A leisure centre worker from Broadstairs will take on the London Marathon this Sunday (April 26) to raise funds for the British Heart Foundation – in memory of her grandad who passed away due to cardiac arrest just the day before his 74th birthday.
Lauren Beerling, 22, hopes to cross the finish line of the 26.2 mile run in around five hours.
Her grandad, Tommy Brewster, from Ramsgate, was a well-known Provident and Christmas club collector and a talented darts player on the Thanet circuit.
Playing mainly for the Red Arrow Club and Northwood Club in later life. Tommy also played for both Ramsgate and Margate leagues over his lifetime.
Tommy often stood out in a crowd due to his love of wearing bright, Hawaiian shirts.
He passed away on March 14 2017.
Lauren, whose work at Feel Good Factory sessions involves guiding people with disabilities and injuries through exercise on motion-assisted equipment, said: “He had been at the Northwood Club just the night before but we woke up in the morning and he had passed away overnight. He’d had two heart attacks and the hospital couldn’t bring him back from the second one.
“My nan saw it all so that had a lot of impact on her.”
Then, in 2023 Lauren’s mum Tracy was taken to hospital with chest pains a week before her birthday.
Lauren said: “We found out she’d had a heart attack and she spent a week in Margate hospital. She has got heart disease but is on the mend.”
In January 2024, Lauren’s nan also suffered a heart attack but was treated quickly and is recovering well.
Lauren, who also lost her Grandad Peter to covid in 2021, said: “It’s been a never-ending thing in the family so the British Heart Foundation is a cause close to our hearts, no pun intended.”
Lauren has faced her own health challenges. As a ten-year-old she had Scoliosis, which is a curvature of the spine.
She said: “My spine was in an S shape at 90 degrees so I have got rods and pins in my spine. Every six months that had to be lengthened but I had my final fusion and full rods put in in 2015 so although they can come out of place, so I’m not allowed to do things like bungee jumping, everything should be fine.”
Lauren has been running for around 18 months and has stepped her up training with shorter runs and interval training during the week and longer, three to four hour runs, at the weekends.
Although she has run half-marathons this will be the first full marathon Lauren has tackled but says she is feeling confident.
She added: “It was always my dream to run the London Marathon and as my Grandad Tom would say ‘up here for thinking, down there for dancing’.
“What better way to achieve my dream than to do it in honour of my Grandads and to help the fight against heart and circulatory conditions that have hurt our family so much.”
Lauren hopes to raise £2,500.
