The William Aldridge Foundation

At 40 years young Garth Aldridge challenged himself to run his first ever half marathon in memory of his courageous nephew Rifleman William Aldridge and raise funds through the Kilimanjaro 2010 Appeal for The RCDM MoD Patient Welfare Fund & The Riflemans Fund.

In true military fashion, his training regime started months before participating in the Bristol Half Marathon, held on Sunday 5th September 2010, ensuring he would be able to complete the 13.1 mile course through Bristol's historic streets.

Garth completed the course in an awesome 2hrs 2mins 9secs - looking as cool as a cucumber approaching the finishing line alongside friend and training buddy Stevo.
Garth said, "I took my inspiration from William with his sheer focus and determination to succeed. I hope to complete several more half marathons in his memory now and may even build up to doing a full marathon!"
History of the Bristol Half Marathon
The race is now an established national event with a growing international reputation. It is seen as one of Bristol’s most prestigious sporting events with the 2010 Bristol Half Marathon marking the 22nd occasion on which it has been staged.

The race was first held in 1989 when it attracted 1,000 runners, by 2009 this had grown to over 16,000 entries.

In 2001 the City of Bristol hosted the 10th IAAF World Half Marathon Championships alongside the Bristol Half Marathon and runners taking part were able to follow in the footsteps of British legend Paula Radcliffe and Haile Gebrselassie of Ethiopia. Thousands of people turned out to watch Paula cross the finish line in the record-breaking time of 66 minutes 47 seconds and Gebrselassie take first place in the men’s race with an impressive time of 60 minutes 3 seconds.

In 2003, local veteran Nick Rose won the ‘Legends Challenge’ – a race within a race that saw top British Olympians Steve Cram, Tim Hutchings, Hugh Jones, Steve Jones and Mike McLeod compete against each other for the first time in nearly twenty years. It is worth mentioning that Steve Cram and Tim Hutchings have continued to run in the event – when their busy schedules allow ! and Hugh Jones has also kept in touch as the official course measurer.


To find out more results, winners and further info on the 22nd Bristol Half Marathon please follow the link below:

www.bristolhalfmarathon.com/2010BHM

I take my hat off to him, its a fantastic achievement, one which requires an enormous amount of training. Well done to Garth Aldridge.

I'm so proud of him Steve ... it is a fantastic achievement and I think he has caught the bug, fully intending to do more!! x

I think we all need to do our bit for our Hero's, and especially the William Aldridge Foundation, which is unique in providing and online directory and raising much needed funds to other forces charities and organisations that help our injured serving and ex-serving personel, and very importantly, helping berieved families of lost loved ones in conflict.