Latest news with #Coleman-Day
IOL News
06-05-2025
- Entertainment
- IOL News
She finished a marathon in her wedding gown to honor her late husband
Laura Coleman-Day ran the last three miles of the London Marathon in her wedding dress. Kyle Melnick With about three miles remaining in the London Marathon, Laura Coleman-Day jogged off the road and onto a median - but not because she was tired. Her friends were waiting, holding the ivory wedding dress Coleman-Day had worn on the same day six years earlier, the day her husband Xander told her she looked beautiful in it. She pulled the dress over her sweaty running clothes and jumped back on the course to finish the marathon in honor of Xander, who died in February 2024 of a complication from stem-cell transplants. The dress stretched about a foot past Coleman-Day's blue running shoes, so she held up the front and a friend held the train until they crossed the finish line Sunday. Then Coleman-Day, 34, broke down in tears. Not only did wearing the dress make her feel connected to Xander, she said, but she had also finished her 12th marathon in 12 months as part of a fundraiser for a British stem-cell transplant charity. 'The challenge has brought me through the worst year of my life,' Coleman-Day said. About a decade ago, Coleman-Day, living with her parents, met Xander, who served in the Royal Air Force, near a military base in Northumberland, England. The couple married April 27, 2019, in a Harry Potter-themed wedding in a stone barn in Chipping Norton, a town in Oxfordshire, England. Coleman-Day said she could always find Xander in a crowd by listening for his loud and infectious laugh. He enjoyed birdwatching in his garden in Lincolnshire, and he was especially excited when he spotted his favorite birds, magpies and hoopoes. But that excitement hardly matched Xander's joy when he learned Coleman-Day was pregnant in February 2021, Coleman-Day said. They had their son, Amos, eight months later. The next year, Xander was often sick and experiencing night sweats. Coleman-Day said she thought Xander had a cold until September 2022, when he was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, a cancer that occurs when the bone marrow produces too many immature white blood cells. Xander beat the cancer three months later through chemotherapy, and he underwent a stem cell transplant in January 2023 to try to prevent the cancer from returning. He found a donor through Anthony Nolan, a British charity with a stem cell registry. But Xander became sick again in June 2023. His liver and kidneys deteriorated, Coleman-Day said, and he was diagnosed with graft-versus-host disease, when transplanted donor cells attack the recipient's tissues. In the following months, Coleman-Day started planning a marathon project to raise money for Anthony Nolan. Coleman-Day said she wasn't much of a runner, but the hobby helped clear her mind while Xander was sick. Her plans were sidelined when Xander, 36, died in February 2024, Coleman-Day said. Coleman-Day said she initially was in denial but soon felt anger that Xander had died before he could watch Amos grow up. She wanted something good to come from Xander's death, so she restarted her marathon fundraiser 'in the hope [Anthony Nolan's] research into GvHD will help save future daddy's and mummy's,' she wrote. She scheduled the first of her 12 marathons for May 2024, but she harbored doubts that she could run every race. Suddenly a single mother, Coleman-Day found family members to watch Amos when she went for training runs, or she ran miles on her treadmill after putting Amos to sleep. In a green singlet and Brooks Glycerin GTS sneakers, Coleman-Day ran marathons through scorching heat, freezing temperatures, rain, strong winds and mud. She wanted to quit during each race, but after finishing, Coleman-Day said she felt a 'high' that helped her through her grief. She was shocked that strangers were donating to her fundraiser, which has now received more than $23 000 (R560 000). Still, many days, Coleman-Day said she didn't want to leave her bed. But she did, teaching Amos how to swim and ride a bike - and thinking about how Xander was missing those moments. In December and January, Coleman-Day said she especially missed Xander while families got together for the holidays. She told herself she couldn't train anymore. 'But then I looked at it, and I thought, 'What I'm putting myself through is nothing compared to what Xander had to go through,'' Coleman-Day said. Plus, Coleman-Day was determined run the London Marathon after learning it was the same day as what would have been her sixth wedding anniversary. She pulled her wedding dress from a closet but didn't try it on until the day before the race - worried it would no longer fit. She found it did, and she gave it to two friends, who planned to hand it to Coleman-Day at the 23rd mile marker near the Tower of London. Coleman-Day ran the entire race in a veil - not the one from her wedding, because it was too long, she said. When Coleman-Day arrived at the meeting point, she hugged her friends and quickly pulled the dress over her clothes. Her friends pinned her No. 76063 bib on the front of her dress and inserted the same pink rose and thistle near her chest that Xander had attached to the same spot at their wedding. Coleman-Day said she ran slowly the last three miles while she held the front of her dress, and her friend Kate Walford clutched the back to prevent Coleman-Day from tripping. Coleman-Day felt hot and uncomfortable running on a roughly 60-degree afternoon, she said, but emotionally she felt 'incredible.' She crossed the finish line near Buckingham Palace in under five hours and 53 minutes. Coleman-Day was relieved to take a break from running marathons, she said, but she also felt bereft that the project was over. She said she will plan another race soon, maybe an ultramarathon. In the past few days, she has considered what Xander would have thought of her fundraiser. 'He'd tell me I'm completely mad,' Coleman-Day said. 'But he was always my biggest cheerleader. I know he would be proud of what I've achieved.'
