Dare to ask for what you want - Dan Woodger

0:10When Paula Radcliffe did that shout out on their podcast, they ended up having to explain like how to try and support the project. And it was wordy. He was saying, oh, his name's Dan Woodger, Dan, W-O-O-D-G-E-R. You go to his Just Giving page. It was like such a leap to try and find who I was. And then it was then I was like, all right, that's too many points of like dropping off to find me. It needs to just bronze seal it. It needs to do what it says. I need something where you just need to go to a point so you can donate to me because this is just too many things going on here. I need a central point.

0:42I built a website and luckily the domain name, I was sorting it Run London, Draw London. It's not a brilliant name with bronze seal in it, right? I was just trying to do SEO it. It does what it says on the tin.

0:58Welcome to Daring Forever, a podcast about being human, wired for wonder, capable of courage, perpetually becoming. It's about the waves that look us under and the strange stubborn grace with which we surface. My name is Radim Malinic. I'm an author, creative and an eternally curious human being on a mission to speak to incredible people whom I call forever daring humans. Those in pursuit of an extraordinary life. Every week I share an interview that is packed with amazing stories, value, and I can only ask you, how will you dare forever? This podcast is inspired by my upcoming book titled Daring Forever, which is now available for pre-order out in October.

1:45My guest today spent 16 weeks turning a London marathon training blog into a crowdsourced illustration, a fundraiser and a masterclass in just asking. Dan Wood is a freelance illustrator and animation director and a returning voice on this podcast. In this conversation, we talk about Run London, Draw London. This project grew from a few donations into 200 hand-drawn characters, a Paula Radcliffe cameo and a Mo Farah handing him the water at mile 23. We get to talk about NDA fatigue, the crossover between running and creative endurance and why nothing happens until you ask first. Dan raised more than£5 ,000 for Oxfam, and this is what happens when a hobby, a hunch, and a sheer nerve collide.

2:28This is Dare to Ask What You Want, conversation with Dan Woodrow. Hey Dan, welcome back to the podcast. Welcome to Daring Forever, a new season about pursuing the things we would otherwise regret never starting. How are you today? I'm on the tail end of a cold, but suffering through freelancer spirit and all that and just having to get on with it. Isn't that just life of a parent? You're always on the tail end of a coat. You finish in one or just about to start the next one, right? Yeah, always, yeah. Absolutely. For the record, you and I normally share a studio space in person when we're doing this remotely whilst you are on your day off.

3:07I wanted to get you back because we chat a lot about what you do, what I do, and you've just completed a project which I thought was so monumental that deserves literally the stamp of daring forever because it's been fascinating to watch. It's been fascinating to witness, to see what you've done with it. So you're my returning guest. I think you came on my first season when we chatted about what it's like to be an illustrator, what it all goes into it. But I'm going to talk about your project, Run London, Draw London. But for those who may have not listened to your first episode or not know who you are, how would you introduce yourself?

3:38Who are you? What do you do? Yeah, cheers. Thanks for having me back on. I'm Dan Woodrow. I'm a freelance illustrator and animation director. I have been working in the creative industry for 15 years now and broadly sell my set style of illustration and animation work to clients ranging from editorial through to advertising, social campaigns. More recently, over the last three, four years, I've tried to pair it a little bit more with my hobby, which is running. I've tried to steer my artwork in that direction. it's an area that i'm passionate about and i feel like in the changing tide of the creative industry with the introduction of ai i've tried to bring more of my personality my own interests into the work that i make and give there a little bit more human depth to what i do your editorial work and your creative work throughout the years has had all sorts of sports themes from strava cheats to fueling and all sorts of stuff treadmills and extra trainers the question is when did you realize that running and illustration can actually really work side by side together it's still an ongoing experiment to see if it can but i think that the more that i familiarize myself with the running space and seeing how there is high tier of design when it comes to the shoes and the really big brands but then below that there is a huge gap in opportunity for a more creative voice and i think a lot of the elite sportswear comes in with this very high performance sophisticated style of design whereas more of the hobby runners like myself we're just doing it for fun running and now you see so much streamlined work i wanted to come in with a bit more of a happier sillier approach where it brings my style of illustration in you remember used to see i think my big inspiration for it was seeing some of the old marathon t-shirts finishes t-shirts from the New York marathons and London marathons where it was much more like character led and sillier and brighter and now it's all very it's all very more modern and sleek and honestly sometimes a little bit boring whereas actually I think that I don't know there is more personality in running than that and so I tried to bring some of that in so I've just tried to bring a bit more of that personality through in what I do and I just recognized it was a bit of a opportunity there to it forced myself into the space a little bit.

