I’m running the London Marathon for the Lincoln City Foundation, and it occurred to me that so many people don’t understand how far the Foundation go to provide services and support for the local community.

With that in mind, I’ve decided to have a couple of days with them, looking at their provisions, talking to people positively impacted by their efforts, and hopefully, opening your eyes to the great work they do. Of course, my intention is that in doing so, you’ll feel moved to add your name to the growing list of sponsors, pushing the total towards the £2000 mark.

If you wish to sponsor me, you can do so here

The first time I realised the Foundation wasn’t just football for kids and a bit of work in schools was when cancer touched my family. Not my Dad, who, as many of you know, survived lung cancer last year. I have an Aunty who had breast cancer, and in the weeks after her operation, she attended the Fighting Fit classes. I had no idea what that meant, but she contacted me effusive in her praise of Lincoln City and the work they do.

Of course, the Foundation is a charity bearing the club’s name, and therefore, it lifts the club’s profile within the community. When my Aunty, never a football fan, contacted me, I figured they must be doing something well. Yesterday, for the first time, I experienced it firsthand. Fighting Fit is a fitness class held a few times a week, where those going through a cancer journey come together and do circuit training. That’s the basics, but I found it to be so much more. I found it to be a humbling experience, a collection of such brave people who have left a bit of an impression on me.

I don’t know what I expected. It’s held at Yarborough Sports Centre, and I thought I’d walk in, people would be in the hall in little cliques maybe, we’d do the exercises and everyone would go. What I found was a remarkable social club of sorts, a collection of people bound by nothing other than the disease they are fighting, but finding solace and hope from each other.

Everyone met in the lobby, chatting and sharing stories of their Christmas endeavours. Alice Carter took the class, but it’s usually Phil Watson. They don’t just ‘take the class’ either – they’re friends with those attending. I went with Martin Hickerton, CEO of the Foundation, and everyone knows him as well. “I have to join in when I come,” he said. “Nobody has a choice.” That’s why I had my shorts on.

The session comprised five different exercises, repeated twice, and then another set of five repeated twice. There are squats, some weight work, skipping, and exercises designed to target certain key areas. One of the group members told me that the sessions featured squats heavily because that built strength for getting up a chair. Another told me they couldn’t climb the stairs before they started the sessions, but thanks to their twice-weekly workout, they were much more mobile and able to live a fuller life. He did comment that he didn’t know there was a lift at his first session, and it took him ages to get up to the gym! That was Frank, a former Sunday League footballer of some repute who once appeared in the final of the Fred Quibell Trophy. I wasn’t in any doubt as to his claims either – he had the photos to prove it.

The one thing that hit me most was how positive the class felt. I couldn’t help but laugh and joke with everyone, and set to a retro eighties soundtrack of everything from Climie Fisher to Belinda Carlisle, I actually felt really good. I forgot I was there as an observer; I got into the exercises and just began to enjoy the infectious company. I had to stop and remember the incredible fight these people have undergone or were undergoing. Everyone had a smile on their face and they all told me about the benefits. One person told me it was about the social aspect, how they were like a support group, there for each other. They meet outside of Fighting Fit, but wouldn’t have been introduced without the Foundation’s scheme.

Another spoke of how it was nice to feel normal. Having seen first-hand Dad’s struggle, I know those suffering from cancer can sometimes feel different. I can’t speak for anyone in the group, but Dad got a little tired of the well-meaning pity as if cancer defined him. In the Fighting Fit group, to put it bluntly, they’ve all got or had cancer. They’re not different from the rest of the group, and that brings a sense of normality to their lives. Talk of chemo and operations isn’t met with withering looks of sadness because they’ve all been through it. There’s value in that, more value than perhaps you realise until you’re the one on the end of the looks, or the one undergoing the journey.

At the end of the session, I chatted with a couple of the group for a while, disappointed that everyone else seemed to have left. They wanted to know what the sponsorship link was as if it was them who could do something for me. That was so humbling. I want to raise money to help provide these programmes, and the people directly affected were just as interested in me as I was in them. I did feel a tiny bit emotional – all I have to do is jog around London a bit, and that is my journey. They’re fighting a disease every single day, and yet they want to help me. That’s the sort of spirit the Fighting Fit group has within.

After that chat finished, I went downstairs, and to my surprise, the whole group were still there, drinking tea and coffee and chatting. I stayed, talking to them all, hearing their stories and telling mine. One by one, they dispersed, but I couldn’t. I wanted to hear everything about the group, about how it helps these brave people feel normal, how it helps them get fit, and how it gives them a sense of community. One or two even spoke of it being the highlight of their week, a sense of real purpose. Not everyone who fights cancer has a family nearby to lean on. This is their family, and the Foundation facilitate that.

Eventually, the final two of the group got up to leave, and as they did, they mentioned something so overwhelmingly sad that it kept me up a little last night. It was the realisation that from time to time, the group loses a member. It often falls upon Phil to inform the others that one of their friends has lost their battle, and even as I write this, I can feel myself filling up at that. These wonderful people, brought together by the Foundation, finding such comfort and joy in their exercise and meetings, won’t all make it. It’s likely in a year or two, some of the people who told me their stories yesterday will no longer be with us.

However, they will have found the final months of their battle more bearable because of Fighting Fit. They will have found solace and comfort in those around them, a strong and happy group of people who look forward, who fight (fit) and who have inspired me even more than I thought was possible. With every step I take on my training runs, a little bit of me will know that money is being raised for them. I thought I started this run because I wanted to help people, but when you meet the actual people your efforts help when you see their faces and hear their stories, it’s an emotional feeling. I keep saying humbling, but it really is.

Of course, many of them will make it, win their fight, and be able to help others in a similar situation. It’s such a wonderful programme, and very few other Foundations run it across the country. Rightfully, the Foundation is proud of the work it does, but not in a ‘look at us’ way. They’re proud because they care. They’re proud because even the CEO lifts the weights and does the skips. Because they help people see the light in their darkest hours. Because they have created a community that matters to each and every member. Because they genuinely care about the people who benefit from their programmes. Nobody is a number or a target; they’re a person, and everyone at the Foundation, from Martin to each and every employee, facilitates that.

Surely, that’s got to be worth a tenner of your money?