Ep 54 - A Cock and Balls Story from Lizzie (With a very serious message!)

Last weekend Lizzie Gatherer drew a large penis and scrotum as a 70+ miles piece of Strava Art to raise awareness of Prostate cancer. In particular to urge males over  50 years of age to get themselves a simple blood test that may save their lives.

As Kev has first hand knowledge of this prolific cancer he had to have Lizzie along to share her story and help further raise awareness and promote Lizzie’s fundraising efforts.

https://www.justgiving.com/page/ultra-mad-lizzie

Aid Station website where you can find the episodes or leave comment https://www.aidstation.co.uk/

Please feel free to give the show some feedback on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/aid-station/id1549735359

Transcript

Section A

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Hello and welcome to the fifty-fourth episode of AidStation. It's the twenty-third of February and I'm joined by Lizzie Gatherer.

SPEAKER_02 0:44

Hello.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

Who's been on here plenty of times before, including hosting the thing itself. But Lizzie's here because she had a very hard weekend. And how stiff was it, Lizzie? There's gonna be a lot of this innuendo. You'll find out why in a minute.

SPEAKER_02 1:10

I feel a little bit stiff, but not too bad. Shall I tell you what I did? Yes. So yeah, Saturday 21st of February, starting at 5am in at Abergavenny train station, I ran a 71-mile giant cock and balls. So yeah, um bit of Strava art. Uh I first saw this run, it was in November 2024. Uh Welshman named Terry Rosamond. He ran the route, he he designed the route and ran the route for the Movember charity. Actually, one of the main benefactors of Movember is Prostate Cancer UK, which I've I've found out during this journey. So I saw first and foremost, I saw the route. Uh that popped up on my Strava, and I thought I absolutely need to do that one day because it's in the Breck and Bacon Beacons, which is my favourite place ever to run. So uh, and it's yeah, for me quite quite a lovely distance as well. So um, but then I read an article in The Guardian about it and found out why Terry had done it, he'd done it, obviously done it for charity. So I got in touch with him a few weeks ago. I think my opening, you know, I've never met the guy, he he doesn't know who I am. I only know him through through his run. So my opening text was uh something along the lines of, can I do your giant cock and ball? Funnily enough, he didn't reply. Um, but I do know my friends Will and Joe know him, so I texted them both and I said, Can you get Terry to check his Instagram messages, please? And then sure enough, Terry did reply, thankfully. Didn't think I was coming on to him, and uh yeah, I just said, Is it all right if I do your roots? And is there a particular charity you want me to raise funds for? Of course, he gave his blessing and said, Whatever charity I wanted. So, because of the shape, I thought Prostate Cancer UK made sense, but also my father-in-law has just undergone treatment for prostate cancer, and he's just got the all clear just just over a week ago now, so that's really great news. And uh, there are a lot of people I know who have been treated for it, and um also a lot well, nearly all of my running friends, in fact, are male and they are 50 and upwards, and 50 is the age that you really need to start getting yourself screened.

SPEAKER_01 3:34

Yeah, at 50 years of age, um you can uh request uh uh to get a PSA test.

SPEAKER_02 3:44

There's no national screening.

SPEAKER_01 3:46

No, there's no you have to go it yourself, yeah. Um and I've had some experience of that myself as having had prostate cancer myself. Um and I'd wanted to go into that a little bit. I mentioned this on uh the podcast before when uh Priscilla S. Smee was on uh because we're talking about cancers. Um and uh I was the typical male in that um I was absolutely badgered into going for a test by my wife Jill after she was told by some friends uh that their husbands, two of them, um had tested positive, and neither of them uh with us any longer. Uh m I don't know the circumstances, but it was highly likely it was because they didn't get tested or find out about it early enough. So I think what you're doing is fantastic, um, and I'm very happy to get you on the podcast to raise the awareness even more, hopefully. Um I know you've been on a few, haven't you?