5:58You're absolutely right, because when I think of all the Nike campaigns when it comes to Hackney Half and whatever other events, or even like the London Marathon, it's very type-based, slogan-based. It obviously works when you think about it from the placards where people cheering you on from the sidelines. That all works, but what you've created to it, what you've created for the space, I think is a really cheerful addition to actually showcase that it's a bit more human, right? Because we all need motivation, but actually to create the representation of the people themselves i think it's really really nice angle yeah exactly i think there are so many more stories in running that aren't championed as much as like the sebastian sarway smashing a sub two hour marathon at london takes all the headlines but what i try to do is give more voice to all the other people who are not grabbing those headlines but still it means an awful lot to them and bringing that more a wider range of reasons why people like running and their reasons for running and just showing a little bit more of what it's like at the back.

6:59You've got to give me an idea for a question because I want to know where did your love for running develop because I know you used to run in the past but you picked it up recently again and I want to know was it fitness, was it escapism, was it mental health, which part of it clicked and at what point do you go from the pain into the enjoyment? I'm really frustrated with my past self for giving up so back in 2013 2014 I first started running I was always quite a sporty kid but then when I went to art school it all sort of completely fell off and then those first few years starting as a freelancer I found that is a good way to manage stress and all those things and then for whatever reason I can still come to this day why when it first clicked I had all these visions of being like doing this when I was older and I saw the older runners and that was my inspiration to keep doing it and then I think just no one around me was running I was just doing it for myself there wasn't really a social side to it there wasn't big social media there wasn't run fluences or anything like that and so I felt quite lonely just posting it up to Nike plus app before this was like pre-Strava I only had two friends on there and I think there was no accountability or people like to riff off of there was no community so it might be the reason but for whatever reason if it's not that it just fell off and then you would think it would be a lockdown thing right everyone took up running in lockdown but I was the opposite I actually was annoyed with runners because every time I was trying to get my steps in for the day they were breathing all over me on the pavement or whatever and I was so terrified about COVID so then when it really started was when my first daughter came along she was born in Taylor in 2021 I'm really keen to have both my girls learn to swim so I started taking them swimming and then it was a weird knock-on domino effect and when I was taking her swimming I noticed that I had been doing the classic thing of a new parent and I was just consuming all the sugar all the late nights had me grazing from the biscuits and the donuts and anything that I could do to propel myself through that mad six months of newborn baby in the house and I started to lose a little bit of control over what I was eating and my health and I was just trying to all those things of managing both new baby a business and I wasn't looking after myself very much and then I glanced over at the swimming pool and I was like I used to love swimming maybe I could start coming to this gym that I take my daughter swimming and then so I started doing that I started swimming once a week, then twice a week, then three times a week.

9:12I noticed myself getting fitter. And then this little bell went off my head. I wonder if this fitness that I'm getting from swimming translates to running. And so one Sunday, I decided to put my trainers on and just blasted like any runners will know. It's the worst type of training, but you're just all out 5K. Just go and try to hit it, run as fast as you can every time you go out the door. And that's what I was doing. And every Sunday, I kept going out. First Sunday, and then I looked at my stats or whatever, still using the Nike Plus app. I dusted that old thing off and found my password. work and then I was like okay I'm five minutes off what I did 10 years ago I reckon that's achievable to rope that back in and then that was it really and then it went from doing it every Sunday to then twice a week three times a week and then it overtook the swimming and then it ticked so many things off for me so one it was this nice level of getting a handle on my physical fitness again but then also I found it did so much for me mentally it crafted a really nice space that I needed between the stress of parenting and the stress of work and it was something for myself which I realized I wasn't taking and it's the easiest thing I could find to do to go get that headspace trainers on out the door so it doesn't require me to put on lycra or get the swimming shorts out and like go to the gym or to go for half an hour I can go and I found it I loved it and then the more I did it the more I valued the environment and being outside and then I would do it in all weathers I started to romanticize it a little bit like come in from a wet run and I'm soak through the idea of then taking off all that you're not cold or anything when you're running in the rain but you embrace the elements and then you come in shower get dry get warm and there's something in all of that that's really a tactile quality to it I like the smells of it there's just all these things that really fire me up creatively and then I realized it was filtering some creative fuel as well and I found myself really excited to then take all this newfound love of my passion this hobby that I'd found and take the things I was loving from it and transfer it to the work that I was making and it was a lovely cycle that was perpetuating itself.

