If lost send out a St. Bernard?s and Return to Pub

With only 90 days to go until our first Kiltwalk of the year, the lads at Dunfermilne FFIT aren't letting a light dusting of snow slow down their training program so yesterday John Nicol, Richard Easton, Gerry Heyburn (pictured above) and Mike McManus stepped out for another 8 mile training session.

Many of you who have taken part in last years Kiltwalk, or follow us on Facebook, Twitter or Blipfoto, or indeed listen to Real Radio will more than likely know all about these guys i.e. Dunfermilne FFIT, which stands for Football Fans in Training.

FFIT, which is funded by the Scottish Government and the Football Pools, and overseen by the Scottish Premier League Trust, is a free 12 week physical activity and healthy eating programme designed to help men get fitter and lose weight, and perhaps more importantly maintain these changes in the long term.

At the FFIT course, everyone is in the same boat. They all want to take the chance to get healthier through the football club that they support.

Dunfermilne FFIT is run by DAFC community team coaches Gregor Tennant and Kelly Armstrong and it's here our that our merry band of misshapen and stretched t-shirts first assembled to begin their own personal journey with the aim of trying to get a bit fitter and lose some weight.

So the challenge began and as you can imagine it gave the lads a chance to get have a kick about on the football pitch, however I'm sure you're as surprised as they were when, body combat, boxercise, zumba and boot camps began. After a few weeks the boys took to it like Trojan warriors and decided things were going so well they were up for a greater challenge.

As part of the challenge they also wanted to raise money for Home Start Dunfermline, a voluntary organisation committed to promoting the welfare of families with at least one child under the age of 5 and this is where The Kiltwalk became the obvious answer.

With a 26 mile walk from Hampden Park, Glasgow to the Bonnie Banks of Loch Lomond the Kiltwalk more than provided the "challenge" part and the Kiltwalk "team" concept enabled them to donate 50% of the sponsorship raised towards The Kiltwalk Charities and 50% towards Home Start Dunfermline.

So on Easter Sunday last year they arrived at Hampden Park, along with 800 others for a bit of a stroll to Loch Lomond and by the time they had all walked over the finish line they had amassed a fantastic £5500.00 in sponsorship, of which £2725.00 went to Home Start Dunfermline, who were very grateful for everyone's efforts.

You may have thought our Dunfermilne FFIT hero's would hang up there walking boots, remove the boxing gloves and stop shaking their Zumba's, however you couldn't be more wrong as this year they are returning looking to be bigger and better.

By bigger they don't mean heavier as the FFIT team have lost a combined total of 45 stone!! No, by bigger they mean their team as it has now reached an impressive 19 Kiltwalkers all of whom want to 'better' last year's total so have set themselves an impressive target of £10,000 and with the determination they're showing along with Kiltwalk fundraising over and above walking, I'm sure they'll sail, or walk past that figure.

If you want to take part in a Kiltwalk event and help improve your fitness while raising money for Scotland's Children at the same time then visit www.thekiltwalk.co.uk for details.