The Belfast Telegraph Runher event is close to Brenda Shankey’s heart.
Not only did Runher kick-start her running ‘career’ that would end up last autumn with the New York marathon, but the event’s charity, CLIC Sargent, also holds special significance for the 38-year-old hairdresser and beauty consultant. “My sister Aisling had childhood leukaemia and CLIC were very helpful providing a house for my mum and dad in Belfast while she went through chemotherapy,” she says. Now, Brenda is hoping to persuade her daughter Lauren (8) and sister Aisling to take part in Runher on June 28 at the CIYMS Sports Complex. The Londonderry-born businesswoman is also a Northern Ireland ambassador for Save the Children &mdash an association sparked after she appeared in the BBC NI’s Spotlight life swap programme, Diamonds and Dole, last year. In the programme Brenda swapped her &pound1m Belfast home and all the lifestyle trappings that went with it for a council house on an Armagh estate to highlight the poverty trap families in the province get caught in.
Since then she’s been working to highlight their plight and raise awareness.