11:04I'm head over heels in love with it as a pastime. What you describe about putting your trainers on and just getting out, I think that's pretty awesome because I remember getting ready for a cycle in winter and I counted 27 different things. I either had to put on myself, put it in my pocket, put it in my bike, put it check this, check that. And you get a question like, is it just not easy just to get out? No. But what I want to know, what you mentioned about the Nike Plus app, which is that's a blast from the past. Obviously now we're all on Strava. But what was your approach and What was your love and hate relationship?

11:32Or was there a love and hate relationship with data? I think it's I'm on the downside of the crest of that data wave. So I initially had some really good results from matching my data. And I got really nerded out on it and started reading up training methods. And I signed up to a training plan app called Runner. And it gives you targets and different types of trainings too. And it's all fed in through the data that you input and it gives back. And got my 5K time down to something I was really, really chuffed to bits with. This was last summer. and then I had a couple of injuries and then I started shifting trying not to get too nerdy with the running technicalities here but basically I then I signed up for the marathon which will lead us on to the project I think quite nicely in a minute but I signed up for a marathon and that is a very different type of training going for a fast 5k it's a lot more slower running and you have to almost change your approach and it's really hard to separate that data stuff because I was doing a lot slower running which means all these things that really don't matter for us hobby runners but little things like vo2 max is creeping back up again because i'm not doing the really fast stuff anymore i'm doing more stuff for longevity and so my data went all in one direction for a really long time and then started going back up in the other direction and i almost don't want to see it and i know in my head i know the reason why that's happening but it's still so hard to separate the two things so i've had to try and my relationship with strava has been a bit weird recently where i used to be all in i used to love it i used to like everyone's posts and stuff and a bit at the moment because i'm the other side of the marathon now and i'm training for some faster stuff again.

12:55I've been avoiding Astrava a little bit. I input my stuff, but then get off the app quickly because in comparison to the Thiever Joy, seeing other people getting some really fast times and stuff, I find it a little bit difficult to not get that competitive thing happening. So it's almost like withdrawing myself before I get sucked into this data spiral. But I find it's weird. It's a real mixed bag, right? I love the data for certain things, but I try not to have it as a comparison tool as best I can, but really hard not to. There's been some studies that actually Strava is quite corrosive to mental health you can test that my cycling performance has gone much much better because I've seen all the other people cycling really well and really fast I was like maybe I can do that and it kind of helps you to hit the benchmark but then you find yourself to be fighting yourself because it could have been better it could have not been better and they've been mentioned they've been actually the studies like how people were really trying to go for the KOMs let's say in cycling and killing themselves because that's what they wanted to do i was doing richmond park yesterday on my bike and it was windy it was proper tailwind from the soys hill i was going like 60 65k i wasn't the fastest that day there were some people going for it thinking it's good but the comparison and other people and at what point do you almost withdraw and say okay this is just me i'm doing it for myself because as you said performance running as you said going from past 5k to marathon is different and it throws you because it's almost like when you think about a type of work when you're creative you've got lots of small projects you want one really long one and then you've got really long project you're like i've one of mine actually is future projects right it's a really good comparison actually with work i find the cross over stream running and work really crop up all the time these similarities because you're exactly right there is a degree of competitiveness with when you're working on projects and it's mad to be working on something that's like i'll be doing a big crowding illustration for a client i'm really excited about i'm really enjoying working on it i'll flip instagram open and see someone's done an absolutely awesome animation job and i'm like why aren't i not doing that why are you doing this and then it's the flip side right you're doing an animation job you see a really good crowd scene job that someone else has done anything oh why aren't i think it's just a human condition isn't it it's trying to catch yourself and make sure that that doesn't send you into some spiral realize that things are okay realize things are good and then focus on trying to channel that energy into something positive rather than a negative comparison and envy and jealousy use it to fire you up and push it back into your own creativity but it's hard it's the same thing both running and drawing they are very similar in that respect there was our mutual friend mike schneid who wrote a book called creative endurance which was initially called runner's guide to creativity and i really like the term that he coined which is creative endurance which is so aligned with physical endurance like how do you prepare yourself for almost every element and it's almost like the element of self-acceptance which is in the book daring forever which is inspiration for this season she's the element of when you really accept that who you are what you do then try to find a curiosity and gratitude in that moment because yeah you can easily open astrava instagram whatever and you're like oh wow everyone's doing everything else but i'm not i didn't realize but they might be dying to do what i'm doing right now i don't think there's ever the date when it stops and you always try to find yourself going there's more curiosity never runs out this is the thing with curiosity you will find what you're looking for you find something that you haven't been looking for, but you always get something and it's up to you to process that data.