SPEAKER_02 4:53

Podcasts. Yeah, yeah. Well and actually I I I have uh you are you probably don't realise, but you are one of my main inspirations for this route because your story really resonated with me because I think how much we have done together, how many adventures we've been on, and that's quite a scary thought to think that if if your wife hadn't nagged you, what I mean you shouldn't really think what could be, but yeah, what could be. Oh, I I seriously think I might not be here now. And and that that is that I found that quite frightening. Um, and uh and like I said, so many of my friends are male, so I so your story was one of my main motivators for this campaign because because raising money is one thing, but to me, the awareness is so much more important, and that is why I have involved as many people as possible in this run. So during the run, I had um I think eight people join me, and the idea there was that I would educate them with my newfound um prostate cancer knowledge, tell them your story, tell them other people's story, so that when they would go home and friends and family say to them, Well, what did you do at the weekend? And they could then say, Oh, I helped this crazy lady run a giant penis, and then of course they're gonna ask why. So the idea is that in running with these people, sharing some facts about prostate cancer, sharing some stories, they would then go home and start spreading the awareness themselves. And even during the run, um, I was lucky enough to have a professional photographer actually, and he was near Haybluff waiting for us to come through, and he got chatting to a hiker because at that point the weather was pretty horrific, and Matt, the photographer, was in full. He kind of looked like an SAS army guy, and his camera was covered with like a waterproof protection thing, and he he was hiding in the bushes, so I can sort of imagine this hiker coming across this man lurking in the bushes and thinking, what on earth is going on here? But they had they had a conversation, and this hiker himself had had a scare, and so he had been he had been tested, and luckily he didn't have prostate cancer, but he said to the to Matt, the photographer, he said, Could you pass on my gratitude for you know for the awareness side of this campaign? And through doing this, I've I've really discovered just how many people it affects, and it it's prostate cancer UK, it's their vision that no man dies of prostate cancer. So to me, that says if you go and get checked and you have it, then you can get it sorted out. But if you don't get checked and it's just discovered late, then potentially it's too late.

SPEAKER_01 7:38

Um yeah, I think um uh a little bit because I th I've heard some of your other podcasts, and clearly I don't think there was anybody else that had directly had it or been affected in that way. Obviously, a lot of people know other people that have had it or being diagnosed with it. Um and there are plenty in our own running club that have had it that I knew about before I was even diagnosed with it. And one thing I want to say is that immediately I was diagnosed with it, I emailed, texted whatever all my friends of my, because they were all of a similar age, uh, about it to try and raise raise the awareness. And I hope that you know ever it's not something for some reason males want to talk about, and I'm not really too sure why in this day and age that is still a problem.

SPEAKER_02 8:33

Well, when we went to training camp, we had with our running club, we went to Kev organised this fantastic weekend um in Dartmoor. So we had a four-hour coach journey there, and I found myself talking about prostate cancer pretty much the entire journey with various different people. And one of our club members suggested to me that perhaps men don't go to be tested because they have this concern that it's a finger up the bum. But actually, generally it does start with a blood test, and my understanding of that is it's a finger prick blood test, so there's no there's no need to be concerned. Um I think and also I think women are quite used to these invasive tests, but it's not that we you know we get these tests we get invasive tests throughout our lifetime uh once we reach um adulthood, um, but men don't. So I don't know if men are a bit worried about the the process of the test or they're embarrassed to talk about it, but but actually one in eight men have prostate cancer, and the statistics are even worse if you are black, so it's one in four black men have prostate cancer. So it just really shows that it you really have to get yourself checked. Um and uh and it's just it starts off with a simple blood test.

