As ultra runners we tend to spend a great
deal of time outdoors whether training or racing.
We need to be very much aware of what we can be susceptible to as we
enjoy the freedom of running (or walking, hiking, strolling, etc)
through the great outdoors.100km
Association member Harry Townsend has good (and very sad) cause to
promote melanoma awareness. Harry's story first appeared in the
Mercury (the 100km Association newsletter) in 2008.
MELANOMA: ONE OF THE DISEASES
OF THE 21st CENTURY
Melanoma is a deadly form of skin
cancer, which generally starts from a mole that is changing quite
rapidly anywhere on the body. After all, Bob Marley
died from a melanoma under the nail on the big toe of his right
foot!
So if you have a mole that's 'doing
things': enlarging, changing colour (especially black or mottled),
thickening, ragged outlines etc., then go to the doctor. NOW. Not
tomorrow: NOW, and you might just have saved your life.
It's one of the diseases that
particularly affects people with an outdoor lifestyle: runners,
walkers, swimmers, gardeners etc. It affected 1 in 1,500 in the
1930s: now it affects 1 in 50, and unless diagnosed early there is a
very high death rate, up to 25%.
It's also the most common cancer
amongst young people: sun beds and package holidays share much of
the blame for this!
Lots of ultra runners might remember myself and my wife Myfanwy: we
organised the 80 mile South Downs Way Run from it's inception until
it's demise sixteen years later, and I also formed the TRA (Trail
Runners Association) with John Foden, and became first Chairman.
Plants (I was Assistant Curator of Kew
Gardens for fourteen years) and rugby (I coached and managed tours
to New Zealand (four), South Africa (two), Australia, Fiji etc.) as
well as low level marathon running shared my life with my family.
After Myfanwy died from melanoma in
1999, myself and our three sons formed a Charity in her name, the
Myfanwy Townsend Melanoma Research Fund
www.melanoma-fund.co.uk to raise awareness, enable
early diagnosis and fund research to find a cure.
I did lots of 'Challenges' to get
publicity for what we were doing:
- Myself and son Cameron (who
was in the US team in the World Duathlon championships in Italy)
climbed Mount Kilimanjaro with brother in law Peter Clarke,
- then I ran the Death Valley
Marathon,
- trekked non-stop across the
Grand Canyon from rim to rim in 2002,
- walked the Pilgrim Trail to
Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain (500 miles, 38 days)
and wrote a book about it, "The Slowest Pilgrim";
- walked end to end of the north
island of New Zealand (800 miles, 68 days) pushing my
wheelbarrow and raised a Wheelbarrow Full of Money which
was the catalyst for the formation of the Melanoma Foundation of
New Zealand;
- and completed the 5 day 100km
of the Sahara race to celebrate my 70th birthday (the 'softies
version' of the Marathon des Sables);
- 'rowed' a marathon on a rowing
machine;
- and so on.
Lots of people have come on board to
help and organise fundraising events: you can read about this on the
website under Donations. So many inspiring and yet often infinitely
sad stories.
Leeds United are major supporters: one
of their coaches, Bruce Craven, died from melanoma aged only 32,
and they brought out our lime green wristbands with the wording
MELANOMA AWARENESS
www.melanoma-fund.co.uk obtainable from me
harry@melanoma-fund.co.uk , like packets of seeds of sweet pea
Myfanwy Townsend and the sunflower The Darker Side of the Sun. There
is also available a nice white running T shirts with the logo and
watchword The Darker Side of the Sun
We organise national Melanoma
Awareness Week every year - do watch out for it - our supporters
bombard the media at every level!
What have we achieved?
- we've set up and equipped a
research laboratory,
- and funded the initial
appointment of a specialist skin cancer nurse:
- this past year we raised more
than £100,000, and we're helping to fund a research project at
the Royal Marsden and Cancer Research, as well as work on more
effective sun screen creams.
- We're producing a DVD covering
the skin cancer element of the GCSE Science curriculum, which
will soon be freely downloadable from our website:
- and we'll launch our first
Mobile Mole Awareness Unit which will tour schools, beaches,
shopping centres and festivals in the West Country and which
will cost us an initial £45,000 or so. The local PCT will add a
similar amount: and we hope that further such units will be
launched elsewhere soon.
So we've done a lot so far: but
there's far more to do! That's why we need more and more people on
board to help: and if anybody reading this would like to be
involved, on no matter how small a scale, I'd be delighted to hear
from them.
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Melanoma is a cancer which
usually starts in the skin,
either in a mole or in
normal-looking skin. About half
of all melanomas start in normal
skin.
The number of people who develop
melanoma is continuing to rise.
More than 8,900 people in the UK
are diagnosed with melanoma each
year.
Melanoma is more common in
women, particularly young women.
In the UK it’s the most common
cancer in people aged 15–34, but
like most cancers it’s more
usual for it to happen in older
people, as our risk of cancer
rises with age.
Macmillan Cancerbackup
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