Charity Rides - Anyone?

baccaman21

Hi

I've been thinking recently about getting involved with charity events related to riding.

Two reasons, firstly to give me some focus to my training. Two, to give something back to society.

Now, I don't have any particular charities in mind, I have no real reason to do it other than to raise money whilst getting fitter and enjoying myself at the same time.

Has anyone out there had any experience of such a thing, and if so, how was it, how did you get involved and any tips.

That's it.

Cheers

irideon2wheels

hey m8. havnt done any charity rides myself yet but am very interested, particularly in raising money for wspa. there are a few websites ive seen that organise this sort of thing both here and abroad for a variety of charity's. http://www.doitforcharity.com is the best one.

what charity do you have in mind?

J

Dazzer Half

Hi, a new member here, i've been doing charity rides for three years know for The British Heart Foundation and for Leukaemia Research. My best mate born with a hole in his heart and passed away three years ago with a heart attack aged 33yrs, and on my dad's side of the family have either died from heart attacks or have needed heart related treatment. I wanted to get fitter and try and make sure my heart was healthy. So far i've raised with the help of family and friends at work about £600 for BHF and for Leukaemia about £200. The courses are varying lengths and challenges but you will feel so much better phsically and for a worthwhile cause. Saddle up and take the bike challenge in '07 or in '08 and make the difference.

baccaman21

I haven't the faintest idea... I've seen the BHF (british heart foundation) advertising various events over the years in some amazing places - the amazon, the himalaya, the nile etc... and fancied a bit of that - mix in some far flung destination into the mix... make it worth it like...

cheers for the link ... I've tagged it on Del.icio.us to check out later.

baccaman21

Dazzer Half wrote:

Hi, a new member here, i've been doing charity rides for three years know for The British Heart Foundation and for Leukaemia Research. My best mate born with a hole in his heart and passed away three years ago with a heart attack aged 33yrs, and on my dad's side of the family have either died from heart attacks or have needed heart related treatment. I wanted to get fitter and try and make sure my heart was healthy. So far i've raised with the help of family and friends at work about £600 for BHF and for Leukaemia about £200. The courses are varying lengths and challenges but you will feel so much better phsically and for a worthwhile cause. Saddle up and take the bike challenge in '07 or in '08 and make the difference.

Welcome to the forum, I'm sorry to hear about your friend. I too have a buddy who went to sleep and just didn't wake up - was ever so sad - sudden death syndrome they call it

But not to dwell on the sadness of things - we must make positive of such situations just like you're doing and I congratulate you on that... it's taken me a while to come round to a more community way of thinking - I expect it's because I'm about to become a father and I'm starting to finally mature... (at 36!)

Hence my interest in the charity events. There's selfish reasons too of course - I've just got back from a cut short 12 month trip around the world - cut short be 7 months because of the imminent arrival - as a result I've hit upon the selfish notion of still 'having an adventure' - whilst at the same time doing something I enjoy AND raising money at the same time...

maybe that's not selfish though when one puts it like that... anyway... thanks for your words of encouragement Dazzer.

I'm now looking at maybe doing the London to Paris run...

or if they do one of these next year I'm in!

http://www.doitforcharity.com/cycle-ken ... ntsummary8

dan1983

Surely if you do one of these charity runs in some far flung exotic destination the majority of the money you raise will be lost by paying for the privilege of doing it? Which to me seems to defy the whole point of doing it? I've never done one myself, but a mate of mine and a group did the Coast to Coast to raise money for one of our other mates' daughter who had meningitis and lost both her hands and tips of her toes (www.tillylockey.co.uk). This way it doesn't cost much to prepare, hence raises more money for your said charity. Also, it'd be a lot easier to organise. Just a thought.

baccaman21

dan1983 wrote:

Surely if you do one of these charity runs in some far flung exotic destination the majority of the money you raise will be lost by paying for the privilege of doing it? Which to me seems to defy the whole point of doing it?

Very fair point Dan, and whilst I agree wholeheartedly I did say I was also doing it for selfish reasons too, I make no bones about that. Charities on the whole generally have to spend in order to make money - ever considered how much it costs charities to market themselves and so on, all those 'free' pens and such...

I think the way it works with the far flung destination things is that they charge the person who's willing to do it a fee which goes towards the logistics of the event. I've noticed that generally events closer to home are cheaper to 'enter' than those further away. Which make perfect practical sense.

Funny... I've just seen the banner on the frontpage of bike radar advertising this...

https://www.bhf.org.uk/get_involved/tak ... spx?e=2688

Seem's like a perfect place to start.

Sandwel'ls south Brum isn't it - where Black sabbath come from ?

P-Jay

I'd love to go further a field to do a charity ride. There's a charity that keeps e-mailing me offering rides through the Amazon and the like, but you've got to raise over £6k or something to do it, and how much of that is taken up in admin / flights etc.

A good ride I did last year was the Ty Hafen Taff Trail Challenge; Ty Hafen is a Children’s Hospice here in South Wales. It's starts in Brecon and Follows the Taff Trail (runs along the side of the Taff River) Across the brecon beacons and down into Cardiff Bay. It's really well organised with rest stop along the way with nice old Ladies handing you free drinks, sweet and stuff like that. 55 miles on Fire Roads, Canal ways and Pathways. You even get a cheer from a reasonable crowd at the end.

Sadly can't do it this year (it's on the 2nd of Sept) one of our team has a christening and the rest of us are off to Morzine and only get back a few days before.

carlos-g

Me and a mate just did liverpool to leeds on the canal (127.5 miles) on the 28th of july , we had a mate meet us at 60 miles and 95 miles to refresh clothes and top up water, we did it for the sick childrens trust a charity that provides a house at 7 hospitals throughout the country where parents can stop whilst their children are being treated.

The cash isn't all in yet but we're over the £1000 mark so it looks like it was worth the sore/blistered perinium , it took us 16 hours with about 2.5 hours of breaks, I can honestly say completing the ride felt really good and doing something like this really does give you a warm fuzzy feeling inside.

just make sure whatever you do seems like a challenge or people may not be too forthcoming with sponsorship.

Good luck becoming a parent ,I was 34 when my son was born and although at 2.5 years old he tires me out more than I thought possible it's all worth it.