SPEAKER_01 9:47

Yeah. Well, I went I went through that process, had the blood test, came back with a um PSA test of 7.2. Now that won't mean anything on a scale to people, um, and I think it does vary a lot uh where you can test higher than that and not have prostate cancer. But I think there's a point at which uh they have a rough idea, and it came back to the doctor. I then was called back into the doctor and did have the finger up the bum test, and luckily um they weren't well it was a female actually, and she wasn't happy with the um what she was feeling, I guess, uh, and referred me, and then I ended up having the biopsies, which then discovered that you know I did actually have um it was six millimetres long actually at the time. Uh the lesion or the or the the cancer growth and luckily it was contained. Um I don't want to go in too much detail because I'll lose people on this, but a thing you get back from the biopsy is called a Gleason score, and this is really for knowledge for people that might be worried about it or go for a test and get positive tested. Um, you need to also take a positive approach to that if you if you get a score back, but your Gleason score, mine was three plus four equaling seven, and the three I think relates to the actual size of the cancer, and the four relates to how far it is extended or whether it's contained within the prostate uh gland itself. Um, so these are all things that go along along the way, um, and I was lucky mine was contained within the prostate gland. That gave me the option to either have radiotherapy, uh have uh prastectomy and have the whole thing removed, or have a thing called brachyotherapy, uh, which uh is radiated titanium seeds that they fire into the prostate and that titanium stays there for your life. Um obviously the radiation dissipates over time, uh, but that kills the cancer cells, um, and that is what I had. Um and came out the other end of it after five years with uh the all clear. Um so it's something to get on top of immediately. You get plenty of time to make the decisions, nobody rushes you into your choices of what to do. I think the other side of the thing with males is that they uh it can have an effect on your sexual function, so that might be an issue uh for a male's even going to start with to the doctor, I don't know. Uh, but they're all silly things to take to consider when you think that as soon as that thing leaves the prostate gland, you can be in all sorts of trouble from other cancers and it's spreading to your lymph nodes and all things. So I don't want to be too alarmist about it, but I do want to make people go to the doctor and get something done about it. Um so having got that message across, should we talk a little bit more uh lightly, because this is also an ultrarunning podcast, about the route you took, where you went, uh why that area?

SPEAKER_02 13:20

Yeah, so well Terry obviously he he designed the route, and from my understanding, um at the time he wasn't an ultrarunner, so he he had a lot of things to contend with. He he d not just designing the route, but getting himself ready as well. So he used um Strava heat maps to help him design the route, but for me it was all very simple because he had already done it. I know that area really, really well, so I only had to recce the hay, the the knob end, uh the tip, uh, which is hay on y. Right. So that was the bit I didn't know, and there was a chunk of that on road. And obviously, as a trail runner, I'm not I'm not used to sort of yeah, I don't know the road. So I went to Recky that bit. I did come across a footpath that he he had used that I I didn't like it at all because it had a lot of um sort of bracken and brambles, and it seemed to be stuck in the ground both ends. So once you got your foot through it, it it was like a trap, and that whole section of footpath was just there was just so many places I was tripping over and climbing over fallen trees. So I I found um I recorded it with a friend Hillary, and we we just found a much better line that that bypassed that footpath, and it it did cut the route short by one mile, actually. But um, it was just a much more pleasant um part to to do. But we start so we started in Abergavenny, I suppose, on on the side of the balls, and then got straight into the shaft, which was uh which was Skirid, and then going up onto the Hatterall Hill ridgeline. You've got sort of three trig points along there. So that that's on the Offers Dyke path, and it takes you all that took us all the way along to Hay on Y, so drop down into Hay on Y. So by now that that was the the tip. Uh so we went round um on the road, then back up into the mountains on the sort of a a parallel line to where we'd already been, and that's where we then needed to be to do to so did you go over Lord Hereford's knob? Yes, yes, exactly. So we got up to we got up to Ross Dereon, and then beyond Ros Dyrion, you you've got Lord Hereford's knob. So we took that line all the way to Hay Bluff. So Hay Bluff we'd previously passed because that was where we'd dropped down off the mountain to get onto Hayon Y, but we needed to do that out and back to Hay on uh to Hay Bluff to get the the detailed shape of the um the top. Uh and then we so then we retraced our steps to get onto the other side, onto the other shaft, side of the shaft. Uh, and that was the Weinvach um, I don't know what that path is called, but but that's like that it's the Weinvach ridge line. Um and darkness came.

SPEAKER_01 16:10

So that heads all the way back down on the other side of Clantoni, doesn't it? Does it come over?