16:11But what you did quite seamlessly was that you talked about illustration, crowd scenes and running and your project that you did in aid of Oxfam for the London Marathon, I think is one of really excellent ways of displaying Daring Forever in a way that you created something that is ownable. It's your own. It's creative. I would say it's quite socially responsible in a way, if that makes sense. It brings people together. What you create, it's something that you didn't have to do. And I think this is the best start for it because when you think about the magic, you're always on the other side of the uncomfortable.

16:42And it's not only that you had to train for marathon, but you've decided to do something with no help of anybody else, but only yourself, to create this mum of crowd scene, which was based on a fundraising, based on the scene of London, and then people will be able to add their own characters to it. I'm realizing I'm doing really bad introduction to it, so I'll let you introduce the project properly. Yeah, the project was called Run London, Draw London. There is a set website for it, website called runlondondrawlondon.com which you can go visit and you can see the final outcome from this project but the gist of the idea was to create a crowd scene illustration that was sponsored by the people who were supporting me for the marathon so you would donate I set the figure at five pounds so you donate five pounds to add a character to this kind of crowd scene think like a where's wally type crowd scene illustration you pay five pounds and you can add any character you like so it can be yourself or someone you know running the marathon or anything just a random character anything you can think of and then I will draw it into the scene the challenge was that it could be anything and then the idea was that with each donation it would build up this huge crowd of runners and supporters on a image of the London Marathon route so I drew the entire tailored version of the London Marathon route that went past all the London landmarks and then you had the crowd scene filled that space and it was a bit of a mad idea because it required a lot of faith that the idea would work.

18:04The only way that it works as a piece is that if crowd scene is filled. So I put a lot of faith in the idea and put it out there with basically nothing to show for it at the beginning. I had to start this project. The idea was that I was just going to show something extremely raw and open. Again, I've been talking a little bit about beginning about AI and how I want to show the creative process from a completely open book. This is how it all works. These crowd scenes always only ever get shown at the end. I wanted to show how something like this is made in real time and yeah I did it in aid of Oxfam so to take it all the way back to the beginning I saw my brother run the London Marathon last year in 2025 and this is where the idea pops into my head and I was watching all of the runners going by and just realized how many stories are out there every person running by is you've got the whole kaleidoscope of life you've got young olds all races and ethnicities people dressed as like the four guys dressed as the mystery machine from scooby-doo went by and then the big big ben guy like ran past and then you've got club runners and everybody is there and then the crowds as well full of all their family and friends supporting them and it's just the most joyous anybody that's been to either watch or run the london marathon knows it's the nicest that london ever is everyone is so happy it's like a carnival all across the city and that just made me realize that there is something in that as a project idea and as a fundraising idea.

19:26So back end of last year, I applied to a few charities, but Oxfam was the one I was most keen to work with and to see if I could secure a place through a charity spot through them. And they agreed, which was great because as an organization, they do, they tick a lot of boxes that I am socially concerned about. And I was pleased that they were, they responded to the idea because I had to try and explain what this whole thing was. And on paper, it sounds a bit insane because I've never seen anyone do this before this fundraising through an illustration vehicle but maybe that brings me neatly onto why I was using the illustration side of what I do to fundraise because I have like something a bit of an audience that follows what I do but I was trying to work out a way that I can engage that audience in my marathon effort I didn't want to just put up a link and be like oh I'm running on the marathon by the way this is completely unrelated to what I do I'm running on the marathon can you sponsor me I was trying to find a way that I could engage that audience that follows what I do in the marathon effort and so I was thinking well if I do an illustration that is built along the way and show it as a journey this might also engage those people that are interested in my creative side of what I do.

