A courageous four-year-old who is fighting kidney cancer kicked off the Race for Life in Kirkcaldy.
Milo Carter was chosen as VIP guest at the inspiring event at Beveridge Park, which attracted more than 2,000 runners raising around £300,000 for Cancer Research UK.
Just 24 hours earlier Milo had a blood transfusion and chemotherapy at the Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Edinburgh.
Yesterday Milo sounded the horn to start the race, cheered by 50 friends and their parents from Sunflower Nursery in Lochgelly who also took part.
His mother Sarah, 36, said: “I call Milo my little Tonka truck as nothing knocks him. He just keeps going.
“Through all of this it was really important to me that everything was kept as normal as possible for Milo and he’s been at Sunflower Nursery as often as he can be. That’s why it’s great they’re all here today.”
Sarah, who completed the 5K, dedicated her medal to Milo who was born with three holes in his heart then lost his right kidney to cancer after being diagnosed with Wilms tumour, a rare and aggressive cancer in both kidneys in April last year.
Many of the runners who took part in the event have survived cancer or were inspired to run by a loved one’s battle with the disease.
It was an emotional day for Deanna McLauchlan, who took part only weeks after completing treatment for breast cancer.
The 32-year-old dress designer from Crossgates, Fife, decided to finally tie the knot with her partner, Stephen Wilson, 36, when she was diagnosed last August.
Since then she has endured chemotherapy, radiotherapy and surgery for a mastectomy.
Deanna said: “I’m determined that canceris not going to dominate my life anymore. I’m feeling ridiculously loved, spoiled and lucky to have such an amazing bunch of friends and family cheering me on.”
Laura Anderson, 28, from, Lumphinnans, ran in memory of her grandfather, John Gordon, who passed away from lung cancer.
She said: “He was a big, friendly, kind-hearted man. He died three years past April with lung cancer.
“Before that he was diagnosed with cancer of the voice box and had his voice box removed but the cancer came back and within two weeks he died.”
Mima Simpson, 70, Lochgelly, took part in memory of her daughter Carol Lockhart, who passed away aged 42 from a brain tumour, and husband Charles Simpson, who died age 70 from prostrate cancer.
Mima, who has taken part for the past six years, was one of the many who wore a sign proudly stating who she was running for.
She said: “I remember Carol sitting under the shade of a tree watching me do the event with her husband while she was undergoing treatment. I can still see her there now.”
Picture by George McLuskie