Murray Hambro lost both feet when he was blown up in Afghanistan. Four months later he was determinedly back doing what he loved the most: riding a motorbike. A year later he formed True Heroes Racing, a team especially for injured servicemen, then he surpassed all medical expectations to ride at the British Superbike Championships. What a hero!! And I was there!
I met this inspirational man yesterday at Brands Hatch. He’s smart, adventurous (and damn good looking!) and proof that anyone can achieve anything by simply refusing to accept personal limits. I met some other super-fast men too… Luke Smith, Murray’s team mate; Dan Helyer, who raced in the British Super Stock 1000 championship; and a mechanic named Graham who wears the world’s most expensive bionic ankles – £160k and worth every penny. This is the future of medical technology and it’s amazing to see in action.
I worked with the Soldiering On team to sell raffle tickets and we raised £1200; not too shabby! Assuming I sold tickets to one in ten people that I approached, I guess I must have asked around 6000 people if they’d like to win a motorbike and raise money for wounded soldiers… no wonder my throat is sore again today!!
Here’s the beauty of social media: I mentioned in last week’s blog that I’d be at Brands Hatch… posted the blog on Facebook… someone read it and told me he was going too… I cheekily asked for a ride… I got a lift from a very lovely man who came out of his way to pick me up and drop me home again.
I have known Paul Eldon for about 25 years and we share some mutual friends, but we didn’t know each other well. I don’t advocate taking lifts from strangers, but he wasn’t strange at all!! In fact, he’s an extremely charming loss assessor from Essex who I have no hesitation in recommending. Although I haven’t personally used his services – fortunately!! He swoops in to help people who’ve suffered a loss through theft, fire or flooding – having spent a few hours with him I can see that his work ethic and commitment to customer care are flawless. I did say thank you yesterday, but this blog seems a good place to repeat that: thank you Paul. (Hopefully he’ll read it!)
Obviously I get a warm tingly feeling when anyone tells me they read this blog. So it was lovely at Clayton Coke’s networking party when three separate people I hadn’t seen for over a year said they look forward to reading it on a Monday – then proceeded to recommend it to new contacts. That was really nice. The whole evening was fun… Clayton had gathered together a bunch of his clients in a London wine bar to chat and connect over a few bottles of Merlot. It was a fantastic marketing exercise by him and a brilliant networking evening for us all.
The following day I met up with one of my favourite friends for lunch. He came running along the concourse at Liverpool Street station yelling, “Sorry I’m late! Thought I’d better catch up on your blog first…” Made me laugh!
I guess some people think I’ll be using Bat out of Hell lyrics again today… Well I try to be a little less predictable than that. “I gotta be cool, relax, get hip, get on my tracks. Take a back seat, hitch-hike, and take a long ride on my motor bike.” Crazy, eh?! (Thanks Freddie!) Remember what I said: It’s not ok to take lifts from strangers. But it’s ok to follow… @WeekendWitch.
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