#TeamCardiff runner Gareth Davies tops the table for funds raised in 2019 so far. We caught up with him to learn more about how he met his fundraising target, and how he\u2019s preparing for the big day.<\/p>\n\n\n
Gareth, you\u2019re one of the first runners to meet their fundraising target. What\u2019s the secret of your success?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n When I signed up my wife very\nwisely advised that I start sharing the fundraising page as early as I can.\nThat allowed me to get a head start on raising the money and then to focus\nsolely on training for when the time comes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is a piece of advice I would pass on to anyone else. I\u2019ve been blown away by the generosity of friends and family and I can\u2019t believe how quickly the target was hit!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n What motivated you to sign up for #TeamCardiff?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Running for cancer research at\nCardiff University appealed to me as, like so many people, cancer has had an\nimpact on my friends and family. My Grandad lost his life to cancer and my\nstepdad is currently fighting a battle against it, and\nnot for the first time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last year I completed the\nCardiff 10K and the Half Marathon was the logical next step. When I learnt that\nI could represent #TeamCardiff and raise some money for a good cause it seemed\nlike the right thing to do. Besides, I love a free t-shirt!<\/p>\n\n\n\n How are you feeling about race day?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n My Gran recently passed away and\nthe race itself falls on her birthday (6 October) so that will be a big\nmotivator to perform well. I\u2019m not really feeling nervous yet but I\u2019m sure\nthere will be nerves in the days leading up to it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I did find that being a part of a huge crowd of runners was a big help during the 10K and looking at the pictures of last year\u2019s Half Marathon, the atmosphere looks incredible. That will be a big factor.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n How\u2019s the training going? Any #TeamCardiff tips?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ve not started any specific\ntraining yet. I do try to run 3 times a week to keep fitness levels up so I run\n10k on a Monday and 5k on Wednesdays and Saturdays, taking part in local Parkruns\nwhen possible. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I don\u2019t want to peak too soon so\nwill start the half marathon training 8 \u2013 10 weeks before the big day. If all\ngoes well I should be in top condition and I\u2019d love to complete the course in\nless than 2 hours.\n\nI feel like a rookie still myself so don\u2019t really have any tips or\ntricks! I do think that music is really important when training; I\u2019m really\ninto skate punk, which is a bit too fast for running to. I often find myself\nspeeding up far too much when the riffs kick in!\n\n\n\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"#TeamCardiff runner Gareth Davies tops the table for funds raised in 2019 so far. We caught up with him to learn more about how he met his fundraising target, and how he\u2019s preparing for the big day.","protected":false},"author":904,"featured_media":3811,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3802","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"meta_box":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3802","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/904"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3802"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3802\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3854,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3802\/revisions\/3854"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}