Yahoo
01-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Why this woman finished the London Marathon in a wedding dress
Costumes aren't uncommon in marathons and other road races but rarely does a runner cross the finish line in a wedding gown. Laura Coleman-Day pulled her wedding dress over her running clothes for the last three miles of the London Marathon to honor her late husband, who died of blood cancer. She took part in the 26.2-mile Sunday as part of a challenge to run 13 marathons in 12 months to raise money for Anthony Nolan, a charity dedicated to blood cancer research, according to the BBC. She said completing the April 27 marathon, which fell on what would have been her sixth wedding anniversary, was 'absolutely amazing.' Coleman-Day ran with her friend Kate Walford, who is also running multiple marathons for her best friend who she lost to the disease. She said running in the dress was 'hot' but she managed to finish. 'The crowds, the atmosphere and running with one of the most inspiring people I've ever met,' she said. Her husband, Xander, died last year from post-transplant complications after developing acute lymphoblastic leukemia, a rare type of cancer that affects the blood and bone marrow, per the BBC. Coleman-Day talked about her husband and why she is running in an Instagram video two weeks before the race. 'The only thought that's going to be going through my mind is him,' she said. Sunday's race was her 13th in the past year to raise money for Anthony Nolan. 'They were doing a lot of research into post-transplant and I didn't want anybody else to go through what me and my son have gone through,' Coleman-Day told the BBC. Walford ran in memory of her friend Mark, who died in 2018 after getting leukemia for the second time. 'Watching Laura step into her wedding dress at mile 23 was such an emotional moment, reminding me what she has been through,' she told the BBC. 'We crossed the line together and did Xander and Mark proud.' While Coleman-Day had a poignant reason to don a wedding dress in a marathon, runners wear costumes for a variety of reasons, including fundraising, bringing awareness to a cause — as she did — and just for fun or to express themselves. Some runners dress up as a way to connect with spectators and encourage other runners on the course. Races run at Halloween encourage costumes. Online retailers offer running garb of all kinds from an inflatable chicken to a Forrest Gump getup. Among the 30,000 runners at the iconic Boston Marathon last week, there was a Princess Leia, a Chiquita banana, a leprechaun, a Larry Bird and a 'Where's Waldo.' And it's not just marathons. Runners dress up for 10K races and half-marathons, too. A 2010 article in Runner's World floated several theories about the costume phenomenon. Write and runner Mark Remy offered these possibilities: No one has costume parties anymore. Today, it's much harder to get your costume fix. Hence costumes in marathons, the largest of which have sort of become parties anyway. Increasingly crowded marathons = increasing lack of individuality. Standing around at the start of a big race can fill you with existential despair; it's hard not to feel like just another face in the crowd. Unless you're wearing pigtails, a blue-checked dress and ruby slippers! Marathoners are getting slower. Today, fewer runners care about finishing times. For them, the marathon is less a foot race and more a 26.2-mile Mardi Gras. Why not dress up? Costumes aren't more common — digital cameras and Social media are. Everyone and his mother also has a Facebook page, Twitter feed and accounts on Flickr, Tumblr and Digg, not to mention blogs (ahem), and is dying to use those to share all the wacky, clever things they've noticed.
