A NEWTOWNBUTLER man is dusting off his running shoes to pound Dublin’s streets on Sunday to raise money for a local playgroup.
Paul Greene, 38, who helps run P&P tarmac with his father, is competing in the Dublin marathon in a bid to raise funding for Newtownbutler playgroup’s Railway Kids programme.
As reported in The Herald last May, the programme was under threat because of proposed funding cuts.
However, Greene, whose own daughter Sienna attended the Railway Kids programme, is getting set to run the streets of the capital in order to make sure other kids get the same chance that his wee girl got.
“I always had it in my head to run a marathon,” he said, “My wee lassie (Sienna) was with the playgroup programme last year.
“One day she came home after her last day there with a box that had 5o pictures of her in it as well as drawings and paintings that she had done.
“I just thought, in light of the group having its funding cut, how awful it was that such a good thing like that was being stopped – after all, she loved it there and they brought her on so much.
“I saw that box and thought it terrible that they couldn’t get any funding and so I came up with this plan to run the marathon to raise money for them.
“They’ve given my daughter a good start to her education and now I’ve the chance to give something back. I’ve a wee boy who was born when
Sienna was finishing playgroup and it hit home that because of the cuts, he wouldn’t get the opportunity to get to it.”
Paul set up a Go Fund Me page so that people could make donations ahead of the marathon and was surprised as to how much has been raised so far.
“So far we’ve raised just over £2000,” he added. “I must admit, I didn’t think we’d raise as much of half the original £1000 I was hoping for.
“When I saw that the funding target had been surpassed, I thought ‘Jesus I’ll really have to run this marathon now’. I’ve not run one before – I’ve done half-marathons in the past but I’ve never done a full one.
“But the hard work – the preparation – has been done now and they say that once you do that, the race itself is the easy part.
“However, there was one glitch. I bought myself a pair of runners worth £300 and then booked my place in the marathon that evening. Then the next day at work, I did my back in. Thankfully a chiropractor got me sorted and there’s no aches or pains in my back at all.”
To donate to Paul’s fundraiser, log on to: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-to-keep-the-railway-kids-programme
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