VIDEO: Seven marathons in one go for Alistair "Ally K" Macpherson as he prepares to run the 180 miles between Glasgow and Inverness in just 70 hours to raise case cash for Highland Hospice
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An Inverness endurance athlete will attempt his ultimate challenge in July in aid of Highland Hospice.
Alistair "Ally K" Macpherson will set off from Glasgow and run the 180 miles back home to the Highland capital in just 70 hours.
His route will take him from the north of Glasgow and follow both the West Highland Way and the Great Glen Way before finishing along the Loch Ness Marathon.
He is planning to set off just after midnight in the early hours of Thursday, July 29, and he is hoping to finish sometime between noon and 5pm on Saturday, July 31.
Mr Macpherson, who is a 42-year-old steward from Stornoway Drive in Westercraigs, said he started running in 2011 and added: "I was in the pub and agreed to run the Skye half marathon as a kind of a bet if you like. I hadn't run for years and I did that with only six weeks to go – I didn't even own a pair of trainers."
After completing that event he went on to tackle longer and longer routes – including a 30-mile race known as the Dirty 30 in the West Highlands in 2012, a run around his homeland of Skye which covered a distance of 134 miles in 35 hours in 2014, and in 2016 he ran 120 miles from Skye to Inverness again in 35 hours.
He said: "I did that again in one swoop and I did it through two nights with no sleep. I started at midnight on Wednesday night in Skye and I arrived in Inverness on Friday lunchtime.
"The fact of two nights with no sleep which was harder because I started at midnight so I started tired already. This is 180 miles, it is the longest one I've done – this is the equivalent of seven marathons in one swoop."
Along the route he will have a support team including a number of pace runners and someone to drive the van.
He said: "Along the way I am going to be joined by various people, different runners along the way, are going to join me to give me a bit of company and support."
Mr Macpherson originally planned to do the run last April but his plans have to be postponed because of the coronavirus pandemic. He said: "I was gutted but at the time I felt it was the sensible thing to do because the way things were I don't think it would have looked right, me running around the countryside when the country is in lockdown.
"When you are doing an event like this it is important to have the support of everybody so I felt it was right not to do it at that time. It was postponed and I have given it a bit longer than a year, one year and three months, and I only decided to do it at the back end of last year."
He said he felt the timing was right and added: "I think now, the way things are, things are moving forward and I really want to get it done this year so that is the bottom line.
So far he has managed to raise £78,000 for various cancer charities and he is hoping to raise £22,000 for the hospice to bring the total to £100,000.
Hospice fundraiser Jenna Hayden said: “We are so grateful to Ali for taking on this mammoth challenge for us – by far his biggest to date.
"What he’s doing is just incredible and we will be there supporting Ali and his team every step of the way.”
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