Lauren Waterman

100 Miles in October Challenge

My Activity Tracking

72
mi

My target 100 mi

I’m running 100 Miles in October with Dogs Trust!

This October, I'm challenging myself to run 100 miles for Dogs Trust. 

I am not a runner. I don't particularly enjoy running, so this is going to be a challenge. I'm doing it for my boy, Nero.

We lost our dog Nero in May this year, just before his second birthday. Unfortunately, he had an aggressive cancer which took hold very quickly and there were no treatment options available.

Nero was a Dogs Trust dog through and through. He was born at Dogs Trust, as they had taken his mum in as a pregnant stray. Nero was adopted as a puppy by a family and returned after a couple of months as he had a poorly jaw and was a bit mouthy. Our friend stepped in and fostered Nero, and into our lives he came. 

We are so thankful for the care Dogs Trust provide, to take dogs in in their hour of need and help them find their families. Nero may have had a short life but he lived it to the max with us. 

Our other dog, Juno, is also a Dogs Trust gal. Juno was 2 years old when we adopted her. In that short time she had been given up twice into Dogs Trust's care and developed a fear of the world, and resulting reactivity. More than 5 years, and a heck of lot of training later she's a confident and happy dog with only a side of spice. No doubt my soul dog. 

Again, I can only thank Dogs Trust for sticking with her and trusting us to take her on.

The aim of Dogs Trust is to give stray and abandoned dogs a second chance at a brighter future with responsible, caring new owners.

Last year, they cared for 11,707 dogs across the UK and Ireland, rehomed 9,914 dogs, and helped deliver nearly one million meals to dogs in need through Fareshare foodbanks.

Your support helps them continue this vital work, especially as the cost of living crisis adds increased pressures for dog owners. The work of Dogs Trust is only possible with donations like yours. If you’re able to make a small contribution, I know they’d be incredibly grateful – and so would the dogs!

Thank you for helping me reach my goal 🐾 It would be amazing to give something back.


My Achievements

Shared Page

Updated Profile Pic

Self Donated

Thanked Donor

Fundraising Page

Raised £150

50% of Fundraising Target

Reached Fundraising Goal

50% of Distance Travelled

Reached Distance Goal

Added image to gallery

50% of Distance Travelled

My Updates

Parkrun - Temple Newsham

It was a sunny Saturday morning for parkrun. We visited Temple Newsham. It was another big run with 191 runners. My gender position was 12th, and Nick came 15th overall. I got my new PB of 27.12. We've both definitely seen huge improvements, although our legs are really starting to feel knackered 🤣

We've reached half way

Today's run put us over the half way mark. Thankfully we're still on track to complete the challenge 🙌

Running for the big green machine

13.10.2026 Bit of free advertising for Asda on my morning run. I got absolutely soaked. Another 4 miles under the belt in good time. Almost half way there 🙌

Parkrun on tour

10.10.2026 - Westmill Farm Parkrun, Ware We were visiting Nick's family this weekend, so we took our running on tour and tried out the local Parkrun. The course reminded me of crosscountry at school. We both hit new PBs, and I came in at 28.48 which is over 5 minutes faster than my Parkrun time 3 weeks ago 🙌

Proof we did a run despite the rain

06.10.2026 Our longest run yet. We ran 7.6km or 5 miles which took us 50 mins with a couple of stops at lights, and a debate as to whether we were running the right way. It was torrential rain for the whole run, but still quite warm so it was actually quite fun. We've not yet had a day off running, but if we can squeeze in some longer runs we might be able to have a couple of days off. Anyway, a few people have asked for more photos, so here you go.

My parkrun PB

03.10.2026 We did our second parkrun since 2019. For some reason in 2019, we did 3 park runs then never again 🤣 This was a tough one as we did an evening run last night so our bodies didn't have a lot of time to recover in between. However, despite that, and despite this course involving a lot of uphill running, I hit my Parkrun PB and my quickest 5km since we started preparing for this challenge. Great to see such a big improvement in pace since last week.

02.10.26

Our second run. Dark evenings are really setting in now, so we probably need to buy some high vis gear and something with a torch on so we can see better. We did our usual route in reverse, which meant more uphill running but we wanted to do the bits of the route that aren't well lit first. We finished in decent time. We're beginning to see small improvements to our pace. 

The challenge begins

First run down! We go again tomorrow.

29.09.2026

Another day, another evening prep run. We're conscious that the challenge starts in a couple of days, so we slowed our pace slightly but completed another 5.4k. 

27.09.2026

Today we didn't feel like doing another run, but we managed to persuade ourselves to do one anyway. This was our first run in the rain, and boy did it rain. We managed 5.4k, but the achy legs did kick in towards the end. 

26.09.2026

Today we did Parkrun at Roundhay Park. We completed the 5k run with no walking breaks, and the course has a brutal hill you run up 3 times 🙌 We were both feeling fairly good at the end, and its given us some hope that we can complete the October challenge. 

23.09.2026

Today we did our second prep run ahead of October. We shifted it up a gear and did 15 minutes running, 5 minutes walking, 15 minutes running. We're still taking it steady but managed just over 5k.

22.09.2026

I went for my first jog with Nick in preparation for October. I figured I needed to do some form of condensed couch to 5k as we don't have long to prepare. We did 10 minutes running, 10 minutes walking, 15 minutes running. We completed just under 5k, and finished in fairly good shape. We will need to adapt the route to make it longer than 5k for the main event and all going well, we should be able to run the whole route.

Step 1. Buy some running trainers.

I wasn't exaggerating when I said I wasn't a runner. I don't even have appropriate running trainers. Well, I do now 🤣

Thank you to my Sponsors

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Lewis Waterman

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Jon Hoare

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John Waterman

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Rachael Higgins

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Lauren Waterman

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Allison Whelan

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Tia Hardy

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Lydia Ward

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Thomas Porter

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Jack Peers

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Emma Osborne

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