PCM News: Top ten finish in local race!

07 October 2009

Top ten finish in local race!

As winter recedes into the distant chilly past, the weekend race calendar starts to fill up with opportunities to test your mettle against other like minded exponents and of course, oneself.

Being able to get out for a ride in the morning for an hour before work, and even sneak in an hour after work in the light has helped, and in one of the first races recently Paul was able to record a top ten finish.

Jostling for position at the start.

Sounds impressive but the race in question was a low key triathlon - so low key in fact that only six people bothered to enter the 'big' race (800m swim, 20km bike and 5km run).

The agony of the low key triathlon runner.

Despite being joint last at the end of the swim, Paul battled hard on the bike, and managed to hold his position on the run, to narrowly finish fourth.

He commented after wards that all his training in the bath didn't seem to have paid off, and the fact that it was only a 100m walking commute to work each day likely hampered his preparation for the run.

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A short history of us

Not long after we were married we felt that God had some full time work for us overseas. This initially began with a move to Sheffield in 1992 to work for a Christian management training company. Three years later we felt the Lord's prompting that another change was imminent and this led to a move to Africa where we helped set up a youth program with the Lesotho-Durham link in the capital Maseru. An initial three year commitment turned into four after which the youth work was handed over to the nationals.

Then, after feeling God was moving us into mission flying Paul enrolled at a flying school and completed his South African commercial license with an instrument rating in December 1999.

We moved from Lesotho to White River in South Africa in June of 2003 where we now work with Mercy Air. Mercy Air was borne out of Youth with a Mission (YWAM) and is a sister, although smaller organisation to the more well known Mercy Ships. We are situated near Nelspruit and provide a service to missions and the development/aid community in the southern African region but mainly serve Mozambique.

We operate four aircraft at present - a Quest Kodiak, a Cessna 310 and two Airbus 350 helicopters which are often used for the relief flights.

When not flying Paul is responsible for flight operations and is Mercy Air's Safety Officer.

Cathy, who is a registered Nurse and Midwife works part time at Africa School of Missions which is a bible college preparing missionaries for overseas service. She teaches in their School of Health and is part of a team which visits a number of rural clinics during the week. She is also helps with the hospitality ministry that Mercy Air runs.

Matthew spent four years at Rhodes University in Grahamstown where he studied photo journalism. He has now flown the nest and is living with his wife in Durban. They have a young daughter named Isabella.