SPEAKER_02 16:15

So Cloney was the previous, was in we went past Clanton, like the there was a turn in if we'd have taken it, we'd have gone down into Clantoni and then yeah, so then we were on the other side of the side of that, and then then we were now heading towards um towards Crickow. So we when we came off the mountain, we were then onto a lane that that that took me straight into Crickowl and and then from there it it was road. Um but that road section was doing the um the balls. Uh so we needed I needed to do another out and back to create um two balls uh to create the line between the two.

SPEAKER_03 16:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:51

Um and then yeah, and then and then finished up in in Abergavenny. So that the whole route was was 71 miles. I can't remember the elevation actually, but um I think it was probably about 10, maybe about 10 tops.

SPEAKER_01 17:03

Um what thousand feet?

SPEAKER_02 17:05

Uh and in um like 10 summits. Oh, 10 summits. And then and then in terms of elevation, I off the top of my head, I I can't remember. Um but it was uh really the the route is fantastic. Um it's quite runnable, actually, um, because you're when you're up on the ridge line, you're yeah, you're up, so it's sort of more undulating. Uh, and then of course when you're down on the roads, um I was actually behind schedule at one point, massively behind I think an hour behind my schedule, but when I got onto the roads, I just caught up so much time. I'd estimated a finish of eleven fifty in the evening, and I finished at eleven fifty-four.

SPEAKER_01 17:44

Oh right, wow. So was that schedule just purely there for people to run with you?

SPEAKER_02 17:50

Yeah, it was for logistics. So I I I didn't want people to feel I I I do find it funny because um when you run ultras and you get people come along and pace you, something people often say is, Oh, I don't want to slow you down, which I find hilarious because you know, if you're in the middle of a of an ultra, you're not running fast, and this person is joining you with fresh legs, so there's no way anyone was going to be slowing anyone down. But the the the schedule really was to help people understand roughly what time I would be wet where, so that when they um intercepted me, they you know that they they knew roughly what time to leave home. But I did have a tracker with me, and the tracker was providing quite accurate ETA. It was based based on my average pace, it was it was providing quite accurate ETAs for them as well. Um, but oh that's what I was gonna say. But the the timing for me, I liked the idea of finishing before midnight because then I could say I've done the whole run on a single day, but equally, this was not a race, it was nothing about you know, the the time was was irrelevant. It it didn't matter if I finished at three, four in the morning, it was just more getting the job done, raising money and raising awareness and having a good time whilst doing it. So so there was a small element of yes, I would like to finish before midnight, but equally it didn't matter. And the fact I did that to me that was that was just a bonus, really. Ice uh cherry on the cake. Is that right? Icing, i i icing or cherries. I'm still a bit tired. Yeah, we'll go for both of them. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:30

Obviously, it helped that you love that area anyway, isn't it? And the and that the route was in that area. Um and so you what you basically stay in Abogavenny, did you?

SPEAKER_02 19:44

Uh so my one of my best friends he lives in Pantagethley, which is two miles from Abogvenny. So I I tend to go to Wales to train once a month. So I would normally stay at his house. Sometimes I stay at my friend Hilary's house. Um just depends who's around. But um, yes, I stay I'm very lucky. I'm I'm a member of Ministry Fell Running Club, um, and I really feel like I'm part of the running community there now. So it's really good because um yeah, it used to cost me a lot of money having to stay in in hotels and BBs and stuff, but now I just stay with friends.

SPEAKER_01 20:16

Right, when you're down there. Great. So how is the fundraising going?

SPEAKER_02 20:23

Very well. Uh I set a target of£2,000, which to me seems like quite a lot of money. Um but I was hopeful. So going into the run, I think I was probably on about maybe fourteen hundred pounds um on the day of the run, and yesterday I had quite a lot of money come in. So I think I think I'm on about 1,800 pounds now. Uh and I do still there have been a few donations uh sort of promised to me. So I it's looking quite likely I will reach that£2,000 target now. So yeah, I'm really pleased about that.