NDTV
01-05-2025
- Sport
- NDTV
Why This UK Woman Ran A Marathon In Her Wedding Gown
A UK woman completed the London Marathon wearing her wedding gown. This was Laura Coleman-Day's 13th marathon this year. The woman from Lincolnshire, England, raised money to support a cancer charity and in the memory of her husband Xander. Ms Coleman-Day's husband Xander died in 2024 due to complications following a transplant he required after being diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia, a rare form of cancer that affects the bone marrow and blood, the BBC reported. The 33-year-old completed the marathon alongside her Guernsey-based friend Kate Walford, who is also doing several marathons in memory of her best friend who died from leukaemia in 2018. She described finishing the marathon on her wedding anniversary as "absolutely amazing" after running the final three miles wearing the dress. On her sixth wedding anniversary, Ms Coleman-Day stopped running for a time in the 23rd mile of the 26.2-mile marathon to put on the wedding gown so she could wear it to the end of the marathon. "I thought that going overboard with my wedding gown would be the ideal way to honour the day and Xander," Ms Coleman-Day told BBC News. "Kate and I are going to stop at mile 23 and put my wedding dress on," she added, People reported. She claimed it was "hot" to finish the race wearing the outfit, but she did it with Ms Walford. "It was absolutely amazing," Ms Coleman-Day said. Ms Coleman-Day married Xander, a Royal Air Force aerospace battle manager, in 2019. The two had a son, Amos, a few years later. Mr Xander began complaining of aches and pains, and physicians diagnosed him with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) by 2022, she told local outlet Lincolnshire Live. He was deemed cancer-free in December 2022 but had a relapse shortly after receiving treatment. Despite his optimism, the cancer eventually claimed Mr Xander's life in February 2024 at the age of 36. Their son was two years old at the time. Ms Coleman-Day ran the London Marathon to raise money for Anthony Nolan, a charity which works in the fields of leukaemia and hematopoietic stem cell transplantation.
Washington Post
01-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Washington Post
She finished a marathon in her wedding gown to honor her late husband
With about three miles remaining in the London Marathon, Laura Coleman-Day jogged off the road and onto a median — but not because she was tired. Her friends were waiting, holding the ivory wedding dress Coleman-Day had worn on the same day six years earlier, the day her husband Xander told her she looked beautiful in it.
Hindustan Times
30-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Hindustan Times
Woman crosses London marathon finish line in her wedding dress, reveals heartbreaking reason
A UK woman whose husband died from blood cancer completed the London marathon while wearing her wedding dress. Laura Coleman-Day has taken on a challenge to run 13 marathons in 12 months as a tribute to her late husband, BBC reported. Coleman-Day decided to put on her wedding dress for the last three miles of the marathon on her wedding anniversary to raise money for a blood cancer research charity. Coleman-Day ran 23 miles of the marathon before stopping and briefly stopping to put on the dress she wore on her wedding day, so she could be wearing it as she crossed the finish line. Although it was hot and difficult to run in a dress, she said that she wanted to complete the event. "It was absolutely amazing. The crowds, the atmosphere and running with one of the most inspiring people I've ever met," she told BBC. A post shared by TCS London Marathon (@londonmarathon) Her husband Xander died last year from post-transplant complications from a rare leukaemia which affects the blood and bone marrow. To honour him, she has run 13 races in 12 months for a blood cancer and stem cell research charity. Kate Walford, her friend, also ran the marathon in memory of her friend of 30 years who died in 2018 from leukaemia. "Despite the harsh conditions of the heat, we had the most amazing day meeting many other inspirational runners. Watching Laura step into her wedding dress at mile 23 was such an emotional moment, reminding me what she has been support from the crowds was incredible. We crossed the line together and did Xander and Mark proud," she said. 51-year-old Louise Bernadette Butcher, who has had double mastectomy after getting breast cancer, also made headlines when she ran the marathon topless to empower women suffering from the disease.
