but my legs were pumping and I was moving quite well. 

“Crossing the line was emotional, I’d used a lot of emotional power to get around this race at this pace and I had to fight off the tears at the end in order to remain on my feet. I was given my medal, food and drink immediately by the Run Nashville team, offered assistance but I just wanted to celebrate with the guys I was with. We’d all ran this day and that was something I was proud of – they followed me to take part in this event! 

“After the race and once the results were posted, I was super happy with the end results. A top 10 finish overall with a 7th place finish and a 1st place in my age group by over 10 minutes! All of which means I also qualify for the Boston Marathon too, which is a huge bonus and an aspirational thing which I wasn’t sure I’d be capable of.”

© 2024 The Christie NHS Foundation Trust

Registered charity number: 1201654