SPEAKER_01 21:01

Yeah, I realise that the money isn't the main aim. The main aim is to get people to go or males of fifty and over to go to their doctors for a PSA test. But obviously, all the funds that help uh the prostate cancer UK charity obviously helps them raise awareness of it as well and saves people's lives, so that's excellent. Do you want to tell people how they can donate?

SPEAKER_02 21:29

Yeah, I have a just give in page. Um it's quite interesting. If you type my name Lizzie Gatherer, because another when I did another podcast, he he typed in Lizzie Gatherer Penis. Uh so yeah, it it doesn't take much to find it, but I'm on just so you could go directly to just give in and type in Lizzie Gatherer or just Lizzie Gatherer Penis. And I I think uh the just given page will come up. And if you can't find it, I'm sure.

SPEAKER_01 22:00

you can um you can get in touch with aid station uh yeah you'll yeah well well I'll put it on the show notes of of this anyway um and the other thing is there's a there's there's a Strava your Strava um uh uh what do you call it Strava account will now have your route on there won't it?

SPEAKER_02 22:19

Yes yeah so you can find yeah I'm Lizzie Gather on Strava as well so you can you can check out check out the route and the and the shape on there. It's yeah it's good it's very obvious what it is. Yeah I'm really pleased with how it turned out we did make it was interesting because um the part that I recorded in Hay on Y I did make an error there because the farmer had since been in and put up electric fencing and put all his sheep in there. So when I got there it looked it looked completely different. So we went all the way down the side of a field that we didn't need to uh so there was that that was quite not not as big as your uh your famous nav error oh sorry your famous it is frustrating especially because in the back of your mind I'm like I'm I'm doing a shape so like every nav nav error I was really like a bit paranoid it was going to ruin the shape but of course seven 70 miles is huge so I think I could have made quite big nav errors and I don't think it would have affected the shape.

SPEAKER_01 23:23

The one one thing I'm not going to get obsessed about with but let's call it the helmet of the top the you drew a line across obviously to define that. So was that an out and back?

SPEAKER_02 23:35

That's an out and back. That's Lord Hereford's knob oh so we're previously oh so I have to say so we going through after hay on why I went past a place called Three Cox and then then yeah and then when I and then back up on the mountain uh that the out and back was was Lord Hereford's knob and that that actually so the weather was we were so lucky because the day before the snow my friends had been up there and they the snow was uh well one of them's quite short so when she rang me to tell me that the snow was waist deep I was like okay well waist deep for her is probably knee deep for me uh but she but it meant that last minute I text we had a WhatsApp group and I I texted everyone and said look um there's thick snow up there even if it's gone it's gonna be really muddy and yuck so I think we're gonna be a lot longer when we're we're when we're up up there so just make sure you've got enough food water and extra clothes but actually it all the snow nearly all the snow had gone and it had drained really nicely and it was not too bad at all we I remained on schedule got into Hail and Why and had to put my sunglasses on and I I actually for the first time in months I felt the heat of the sun on my face it was it was just wonderful but then we were when we went back up the mountain into the mountains the that's when the weather came in and it was oh it was so windy and that sort of horizontal ice cold rain like burning into your face and um my friends Rihanne she'd parked when you get to Hay Bluff you can get down off the mountain really quickly and there's a car park there so that's where she had parked so when we got to He Bluff for what would have been the second time she was really close to her car and that was her ducking out point and my friends Debbie and Michael they so easily could have ducked out with her and I was a bit worried because the weather was so horrible and I just remember Debbie saying to me we're in we're in this now for quite a few hours because it's really exposed up there and I think it was that realization that she well she and Michael had the option there. They were either committing to another four hours of of freezing cold rain wind um exposure night was coming and they could have just dropped down off the mountain and jumped into Rihanne's car but luckily they didn't they stayed with me and it was it was pretty yucky up there we we all had to stop to put emergency layers on um and then we when we got up to wine it was just before WineVack my mood was just beginning I'd basically been smiling the whole time and loving it but I was just borderline not quite warm enough and knowing I had still hours left of this weather and I knew the head torches would be on soon but I stopped to put my layers on and that's when I also got a stone out of my bag and so this stone was sent to me by someone he got in touch with me through Instagram and said he he said that the challenge had really struck a chord with him. His father is currently with him at home dying of prostate cancer and I said to him could is a you know is there something I can do can I dedicate some miles to his father he said that would be lovely. So I had a little think about it and I was thinking well how how do I dedicate some miles so I suggested that he painted a stone with his father's name on which I would carry with me from the start and then I placed the stone on Winevack which is the highest point of the course it's about it's definitely over halfway I think it's about I would say about 40 miles in so when I stopped and I was feeling a bit miserable and I got out my extra layers that's when I thought oh I'll get the stone out now put that in my pocket and just having just taken the stone and have it in my hand I was like why are you miserable? Yeah you know it was it was just such a reminder of what I was doing and why and then we got up to Winevack and um and I placed the stone on there and I hadn't really thought about the act of placing the stone but it was really emotional I did have a little cry um and it was just it was I suppose it um I don't know if highlight is the right word to use but it was an definitely like a an emotional poignant significant thank you yes and uh I yeah so I I've I I took um my friend took a video of me doing that so that I sent it to this chap um who had sent me the stone so yeah that was that was definitely a moment yeah that's a lovely story really nice that glad you got that in and didn't uh forget to tell us that that's really nice.

