They visited the UK’s four neuromuscular centres and have raised an incredible £34,000, so far! One of the support team, Tom Mowforth, has described the planning (and shopping!) needed to arrange and then deliver a major event like this.
Last week, myself and four others had the privilege of supporting an incredible team as they cycled nearly 400 miles from London to Newcastle via Oxford and Liverpool. Their mission was to raise money for Muscular Dystrophy UK. Our mission was to keep them alive and (relatively) happy. The challenge was the brainchild of Sam Taylor whose son Will was diagnosed with the condition at the age of four.
You may be wondering how I ended up driving across the country behind, ahead of and sometimes right in the middle of a bunch of lycra clad legends on two wheels.
I’ve worked with Sam at JCB for a number of years now and over that time, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Will and the rest of the Taylor Family. I was blown away by the courage they all showed and the determination they had to help find a treatment for Will’s condition. So when Sam told me about his plans for the Duchenne Research Relay earlier this year, I leapt at the chance to be part of something that could potentially change the lives of so many people. Since my level of fitness and competence on a road bike left something to be desired, the obvious choice was to join the team who would be closely supporting the riders on their journey north.
Sam said that in terms of planning, the basic plan, route and room bookings were set up in July 2020. He had had fortnightly meetings with MDUK for the last three months to set up the meetings with the research teams, and to plan the promotion. The exact route was confirmed four days before they set off, once Sam had ridden it.
We provided breakfast lunch and tea at every stop. The food and the accommodation was self-funded by the participants with any left-over cash being ploughed back into the charity fund at the end.
The shopping list looked something like this:
- 380 rashers of bacon (c. 1 per mile)
- 90 bread rolls
- 70 litres of tea and coffee
- 20 pints of milk
- 90 sandwiches
- 180 flapjacks
- Three cakes
- A reservoir full of water
We also bought:
- 30 pizzas
- 30 Mexi Co Burritos
- 30 Nando’s chicken wraps
- 30 milkshakes
Several unexpected donations really helped boost the final fundraising figure.
Perky’s Cafe in Wooburn Green (breakfast on day 1) still haven’t sent us a bill. Endmoor Bakery in Cumbria (breakfast stop on day 3) refused to take any payment from us. The final night venue and food at the CycleHub in Newcastle also donated.
The support crew consisted of Mike Britton, Alan Davies, myself, Louise Hemmings and Poppy Burrough.
Sam’s kids Will and Beth also joined us. It was great for Will to come along with us because he loves having an active part in the events, and Beth’s photography skills were invaluable.
We were split between a number of support vehicles which carried essential supplies including food, water, first aid kits and tonnes of Jelly Babies. The benefit of having multiple vehicles was that all rider abilities were catered for because as the pack spread out over the course of each leg there was always support close at hand. Poppy and I would also be covering the social media for the challenge so would have to leapfrog past the riders at various times to get some great photo and video content along the route.
One of the key roles of the support team was to get the rest stops set up ahead of the riders’ arrival and make sure they were sufficiently fuelled up when they did get there. For the morning “breakfast” stop at about 9 or 10am, usually Al’s spectacular bacon sandwiches cooked over a small casing stove did the trick. This was followed by a lunch stop of sandwiches, paste etc. and then an afternoon break where cake and biscuits were the calorific champions. Of course, tea was also an essential requirement at each of the stops. So much so that I was almost excommunicated at one stop due to the fact that I managed to arrive with 8 pints of milk which although were still “in date”, had long since turned to cheese. Luckily Poppy managed to swiftly find an extremely convenient convenience shop and the day was saved.
Finally, and probably most importantly was our role in providing motivation and moral support to the riders as they faced the toughest points along the route. Of particular note was the afternoon of the final day where the riders faced almost 80% of all the vertical ascent on the whole journey. We developed a number of strategies to help spur the riders on and keep them going to the end.
We were all so happy to be there in Newcastle to welcome them over the line and felt proud that in our own way we had contributed to all 19 riders completing the challenge and raising over £30,000 for MDUK. After the event, I asked Mike what he thought it was about these events that made them so special and made him sign on year after year to help out.
His answer:
I’ve spent three very happy days driving around with an inspirational young man, helping a fantastic group of people do a wonderful thing. Why wouldn’t you?
My thoughts exactly.