20:33In January I launched the project and it started in a complete canvas. I knew what I was doing but I knew that for a marathon they usually say it's a 16-week training block so I wanted the project to follow that. In the December I'd just moved house so all of the planning pre-planning that I'd done was taken up with moving house so we got to january and i was like okay we're now throwing straight into the marathon training block i need to get this fundraiser up and running and there was still so much still to work out but i knew that i just needed to start talking about it so i created a few videos i was conscious i wanted to try and make a push into youtube which ended up not really working but i was trying to log the entire thing so i was showing me mapping out my idea so i held up the stick figures of the london marathon route and then this is how you sponsor it and i was doing these big Instagram videos being like, this is how you can sponsor the project.

21:19And I was like, launch them out. And no one was paying any attention. You know what it's like Instagram, you throw out into this, a wash of people shouting at you. And it just got swept up in the algorithm. And I knew straight from the beginning that if this is going to work, I just need to keep chipping. I just need to keep posting. I need to keep on about it. And I knew that the 16 week block would be just enough time for me to just keep going on about it and hold my nerve. And I just knew that there is something here and I have a keep at it. This will pay off in the end. And so I was just kept talking about it.

21:45I just kept showing me building the base layer of the illustration and showing where characters would go. And then once one or two people started sponsoring, that's when I started really throwing myself all in. The first person actually that donated was, they're a company called Collectible Cities and they make these beautiful little 3D model resin characters of London. Not just London, but they have beef eaters and William Shakespeare. And they suggested a couple of their characters to be represented in the illustration. Every time anyone at the beginning sent me something I was like right and I made a big Instagram and videos about me putting them into the scene and once people could see how the project worked I think then that helps perpetuate it a little bit.

22:23Let me interject for a second this is interesting because you said a word which connects all of this and you said stories I've always admired someone who can be dressed as a toilet or a phone box or a big band run 40s okay I'm like how how do you guys do it because it's absolutely incredible the word story is I think it's so important here because when you said Instagram doesn't really help you to do just a one-off. This is just a classic case of everyone thinking like, hey, I've just been on a hiatus a little bit. And I know you're quite active on the platform and you've got people who follow me and they're quite loyal and they're quite loyal to what you do.

22:55But is that one hit never really solves anything, right? Because as you said, you have to keep going, going, going, going and tell everyone. Because interestingly, I've seen a post from Austin Cleon the other day and said, look, I've been publishing books for 16 years. We've got a new book. And as much as I can be sick of talking about, I've got a new book, I've got a new book, I've got a new book. People say, I didn't know you got a new book coming out. There's always someone who'd be like, oh, I didn't know this is happening. Because in this noisy live space, digital space, everything, that chance of getting through sometimes is so minimal because there's so many other things to see.

23:27Your story, how did you feel that when you unlock that storytelling part of putting other people's characters in your map, it unlocked the connection with other people? We'll be back after a quick break. This episode is brought to you by Lux Coffee Co. The first creative speciality coffee company, building a platform to shine the light on emerging global talent with a mission to make a positive impact on a creative industry and beyond. Lux Coffee Co. offers exceptional coffee sourced from around the world through ethical and sustainable practices. And you can discover the current range of signature blends and single origins, coffee hardware and accessories along with exceptional apparel head laxcoffee.co.uk you can use the code podcast to get 15 % off your first order

24:27I would love to say I had given that loads of forethought and that it wasn't a happy accident it was a combination of the two I knew that there would be an element of if I could bring other people's stories into it that would make the illustration more rich and interesting. But the unhidden thing that I didn't really consider was that when I was adding in the characters, I would tag them in Instagram, and then they would then be able to share that with their followers. And it almost widened the reach. But it was really lovely to bring in these stories that I could highlight about what other people are doing.

24:56So it almost brought more people along for the journey. And when I almost like brought them, gave them a level of investment in making this work as well, which was really nice. They had invested enough to sponsor, but when they see that their character is now in this too, it almost brings them along for the ride. And when I saw that mechanism really worked on Instagram, where I was highlighting the stories of people who were sponsoring me and showing how their characters are being added to the scene, and then they would share those, I realized how much that extra attention that brought to the project.