SPEAKER_01 28:27

Um so I think it would be remiss of me now I've got you here not to talk about what else you're gonna be oh I ought to also say because you were relating previous to the story about the stone that it was pretty I think it's a pretty brave thing to do as well because this is a mountain winter mountain adventure um or run. And you know there's there's been a lot of sad news around a couple of guys that were uh lost lost their lives on Snowden recently so I I think it these things need to be taken very seriously when people set out to do these things and remembering that it is a winter event um and you were of course well prepared for it as you said putting on emergency layers um moving on from that the um what is Lizzie Gatherer up to next can you tell us what your plans are for twenty twenty six oh for twenty twenty six well I hopefully will be at Sherwood Pines Backyard Ultra in March Alex Sweets will be there uh he has fifty he was Sarah Perry's uh assist he's got fifty eight yards uh yeah this is backyard ultra backyard ultra there's a that event will go really long because there's a lot of good quality people in there um I would like to do a poner there's lots of things I know that I would like to do but um I'm just sort of taking the year a quarter at a time at the moment right to see where is it does that all revolve around it kind of revolves around Sherry Pines because I um I don't know if I'm working or not so I actually I'm I think I will be there but at the moment I haven't got uh the official go-ahead from work so I don't want to get too excited about it.

SPEAKER_02 30:28

And is that a silver ticket event or is it no uh Highlander is uh Portland Pig is I think God's own backyard is and one other I can't remember. Uh and then yeah and also of course it depends how far if I if I am there how far do I go and then how long is my recovery? So it's a very it's very difficult so that's why nothing is planned beyond March because I don't really know what state I'll be in. But next year um I would like to do a repeat of this challenge that I've just done but instead um of doing it for men's health I would like to do it for female pelvic health. So I have some outcome goals that I know I want to achieve um but at the moment I haven't you know I've I've only just done this this campaign so I need to sort of um I I don't know what shape I'm gonna do. I'm sure it'll be in the same area again. In the area in yeah in the in the Breck and beacons yeah because I just because it's just um for me in terms of route planning I already know it so I can I can look at the map plan the route and already visualize how it's gonna come together and know how big the climbs will be and plus because of the running club I'm a member of there I you know I've got a lot of support um so I think um yeah there's a lot a lot of thinking and planning to be done but yes I I want to do the same idea again next year for female Pelvic House and and do another awareness campaign there because that's something that's fantastic needs to be talked about I think yeah yeah and it it yeah it would be a good follow-on wouldn't it as a second project to do yeah because I've learned I've learned a huge amount from this it's not because the running really was was the easy bit it it's the the campaign side of things was was new to me you know having to reach out to journalists and podcasts and um you know get a photographer on board because it's it's kind of like well you um if I want it to be in the in the media then I need to have good photos.

SPEAKER_01 32:32

And I have to say the photos are fantastic.

