What a 69 year old cancer survivor riding London to Paris in 24 hours taught me about endurance training.
- Emma O'Toole
- Jul 5
- 4 min read
What can endurance athletes learn from a 69-year-old cancer survivor riding from London to Paris in 24 hours?
Jane’s 300km+ challenge shows how consistent training, careful volume progression, strength work, coaching support and mindset can help athletes achieve goals that once felt impossible. This article shares Jane’s journey from cancer treatment and recovery to completing London to Paris for PLANETS Cancer Charity, and explains why purposeful preparation matters at every age.
Strength training for runners and cyclists over 30 is a game-changer for performance, resilience, and long-term health.
If you want the full breakdown, check out my Strength Training Over 30 Guides:
TRAINING BREAKDOWN
"With the right preparation and the right mindset, more is possible than most of us dare to dream."
By Emma O'Toole
Bonjour from Paris!
This weekend, I have ridden from London to Paris supporting a coached athlete whose story I have been wanting to share with you for the past 9 months. We’ve ridden over 300km in total, from London to Newhaven, a 5hr overnight ferry to Dieppe, and then 200km into the French capital.
This epitomises what endurance sports are about and I hope it inspires you today. Meet Jane.
Jane is 69 years old, soon to be 70. In 2020, during the first Covid lockdown, she was diagnosed with colorectal cancer. What followed were rounds of strong chemotherapy, chemo-radiotherapy, major bowel surgery, a stoma, a reversal, and a challenging recovery.
This March, Jane received the news she had been waiting five years for: she is cancer free.
Five years is a significant milestone in cancer recovery. For Jane, it was also a moment to celebrate in style.
PLANETS, the charity closely connected to Southampton General Hospital where Jane was treated for colorectal cancer in 2020/21, were organising to ride London to Paris in 2026 and when Jane heard about it, something clicked.
The story of how Jane and I ended up doing this together starts last August. Jane reached out to me for some advice, wanting to know whether this challenge was even feasible. She was honest about her history, the cancer treatment, the ongoing physical challenges that come with the surgery she has had, and a full knee replacement she had undergone in 2019 before any of this began. We talked through what preparation would look like and whether her body could handle the demands of riding 300km in 24 hours riding time (she did it in 17.5hrs riding time!).
My honest answer was that it was feasible, but it would take time, consistency, and a very careful approach to building her training volume. Jane did not hesitate, she committed straight away and we got to work.
What first struck me when we started working together was not just Jane's determination but her attitude. She does not dwell on what her body has been through, rather she focuses on what it can still do. And in my experience coaching runners and cyclists over 30, that mindset is rarer than you might think.
The training has not been straightforward. Jane manages the ongoing physical challenges that come with her previous diagnosis and she’s also been brilliantly creative about keeping her training going whilst travelling. She has trained on static bikes with collapsing seats covered in rust while travelling, carried a mountain bike up and down steps on the Bermuda Railway Trail, but not once made excuses.
Alongside her cycling training, strength work has been a core part of Jane's preparation. Jane's body has held up significantly well across long training rides, and her strength training has played a significant part in that.
One of the highlights of Jane's preparation, and honestly one of mine too, was riding together around the Isle of Wight with Planets charity and extending the ride with a circa 20 mile commute to and from the ferry terminal. It was a simulation training day and a test to see how Jane would respond to sustained effort over a long day in the saddle. Of course, she was brilliant. Watching her manage her effort, her nutrition, and her mindset across those miles gave me a huge amount of confidence that she was ready for what lay ahead. It was also just a genuinely wonderful day out on the bike, (thank you weather!) and one I will not forget!
Jane has completed this epic challenge for PLANETS Cancer Charity and you can read more about Jane's story here.
I discuss a lot on this blog what good training looks like: consistency, building training volume and intensity gradually, strength training to support your running and cycling, how to manage your training alongside a busy lifestyle and commitments… to name a few.
What Jane has achieved is a real life example of all of those things, and having a coach in her corner to support her, adapt her training when needed, and keep her on track through the harder weeks has been a central part of that. This is what consistent, purposeful training with the right support actually looks like in practice. And it is why I will never stop believing that with the right preparation and the right mindset, more is possible than most of us dare to dream.
I'll be back next Sunday evening with our usual coaching content. This week I just wanted to share this as moments like this that make your heart sing are ultimately what we do it for, right?
Happy running and riding!
Emma x
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Simply amazing!
What a story, congratulations Jane!