Cancer-battle dad saddles up for challenge

ROBERT WILL CYCLE 250 MILES FOR CHARITY

- EMYLIE HOWIE

A Renfrewshire blood cancer patient is set to take on a coast-to-coast cycling challenge for charity.

This June, Robert Howat and two friends will set off on a coast-to-coast cycling challenge from Stranraer in Wigtownshire to Eyemouth, Berwickshire, all to raise money and awareness for Blood Cancer UK.

And when the 50-year-old told his wife Suzanne he planned to cycle 250 miles across Scotland just months after being diagnosed with blood cancer, she thought he was “nuts”.

Robert, from Kilbarchan, was diagnosed with a form of blood cancer, chronic lymphocytic leukaemia (CLL) in 2024.

“I was quite fatigued, quite a lot of the time, me being me, I didn’t tell anybody I wasn't feeling great,” Robert explained.

“I didn’t want to feel embarrassed; I'd fall asleep sitting on the couch, I was dizzy all the time, and out of breath. My wife is a nurse practitioner, she took my stats, she didn’t understand how I was still standing!”

CLL is a slow-growing type of blood cancer that affects white blood cells and can often go unnoticed until it reaches a more advanced stage.