Help Marc regain his independence & mobility

Hi there, my name is Michelle and I'm a parent of an elite diver at the City of Leeds Diving club where we are lucky enough to have Marc as our Head Coach. Before Marc was appointed as Head Coach at Leeds he coached the GB team and was instrumental in helping them achieve many medals at the Olympics and Commonwealth games plus numerous other competitions.

For the months leading up to Marc taking on the role of Head Coach he accrued almost 50 hours a week at the pool, learning the role, meeting and developing relationships with the divers and implementing structures, pushing himself beyond most peoples physical limits, without any complaint or wanting any recognition.

Throughout this time Marc has been struggling with a bad knee, he's made no complaint and his discomfort was not obvious, his only mission to ensure the divers had every resource possible to achieve! Unbeknown to us, he had been trying to get help via the NHS to no avail.

Things came to a head last week when Marc's knee finally gave up and has left him completely unable to mobilise and unable to do the thing he loves the most, coach our children and help them to achieve. Marc lives with a condition called Friedrichs Ataxia, which attacks the muscles and he fights hard to delay his condition from further degradation, so this loss of mobility inevitably makes his fight much harder.

Our aim is to get Marc the medical attention he needs privately and to help fund his rehab.

If you could help us it would be very much appreciated. Our hope is to get him the help that gives him back his independence and back poolside where he belongs.

Any donations over and above the asking will be sent to Ataxia UK www.ataxia.org.uk

Thank you for reading!