July 25th 2013 will be a day that 28 Cardgains Charity Challenges will not forget in a hurry!Cardgains staff, members, suppliers, friends and family join forces to take on the annual challenge and raise money for the Cardgains charity of the year which this year is the Katy Holmes Trust, a charity aiming to raise awareness and money for research into paediatric brain tumours. www.katyholmestrust.co.uk. The target for 2013 is £20,000.
Since 1999 Cardgains have been holding charity challenges every year raising thousands of pounds for various charities.
This year the event re-visited a previous walk – the 3 Peaks in the Yorkshire Dales, which was a very early Cardgains Challenge back in 2002. A 25 mile walk over Peny-g-hent, Whernside and Ingleborough to be completed in under 12 hours. The 3 climbs totalled 8900 feet, which breaks down to 55782 steps and burns over 10,000 calories!
Many new walkers joined this year with walkers in their late teens to walkers in their early 70’s! They walked alongside Chris Dyson, Penny Shaw, Steve Grocott, Jim Girvan, Ian Powis, Richard Wright, Bob Holt and Nathan Hitchcock who also completed the walk back in 2002.
Incredibly, given the challenging route and conditions, 29 set off and all 29 returned safely under the 12 hour challenge time limit.
Also amongst the team were Riou Baxter of Why Management, family and friends Ron Bridger, Alison Allen and Andrew Gerrard, Chris Houfe from GBCC, Nick Leek of Nigel Quiney, Amy and Jenna Shepherd of Conway Cards, Will and Jackie Collins of Cherry Orchard, Michelle Comerford, Mark Drury and Anna Bubnova of Pioneer Europe, Chris Maskell of Saltash Cards, Anneke Driscoll from Lucilla Lavendar, Hamdy Shahein of Hamdys News, Richard and Judy Wright of Axiom Displays, Jon Dudley of Boyatt News and Julie Rowland of Carte Blanche.
Chris Dyson commented: “Over 25 miles of hard terrain, climbing over 8900 feet, walking 55782 steps whilst burning around 10218 calories was certainly a day many of us will remember for years to come. It was especially good this year to see so many ‘Cardgains Challenge Virgins’ with the age group spreading from teenagers to early 70’s! We witnessed ‘tears of pain’ and ‘tears of joy’ and watched people ‘dig very deep‘ throughout the day to ensure they finished”.
Aches and pains and stories of ‘Wow’! were a-plenty at the evening celebration dinner.
Above all the absolute winner is the Katy Holmes Trust. Currently walk sponsorship is around £12,500 with many walkers still collecting!
Anyone wishing to add to that total can do so www.justgiving.com/card-gains or send a cheque to Cardgains HO made payable to Cardgains Charity A/C.
