In April 2009, two British athletes, Guy Watts and Andrew Delaney, are attempting to break a world record when they participate in the Indian Ocean Rowing Race, by becoming the 1st pair to reach Mauritius from Western Australia in a rowing boat. The total distance covered will be 3,780 miles and could take up to five months at sea to complete.

They are trying to raise a total of £200,000 to support Orchid, a male cancer charity.

My name is Mark Cawthorne and I am a fitness motivator at Everyone Active, Malvern Splash. Guy is a very close friend of mine from back home' in West Sussex where we grew up. I wanted to support him, so as well as devising training plans, we decided to run the Berlin Marathon together in September this year, along with his brother and another friend, to do some fundraising.

We have all completed one marathon before (2 in NYC '05 and 2 in London '07), so we've got an idea what we've let ourselves in for!

My weekly training blog, starting now, will keep you updated on our training and I'll try to include some advice along the way to perhaps help you start a bit of gentle jogging' or a few tips if you already do!

Weekly Tip from the Top.

If you are contemplating doing something active, have recently started or are already doing it, take some time to consider your goals. Don't worry about your starting point for now, just concentrate on what you want to achieve, how it will make you feel and why it is important to you to achieve that goal. Make it realistic, achievable and give yourself a time frame to work within. For example it may be to run slowly for 30 minutes without stopping by the end of the summer holidays. It may be to lose a stone by Christmas. It could even be to complete the Berlin Marathon in less than five hours! Now you can see your journey ahead of you and can start to plan your activity.

Please visit www.indianoceanrace.com to view the official website of the world record attempt, to meet Guy and Andrew and to make a donation if you so choose.

I'll be back next week with a top tip to get you jogging and enjoying it.