25:24And then that switched a little light bulb over my head. What I had started doing was just waiting for people to sponsor. But then I thought, well, if I can reach out to people with some influence in the running space or in the creative space that could also work it can help bring these two genres together and start reaching out to people who either were celebrities who were running the London Marathon or former athletes who had some involvement in the marathons the first person I managed to get over the line which is the biggest one was getting Paula Radcliffe to participate in the project it's all this thing of I'd been building up this project for a really long time I'll give you the insight of how I got hold of hers last year I ran the Great South Run and I'd gone to an event with a run club called running late down in south sea who we do a few collaborations with in terms of i make some t-shirts for them and things and they have me down for some events and they did an event for the great south brunner at that i met this former gb athlete called christopher thompson who does a podcast with paula radcliffe we got chatting and he followed me back on instagram and then in my head i was already stockpiling leads for things that i could do more in my project eventually came along i was thinking well okay great i've got a connection to chris and Paula now when it comes time for my project it might become useful and then when I suddenly remembered oh I've got Chris's message I can message him quickly and I shot out a real shoot for the stars and I was being weird as well I was being purposefully weird I was like being hey Chris this is a really random question but can I draw you really odd message to open almost needed something that was a bit different from what his usual email messages and things were and he got back to me said oh yeah this sounds great I'd love to so they did a little feature of me on their podcast and I managed to get those two in and that gave this level of cachet that I could really now attach to when I was going to other people I'd be like oh by the way Paula Radcliffe's in this as well I gave it this extra element of legitimacy that this mad guy that was asking if I could draw them also had Paula Radcliffe backing the project too so it wasn't just a complete weirdo and that really helped and there was two things happening here now there was people backing and sponsoring the project and getting involved and I ended up with maybe 10 to 15 high profile and people so ended up with getting run fluences like the running channel or like a YouTube platform they're big in the space and there was like influencers Aubrey and Vula and Callum Goddard then I managed to get Julia Paternane who is a pro athlete who ran the London marathon I think she came I think she was either fourth or fifth female this year at London just gone so she won the marathon at the World of Athletics Championships last year but I think the biggest one I managed to get out of everybody was the Ellis James and John Robbins podcast which I shot for the stars with that one and again it was a connection I'd made that was tangential to their podcast and he said I'll put in a word and then Dave Masterman who is the producer on the show then emailed me and then the door was open and I managed to find a way to work my way in and they ended up making a big thing of that as well they featured it on the show but then they also included my illustrations in the feature they did of John and Dave running the marathon too so there was this almost like I joined their journey as well which was amazing yeah it was really cool what you're describing it's almost incompatible with a regular way of being an illustrator because you normally would put out a portfolio up in the open and hope that something will happen.

28:25You might make some noise. You might hope to go and get some press on the back of a project that might have a non-NDA attached to it. It might be free to do it. And I think generally you would hope that someone will come and find you, whereas what you've done, you've flipped it totally on its head and you've been thinking of just about caching some possible leads and having a list of people who to go to. Because when you think about it, everything that you want happens when you ask for it. That's just a simple sentence. Going after people and telling them that you're Not that you're there, that you're doing it, that you actually care about.

28:52How did you balance all of that with training, young family, regular work, all of this stuff? It requires lots of extra energy and time to put into it. So logistically, how did you do it? Well, I don't know. I think I'll eventually look back on this and be really perplexed with how I managed to fit it all in. I'd rather quickly come back to one point that you made there, though, about the reaching out and asking people for things. because part of the reason I wanted to do this project in the first place, not only to combine my love of running and drawing and to raise some money for a charity that I really believe in, but I was also growing very frustrated with work.

29:28I had done some really, really big projects in 23, 24. They were NDA'd, no one has ever seen them. And I was growing really frustrated with the way that I have been relying on work coming in has been via word of mouth and through people seeing the work that I've been doing for client projects. And when you can't share those, there was this real inevitable because I was working on so much stuff that was NDA'd, people just stopped seeing what I was making. And it very much reflected in my inbox. I definitely saw a slowdown. And I was looking to do something for myself that really showcased what I do, make a big splashy song and dance about it.

30:00But the biggest eye opener of everything is asking. I have been so guilty of waiting and sitting. And I've got an agent and I've been letting them do their thing. And I've been chipping away at social media. But I have not been asking. It is true. Don't ask, don't get. I started asking and I started getting. And every time I was thinking, oh, this is really dark. And don't get me wrong, there was lots of things that didn't happen. I shot messages of people and they never responded. 60, 70 % of the time I got something back from it. And it's amazingly effective. Just asking for things and just being cheeky and just shooting a shot.

