Football eh? A game of two halves isn’t it? Jumpers for goalposts, boys in the park playing til it gets dark. Well people often say “football ain’t what it used to be”, and a group of lads in Newcastle will be proving that point this weekend when they attempt to break a world record by playing football non stop for an astonishing 36 hours! The Donation4charity team are all massive football fans so we donned our Jonny Motson coat and headed up to deepest darkest Newcastle to catch up with Paul Newton over a Lucozade and some orange segments.
Can you tell us a little bit about your world record attempt?
I lost my father to a disease called Wegeners Granulomatosis last summer and I wanted to do something in his memory. He loved football and passed that passion on to me and so it seemed fitting to have the event football based. When I started looking into endurance football matches on the internet, I quickly stumbled upon the current record and thought that it would be an excellent focus for us. The core of the team are friends and former work mates from P&G with a few stragglers thrown in who have become good friends through this event.
How much training has been involved?
We have been in training since November last year and have been running, circuit training and playing 9-5 sessions of football throughout. We have lost a number of bank holidays and weekends to this and the WAGS are very much looking forward to getting their other halves back next weekend. One of the great things has been to see the change in the guys over the period from fat beer monsters into toned athletes that, now, are really enjoying fitness training.
Having played football against many of you (and still sporting the bruises) has all this training seen your tekkers develop along with the reduction in waistlines? Who’s seen the most improvement and who should we look out for as top scorer (if you’re counting)?
Persoanlly, I have lost almost two stone through the training and I can see that many of the lads have lost a lot of weight as well. When we found out that a similar record attempt in Blackpool ended up with 3 guys in hospital, the guys really stepped up training and looking after themselves. Some of the lads started from a great position while others have found the concept of training and fitness brand new. It wouldn’t be fair to name names, but I think that the fact that some of the lads have started running and doing circuit classes in their spare time shows how hard they have worked at this.
In terms of top scorer……..I think David Samms, Phil Young and Sean McGarry will be there or there abouts. If I notch 1, I’ll be happy with that!
Can you let us know a bit more about the charity itself?
As I say, my father died due to a condition called Wegeners Grnaulomatosis. I looked into supporting the local hospitals in Newcastle where he died, but they didn’t have a specific fund for that condition, only generic funds. That was when I found the Wegeners trust and they have been a great support to us. Wegeners Granulomatosis (WG) is a rare condition of unknown cause that develops as a result of inflammation in the blood vessels. Around 500 people are diagnosed with the condition each year in the UK. It can occur at any age but is most often seen in middle age (the 4th and 5th decade) and distributed equally between men and women. It is highly unusual for it to occur in two people in the same family, so there is not a strong genetic link. As all parts of the body have blood vessels within them it can affect many different organs and systems including the sinuses, ears, throat, lungs, kidneys, nerves, brain and skin. Joint pains and eye symptoms can also occur. Less often the heart and bowels can become involved and some patients seem to be at a greater risk of developing blood clots in the leg or lung.
Football and fans get a lot of bad press. Have you managed to get any media coverage to show the good the game can do?
We are fortunate to have a BBC radio Newcastle presenter on the squad and he has been great for us. He has organised media launches at NUFC and sorted press releases for us with local news and radio stations. We have also got a friendly PR company quay2media to help us out as she’s a mum from my daughters school. Everyone has been so helpful, its genuinely been very touching. The social media side, the blog, twitter and facebook, have allowed us to keep a constant barrage of messages out there and, with 20 squad members, its been pretty full on and we are no doubt named on more than a handful of spam filters!
You can donate to the lads here :
http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/fundraiser-web/fundraiser/showFundraiserProfilePage.action?userUrl=Soccerampmam
and follow them on their blog at www.soccerampmam.wordpress.com
Or twitter @soccerampmam
