London, Australia, Canada: a marathon month for Performance Projects Director

Chris Horton, Managing Director of Silverstone Park-based engineering business Performance Projects, has completed his first half marathon to help raise over £800 for the Batten Fighters Forever (BFF) charity.

Chris covered the London Landmarks Half Marathon earlier this month in one hour, 55 minutes – just four minutes behind broadcaster and TV presenter Dermot O’Leary!

BFF supports families affected by the life-limiting Batten Disease and Chris further raises awareness through his participation in motorsport sprints.

Chris said:

Times are tough for everyone so we didn’t push the message too aggressively. We still managed to raise £800 and, of course, any further donations will be gratefully received.

CLICK HERE to make a donation.

Chris continued: “The legs took about a week to recover before I could start running at full pace again, but not bad for non-runner who only took up running with the ‘Couch To 5K’ programme four years ago.

“You go through your own individual fitness thresholds and it’s easy to want to stop when you don’t constantly keep seeing improvements, but keep going and suddenly you’ll find you make a leap.

“I wanted to beat 25 minutes for the 5k Parkrun before Christmas but didn’t – now four months later I’ve gone under 24 minutes.”

Chris ran the London course with eldest son Sam, 19, having also completed the Silverstone 5K run with his youngest, 13-year-old Elliot.

“Hopefully I can get an entry to the London Marathon with Sam and my wife Sarah who has also got into running – that would be a great way to raise more awareness of BFF.”

Prior to the half marathon, Chris had a couple of ‘marathon’ journeys with Innovate UK to help promote Performance Project’s electric, autonomous ‘GoFar’ rover technology.

A fortnight-long trip to Australia saw him attend a major Asia-Pacific agri-tech seminar, conventions in Adelaide, Brisbane and Sydney in Australia and visit on-site applied research farms.

This was in addition to a week in Toronto, Canada to Innovate UK’s ‘MaRS’ innovation hub which promotes potential high value, high growth tech innovations.