A DEVOTED dad from Portishead is running 100 miles in two days to raise money for the British Heart Foundation.

James Reddrop, aged 32, is completing the run with seven friends as his two-year-old daughter Grace suffers from a heart defect.

Grace was diagnosed with tetralogy of fallot before she was born and has already had an operation to repair her heart and help it pump more effectively.

Sufferers commonly have four defects of the heart and its major blood vessels including a hole in the heart and narrowing of the pulmonary artery, which connects the heart and lungs.

The condition has also left Grace with severe reflux, so she had to be fed via a tube through her nose for the first 18 months of her life.

In December last year, Grace had surgery to fit a PEG tube, which means she now gets her food through a tube in her stomach. James, who is also known as Reggie and works as a physical training instructor with the Royal Marines, said: “Grace used to pull the tube out of her nose all the time and she kept losing weight.

“Since the operation she’s started to eat more, but she’s still going to need another operation at some point as her pulmonary artery is too small.

“The reason we are raising money is that there are children a lot worse off than Grace with heart defects and the money is going to the Mending Broken Hearts appeal with the British Heart Foundation.”

James and his friends, who are also marines, will be running from Devon to Poole along the Jurassic coast on November 13 and 14 and hope to raise �2,500.

To make the challenge even more gruelling, the marines will be taking it in turns to carry a 40kg log along the route. The friends are planning to run 50 miles the first day, before camping overnight ready to take on the final 50 miles. To sponsor James visit www.justgiving.com/100milelogslog4grace