SPEAKER_02 32:34

How do you saw them today was it today or last night you sent them out yeah Matt's done an incredible job and he bought you know he even bought I mean hey hey bluff that it was disgusting there and he uh god knows how long he was lurking around waiting for because I'm not sure there's any phone any signal so I don't know if he'd have been able to track us there and as I came down to him he just threw an aubergine at me because obviously that's been like the emoji that I've been using a lot so there's a great a photo of me catching an aubergine and then one of me holding it but I just look like I I I'm literally crying with laughter because it was like not I was not expecting anyone to be throwing aubergines at me in the middle of an ultra I think you did a fantastic job with uh uh raising the awareness the amount of like Instagram Facebook and other coverage that you've managed to garner and and put out there it's really really really good it's so much more involved isn't there than just going for a running a lot more I mean I had this idea I was like you know I'm gonna contact um you know local media national media podcast you know and I and I I spent a day or half a day pinging off emails to various different people um but then of course you've then got to act on everything and it's it's almost felt like a f a full-time job at times because um like you know I I spoke with a national um they're like they're an agency who work for a national paper so they've been or um not a they they they're an agency so they just ping it off to all the national papers and then whoever takes it takes it. So they've been incredible. They reached out to me having seen the story in the Basin State Gazette um and they they tried to get it out last week on Thursday and Friday but Prince Andrew apparently was taking up quite a lot but they I couldn't believe it because to me I'm it's an insignificant in you know in the in the grand scheme of things when you've got you know for a national paper but but the the the guy rang me on Friday morning apologising that it hadn't gone out because of Prince Andrew and I was like I can't believe you're putting me in the same sentence as him but they bless them they they were like if you can as soon as you get back from the run can you send us some photos and a a couple of lines so they tried to get it in the Sunday press um and they're the last ditch effort they've they've sent it out today but I just really appreciate the the how hard they've tried to get it to get it to go national but um but it's definitely I think yeah it's gonna go in Wales online which is big that's a that's a bigger press um so it it's been quite full on yeah it's speaking to lots of and I've I've loved it I've really really enjoyed it um but yeah speaking to all the different people and then getting images across to them and um sending them the fact sheet that the charity have sent some ensure that they're they're printing correct information about prostate cancer. So um but I but of course I've now I've got all of these contacts next year when I do the same again but for women's health I I think hopefully I can just lean on all these you know remember me the penis runner from last year you know so I'm kind of hoping I've got my foot in the door for next year and and then yeah and it'll be it'll be easy to to get out. Um so yeah it's it's certainly been I've loved it I've I've I've really I've enjoyed I've loved all the logistics and the planning and um figuring out where people can intercept me on on course and you know who needs to bring me water or um yeah it it's it's been it's been quite a project.

SPEAKER_01 36:18

Yeah well fantastic and well done you to I think it's great to do something like that as a a charitable project around something that you love doing um in ultra running so it's a that's a really wonderful thing a wonderful result um and I hope that if you've saved one life because somebody's gone to the doctor to get a PSA test that's that's wonderful and hopefully there'll be a lot more and I just think it's just go and get why not get peace of mind. You know most a lot of people will get a negative result and not need any further treatment. Although it is something that you should keep doing as as life goes on through older age I think you should keep going back and keep getting tested. I certainly do I go every year now but well done Lizzie and uh good luck with the next one thank you and everything else you do of course and thanks for coming on aid station again.

SPEAKER_02 37:24

Thank you for having me. I'm glad I was able to string a sentence together because yesterday I couldn't still recovering yeah I didn't sleep when I got back I was just so I was just buzzing absolutely buzzing and um yeah you know had a shower and you know got into bed and I thought oh I'm exhausted but then my my brain was just like yeah wearing around million miles an hour and yeah I didn't sleep at all so oh well you'll have to catch up now. Yeah I had a good I had a good sleep last night. Oh right okay hence I was a bit late coming over this morning so no no problem but yeah just great to have you on.

SPEAKER_01 38:00

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 38:00

Thanks a lot to the next bloody eight station