30:31I think it helps that I believed in this as well. I think it wasn't me just asking a random question. There was very much purpose behind what I was asking. But every time I felt like I shot for something, it came off. absolutely because when you think about it it's a direct question about a direct thing right it's obviously that there's a purpose because you created a destination for people to have something to be part of it because what's really interesting i recognize that as a problem that some people highlight that people say look my work is under nda i've got no new work to show therefore i'm not getting new work and i'll sometimes think that's not your portfolio problem that's your lead generation that's your business problem when you think about it because when you think about brands and companies that you get five emails a week from them saying hey we've got this we've got this we've got this we've got this or you got tech bros trying to sell you their courses and i'm like they're always asking they're always pushing they're always trying you know even coca-cola still advertises every day they still try to be in front of their mind but i think there's something there's a fellow self-initiated project creator there's something about that freedom and that expression and you can find in a way of like this is my project this is my ownership this is where i can drive and this is what i can do with it because it takes you to a completely different place when you started with you got an idea but it takes you somewhere and you come out on the other end totally different you've got a lot more to talk about you can be yourself because you believe in this if i want to talk to you about it like how you take an ownership you hold yourself accountable you have to put in extra hours because no one's going to give you extra money because you want to do this it takes a lot out of you but the outcome then it's so worthy because of the what you've created and just find yourself in a national newspaper it's a lot of friends and it's gone pretty wide on instagram and kind of people got to know about it so from this asking and pushing.

32:07How do we put the mechanics between the idea and now we've got Paula and all the other people and how do we take us to the finish line literally both ways on the ground and digitally? When Paula Radcliffe did that shout out on their podcast, they ended up having to explain like how to try and support the project and it was wordy. He was saying, oh, his name's Dan Woodger, Dan, W-O-O-D-G-E-R. You go to his Just Giving page. It was like such a leap to try and find who I was and then it was then I was like, all right, that's too many points of dropping off to find me. It needs to just Ron Seal it.

32:39It needs to do what it says. I need something where you just need to go to a point so you can donate to me because this is just too many things going on here. I need a central point. I built a website and luckily the domain name, I was sort of calling it Run London, Draw London. It's not a brilliant name with Ron Seal in it, right? I was just trying to do SEO in. It does what it says on the tin. There's Running London and Drawing London. That's what this project is. And I just kept hoping that something might pop out that was better, but that stuck. And then I looked up and that was available as a domain name.

33:06So I bought the domain name and then I just spent an afternoon building a really simple website. I punch us about my use of AI, but I got into ChatGPT to be asking, how can I build a very simple website? I need a basic code. How do I go about this? What's the simple way? And within 20 minutes, half an hour, it gave me a pretty good simple site that I could just use, that I could get up in an afternoon. And I kept thinking that maybe I would rebuild it or do something else with it, but it worked perfectly. all it needed it was two things it needed to do right just needed to have a central point runlondondroland.com a place to donate and then somewhere where people could see the illustration developing so that i could just post updates of where it's at and it works really well as a device to focus a project around and by the end when we crescendo so building up over the next few weeks towards the marathon i was posting more and more there are these things that these engagements that kept happening where i don't know the marathon's getting nearer so more and more people are talking about the marathon and they're looking for content around the marathon and there was things that oh this guy's doing this project where he's drawing loads of people in it so I was getting more press the observer came on board and an art director from the observer sponsored me and then said hang on I think we could maybe print this on marathon weekend so there was an opportunity for people who were interested in the project to have themselves in the paper on marathon weekend in the illustration that was brilliant that was amazing but it was a bit tricky to manage in logistical terms because my idea was that I would stop donation deadlines on the day of the marathon.

34:32That would be when the last point to donate was the end of marathon day because I had to tread this fine line between finishing the illustration and stopping donations too early. I wanted to obviously raise as much as possible, but then I still needed to finish the thing. So I built this rough plan, this timeline where I would have the illustration finish at 11.59 on race day. And then I wanted it to be one week afterwards. That's when I would get all the illustrations into the final piece and then finish a week afterwards because I just did not want this thing lingering on. you run out of steam you run out momentum and then people stop caring there's a very conscious effort to try and get all these timings right the observer was interesting because they needed that four days before the marathon so i had to make a roughly finished version for that that looked finished on paper but still needed finishing off so there was lots of things moving parts to keep trying to work out but back to your question about how i fit it all in i genuinely don't really know my one-year-old daughter doesn't sleep we have a busy family life and yeah training for the marathon as well but somehow I think through the excitement of it all and the feeling that there was genuinely people backing the project and interested and engaged it gave me that adrenaline to keep going like we can still do this there is an end point here once the marathon's done and once I finish this illustration that's the end that's the finish line we can keep doing this we've got time we've got energy we can keep at it we can keep at it and the stories that were coming in were just were that fuel that I needed I think some of them were really heartfelt some of them were brutal people who have lost family members, children, they're all in that illustration.

