Samaritans raise money to help people in need of emotional support, no matter what the size of their problems. The charity is contacted every six seconds by people in need of emotional support, but to maintain their 24-hour helpline they need to raise more than £10m a year.

Stress Down day is a Samaritans campaign that aims to raise awareness of the effects of stress in the workplace and encourages people to take better care of their emotional well-being.

We think this is a brilliant charity and a fantastic campaign, so to support this we have all decided to wear our comfiest slippers all day in the Feel Good office and donate some cash to the Samaritans. At least we get to keep our feet nice and snug on this cold winters day!

As you can see, Michael has gone a bit further…and donned his PJs too!!! We hope that other companies are joining us and letting their teams wear their comfy slippers to work…

7.30am 6th July 2008

Why is my alarm clock going so early on a Sunday morning??  Agggghhhhh….I’ve got to go and run 10k!

That was pretty much the way it went on the morning of my run!  Blind panic after having a little bit too much fun at the Feel Good Picnic the previous day!  But I stumbled out of bed, and despite missing breakfast, the opportunity to grab anything to drink, and being a little bit sleepy, I made it round the course in 1hr and 2 mins!!  Unfortunately, Mel had to pull out the day before with a throat infection, but I battled on alone, and the atmosphere was just amazing as I passed the London landmarks, and with 25,000 runners fighting their way around the course there was plenty to keep my mind off the fact that my legs were killing me!  One of my most memorable moments was being passed by a girl dressed as Baby from “Dirty Dancing”, with leg warmers and all, who had a sign on her back saying “For my dad and Swayze”…..definitely an emotional moment!

Having crossed the finish line, feeling absolutely starving, I headed down to the SADS UK picnic in St James’ Park where I met lots of lovely inspiring people who were also running for the same charity.  Special thanks to Anne for providing such a fantastic spread which definitely aided my recovery!

The sponsor money is still coming in, and it looks like I’m set to raise at least £500 once my funds have been matched which is a fantastic result.  There’s still time to sponsor me if you’d like by visiting the web page at the link below….

Justgiving – Lyndsey Bennett’s Fundraising Page

Thanks to everyone for all their support, and now it’s time for me to get ready for my next adventure at this year’s Great North Run where I’ll be running on behalf of The British Heart Foundation……the hill training starts here!!

So after 3 months of far too much fun, and far too little exercise, my next adventure at the London 10k on 6th July is creeping up terrifyingly quickly!! This time, I’m going to be running with my sister Mel, and we’re just hoping that the gorgeous route past some amazing landmarks like Big Ben and Westminster Abbey will keep us occupied and stop us thinking about how much our legs hurt!!

This time, we’re going to be running for a charity called SADS UK, who do lots of fantastic work supporting families affected by cardiac arrhythmias.  With a slightly ropey ticker myself, this is a charity that’s really close to my heart, and we’re hoping to raise over £500 to help them do even more great stuff, like providing automated cardiac defibrillators and doing even more research into these sorts of heart conditions.

We’re upping the training this week, and I know Mel is going to be fighting her way through those Cornish hills, while I’m enjoying the joys of the flat green parks in Cambridge…..I definitely got the better end of the deal there!

Here’s hoping it’s a sunny day, and that we don’t come last out of the 20,000 runners taking part!!  We’ll let you know how we get on!!

So I woke up yesterday and my first thought was ‘Oh my goodness I’m doing Race for Life today!’ and with that I started to feel a little nervous!

When I arrived at Hylands Park I couldn’t believe the amount of women that were about to join me in running/walking the 5km all in aid of Cancer Research. The warm up was really fun and my friends and I were giggling away at how silly we looked in our pink cowboy hats!!

Taking part in the Race for Life was certainly emotional. Someone close to me has had Cancer recently so I was doing it for them and all the other people I know who have been affected. It was quite heart wrenching reading all the signs on peoples backs throughout the race – I had tears in my eyes the whole way round!

Anyway, I finished the 5km in just under an hour which I was really pleased with as I am far from the athletic type!

I would definitely take part in Race for Life again so that I could raise even more money for such a great charity that is very close to my heart.

One day in early March the “Wholesale, Food Service and Licensed Team” (affectionately called The Waffles) decided to enter the Sports Relief Mile.  Now this is an event for the fit and not so fit and therefore has 3 levels of distance: 1, 3 and 6 miles.  Thinking 1 mile seemed a little easy we decided to enter 3 miles…but disaster struck – it was full!!  So a mad moment came over Sarah and me when we thought “6 miles? Easy!”  Hmmmm….!

So Sunday 16th March rolled around and we all awoke to the coldest, wettest day imaginable…but we all crawled out of bed and made our way down to Victoria Embankment.

As we lined up for the 1pm start the lovely ladies from Bannatyne’s Health Club helped us warm up with what we interpreted as some very energetic dance moves…we were then given some inspirational words by Davina McCall before the starting horn blew. 

Lyndsey – being the runner in the team – flew off leaving Mark, Sarah and I to enjoy a leisurely jog/walk (ok, it might have been mainly a walk…) for the next 6 miles.  With the views of Big Ben, Waterloo, The London Eye and of course the Thames we laughed our way around (snacking every now and then on a few waffles) and finished the full 6 miles feeling very proud of ourselves.

We raised just over £500 for Comic Relief (including the money matched by Feel Good Drinks) and will definitely look at doing another day again!

By the way… Jay was down in South London running around an athletic track 12 times in the rain and raised £130!

READING HALF MARATHON – that’s 13 miles isn’t it? How did I end up agreeing to run this….. what with 3 kids under 6, a job, 2 horses, a husband (he is great) just starting up his own business, an old knee injury from running and a bad hip post having my 3rd child!! When am I going to train?!!

BUT….the challenge and desire to get fit again plus proving to myself that I can still do it got the better of me. If I am going to run it I told myself, it must be for a charity and Against Breast Cancer seemed a worthwhile charity having lost my mum to this 6 years ago. I set about the training, squeezing in a few short runs in the week and a longer run at the weekend. The sponsorship started coming in which inspired me more and with a target of £1,000 plus the feelgoodness fund matching whatever I raise, so £2,000 was the target.

IT WAS A GLORIOUS SUNNY DAY and I felt excited and a bit nervous- I hoped to do it in under 2 hours so thought positive. I met Lyndsey from Feel Good Drinks at the start and after numerous trips to the loo and last minute “oh my god are we really about to do this” we set off. I had been told Reading was a flat and easy course – well someone was lying as at about 2 miles we had a very steep hill at which point I though I must have gone off course! It was then fairly steady for the next few miles, the crowds were great, the atmosphere building all the way round and with Mika on my ipod I felt great. Water stops and sweets were on offer – how great, a quick sugar rush kept me on course as I hit the 11 mile mark. I had not run further than 11 miles for a very long time so I was now in what I call ‘no man’s land’. Legs tired and ankle sore (having put my chip timer on the wrong way round and the Velcro rubbing….typical) but the crowds kept cheering and I found some extra reserve – the site of the Madjeski stadium was heaven, I managed to muster up a small sprint to the finish and I felt like an utter god!!! 1 hour 55 mins my time – much better than I had ever expected– really was the best run ever. In total I raised £3,000 for Against Breast Cancer

I met up with my family who had seen me come in and my 4yr old daughter Sophie brought me straight back down to earth when she said ‘mummy you did great but Scooby Doo beat you!’.

My next stop… London April 2009… seriously…I think!!