Karen Burrows

I would like to nominate my sister Karen (Kaz) to be a torchbearer. Kaz has been an inspiration to me since losing her daughter at 22 months to a brain tumour, and since I lost my husband to lung cancer - he was just 43 years old. At a time when we both could have decided to give up on life, Kaz turned our lives around and was the driving force behind us becoming slow, but fit triathletes. Following our losses Kaz encouraged me to take part in the local 'Race for Life' to give us something positive to focus upon. We followed a training plan, initially just running for 1 minute and then walking for 1 minute until we could just about manage to run for 30 minutes. Once Race for Life was over, we then needed another challenge, so joined a local running club and began entering 5k and 10k races. This then set the scene for the last 11 years of our lives - every year we decide on a challenge which enables us to continue to move forward whilst focussing on something positive. Kaz has supported me and trained with me for many running events including London Marathon and then subsequently, triathlons at all distances, the pinnacle of it all being when we crossed the finishing line of Ironman Austria last year, in 15 hours and 49 minutes, holding hands and with the biggest proudest smiles!! Kaz has raised much money for the NSPCC and Cancer charities throughout this time and her beautiful smile would make her a perfect torchbearer! I am so proud of my big sister!!