The Ray Murphy day usually starts at about 5am, making sure he is ready for the 65 mile trip to his offices in Chichester where he works for Covers Builders Merchants from his Christchurch home, a trip which at that times of day usually takes about an hour. For his full time occupation Ray runs a Joinery Directs department in the family owned thirteen-branch strong company where his role encompasses all the branches. The working day usually ends between 4pm or 6pm depending on work load with rarely a break for lunch, business at the moment is seeing more 6pm finishes than 4 and the journey home usually averages an hour and twenty minutes.

Fortunately in his spare time Ray is also Football Secretary at Blue Square South side Eastleigh Football Club, where he ensures all contracted players procedures are carried out as well as organising matches for the first team, reserves, youth side and Ladies team.

As a hobby Ray is also writing a history book on the Wessex League to celebrate their first twenty-five years and a history on Winchester City Football Club, where together with Bashley, Bournemouth Poppies and Dagenham he lists as his previous clubs during his pen-pushing career. Ray is also on the committee of the Sydenhams Wessex League as well as newly elected Press Officer for the Hampshire County Womens League. Also stashed away in the files of the computer is a murder mystery fictional work that he hopes to have published one say also.

Later on this year the half-century is reached age wise, so trying to do as few things that he has always thought of as being good things to do, one of the items on the list was to run the London Marathon. Well after submitting an entry into the ballot, Sunday 13^th April 2008, Murphy will get the chance. Having already been in training since November Murphy has shed almost three stone as he builds his fitness for taking part in his first ever run of this nature, 1500 metres at school was previously the furthest he had to do and that was begrudged. Now we have 26 miles and a bit, which he would dearly love to finish on a five-hour time scale, but as long as the legs cross the finishing line, it can take all week.

Ray is raising sponsorship for Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital, which is where one of his twin boys, Ian Murphy, (now aged 25) spent the first few weeks of his life in an incubator recovering from a split intestine weighing less than three pounds having arrived some six weeks early. This is just some way of being able to repay the tremendous work the hospital carried out during those weeks.

Murphy by his own admission notes that although training is not going too bad he does need to step up the routine before the big day. Currently registering a regular five miles a night, he trains largely on his own though one of his other sons, Paul, has also helped out with him with regular gym sessions whilst Murphy has also been seen jogging round the Eastleigh pitch prior to a first team training night warming up with Eastleigh striker Steve Watts working his way back from injury. Its times like those that really helps me through the endless times of running alone says Murphy.