35:57And whenever I was feeling frustrated or wiped out or tired, just thinking about the people that were investing in this project, I think gave me that extra boost to get it over the line. And then marathon, marathon day, it was hard. It was very hard. I'd never run a marathon before. I'm a keen runner, but that was the first time I tackled that distance. And I got found out. 30k cramped up and had to drag myself over the finish line for 12 kilometers. But it was incredible. Just the best experience and the same thing that why they're so well aligned right the illustration and the running because every time I was either struggling with one or the other thinking about all the people that were backing me or cheering me on or like whatever just kept me going and I call them like I was calling them two finish lines so finish the first one the marathon finish line I've got a respectable time I was three hours 51 which I was pretty happy with but I think that I probably got more in me but it's the first marathon so I think it was never about the time with this it was always about the project and then the second finish line was getting those illustrations done so I gave myself one day off and then I dragged myself back into the studio and started like getting those characters in and then by the following Tuesday we were all done so every character was added I had to work my way through the list make sure they were all included I really want to focus on the race because when you've been experienced virtually you've been creating the illustration of the race and you're thinking about the stories and it was quite nicely woven into what you just said that is nice to think about when you feel tired it was you put yourself in someone else's shoes.

37:20But what was the actual feeling running for London? I'm thinking, my God, it's actually here now. It's happening. Because it's the euphoria, as you said. London is the nicest ever on a marathon day because the energy that's there, it's giving me goosebumps now and I haven't been for a few years, but it's so loud. There's so much energy that even if you haven't got the legs to carry you, the crowd would carry you. So how was it for you on a marathon day? Was there any relief? Because you still haven't finished the illustration, you haven't sent out the print. What was going through your mind on the day?

37:49this just momentum that was just driving the entire time there was so many things going on that i felt like i had a really engaged audience that was following and willing me on for this thing and little mad things i was trying to get a t-shirt made up so i could wear it so i could rep the project and even the adventure of i had to get it done with some mad company that because all that i'd left it too late and i had to get like a local cut business to print it up for me and i was so terrified they only gave me the t-shirt like two days before and if it were if If it looked good, it looked good.

38:17If it looked bad, I was still going to wear it. But it turned out great. And there was all these little things along the way that people were just engaged with about the whole project. And then it felt so good to be on the day, like repping this thing that I've been working so hard towards. And bumped into people who had backed the project. Or one guy tapped me on the shoulder at 10K and was like, you drew me. And then I looked and I was like, I did. Because his wife had asked him to be in the project and told me what he was going to be wearing on race day. There's people from club runners. and I was recognizing their outfits and they were like oh you drew my friend Ellie she's doing great there's all these things like the people who saw me and got invested in the projects and stuff there was just something in the water that day there is just a magic in the air I think that my race didn't go perfectly I had like I said on 30k I had cramped up I felt a pop go in my knee and I thought my race was over and it turns out it was just like a really bad case of cramp and then I had five or six cramp attacks between there and the finish line but there is an intense almost like the crowd genuinely pull you as you're running it's an atmosphere i've never felt before and it's relentless it just goes the entire way there is like an intensity that i've never felt because i usually run on my own i usually run like in the woods i usually run on tow paths so to be in this funnel of noise for four hours is an intensity that i've never experienced before i can't really explain it it's just a magic and the maddest thing that happens towards the end so i'm looking at my watch and it's a bit out of sync with how long it's left but i was i think There's like about 5k left.

39:42And essentially my problem with all the cramping was I was dehydrated and I was making some really rookie errors by basically chugging at every water point because I was gasping for water. And you're not supposed to do that. You're supposed to sip often and little. But every time I got to a water station, I was like, give me the whole thing. I was necking it back. And the last one, which I think is 3 or 5k from the end, I went running up to this guy and I was like, thank you. And then I realized that it was Mo Farah handing me a bottle of water. I'm just wondering whether I'm even like at this point completely hallucinating.