Obiter would like to extend our congratulations to two solicitors who joined the estimated 28,000 runners competing in Sunday’s Manchester Marathon.

The UK’s second largest marathon – and reputed to be the country’s flattest – included Giles Searby, a director from Chesterfield firm BRM Solicitors, who got round the course in a personal best time.

Searby is also a governor and incoming deputy chair of governors at Sheffield Hallam University and ran to raise money for its scholarship programme, which provides education opportunities for students from unrepresented and disadvantaged backgrounds.

Searby took up running six years ago at the age of 47 but had yet to break the marathon four-hour barrier until Sunday, when he completed the 26.2 miles in three hours 55 minutes.

Meanwhile, James Sloane, a personal injury solicitor in the Manchester office of JMW, ran the marathon to raise money for the Standing Tall Foundation. The charity was jointly founded by JMW ambassador Andy Reid, a former corporal in the British Army who was badly injured in Afghanistan in 2009 when he stepped on an explosive device.

Money raised by Sloane will help to tackle mental health and addiction issues by offering structured individual programmes from the charity’s hub in St Helens.

Danny Smith from Sheffield, a solicitor advocate specialising in employment law at rradar Ltd, completed his first ever marathon to raise funds on behalf of his friend’s baby daughter, Lottie. She was born with a congenital heart defect and needed a lifesaving operation shortly after birth and is due to have another one soon.

Smith has raised £1,135 for the Children’s Heart Surgery Fund which supports 17,000 babies, children and adults living with CHD every year, providing Leeds Congenital Heart Unit with funding and resources.

Family law solicitor Angela Lally, from Yorkshire firm Rucklidge Law, has been a runner for many years but had never completed a course longer than a half-marathon. Fitting in training around work, she started training in December and managed to post a time of three hours 55 minutes.

Lally said: ‘Training started in December, which is tough when it’s cold and dark. On one 15 mile run it was so cold my hair froze! I stuck with it and delighted to get a sub four-hour finish on my first attempt.

‘It was the most amazing experience and the crowd support was incredible. Before the race I said it would be my first and last, but now I may be changing my mind!’

Erika Wright, a public law and human rights solicitor with Irwin Mitchell in Birmingham, completed her first marathon in just over four hours, raising more than £1,000 for Macmillan Cancer Support. She had chosen the charity after a school friend was diagnosed with cancer and received huge support from the Macmillan nurses.

Wright said: ‘I started training for the marathon in September 2022 and could not imagine the support to have been as good as it was around the course.

‘The experience was great but I think my colleagues will be excited to hear about something other than my running complaints in our weekly meeting.’

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