A City executive with multiple sclerosis is attempting to complete the London Marathon in her wheelchair despite using one for less than a year.
Sara Weller, 61, was a director at Abbey National and managing director of Argos before she was diagnosed with MS in 2009.
The disease, which affects 130,000 people in the UK, has left her unable to walk.
But Weller, who has raised over £100,000 for MS Society, said that people’s donations can help improve treatments for sufferers.
“The sense is that we’re on the brink of a breakthrough,” she said. “It’ll be too late for me I suspect but I’ve got a 30-year-old daughter and if she was ever diagnosed, I would want the treatments to be a lot better than they are at the moment.”
Weller, who has had her wheelchair for just eight months, will be one of just 13 assisted wheelchair participants in the general race.
She has been practicing for the 26-mile race in Battersea Park, as well as in her garage.
“I only got the wheelchair last August,” Weller said. “I didn’t use it very much to start with but as I got into Autumn I came to understand that I’d have to spend more time in the wheelchair.”
“Now I want to do something positive with that experience rather than for it to feel like the end of something.”
Weller had a series of executive roles before joining Sainsbury’s as assistant managing director in 2000 where she recruited Jamie Oliver and launched the Nectar card. She received her diagnosis while working at Argos nine years later.
“I stayed for another couple of years but it was a very public job and I had 25,000 people working for me so there was nowhere to hide,” she said. “I didn’t want to live with the uncertainty about my MS whilst also trying to run a very big business.”
Weller has since taken on non-executive roles at Lloyds, BT, Virgin Money and various government departments.
“It’s not quite the six day a week, 13-hour days of when I was running Argos, it’s been a question of adapting and doing what my body allows me to do,” she said.
Weller’s aim is to raise £200,000 and she has received over 350 donations from friends, strangers and even former employers.
“BT, Virgin Money and Lloyds have donated money but also little businesses, such as the safari company that I go to Africa with every year,” Weller said.
“One of the best bits about this whole process has been hearing from people who I haven’t seen for 30 or 40 years and have somehow found out about it and made contributions. It’s been fantastic.”
The MS Society’s Stop MS appeal is hoping to raise £100m for research into a cure for the condition. You can donate to Weller’s fundraiser here.
