Olivia and her family organise a Walk for Winston’s Wish event every year to raise money for Winston’s Wish and say thank you to the charity which supported them after the unexpected death of her mum in 2010. Due to COVID restrictions this year, the event has been adapted into a 24-hour relay with people taking part all over the world!
Why have you chosen to support Winston’s Wish?
Following the unexpected loss of our mum in 2010, Winston’s Wish became a big source of help and support during a really challenging and difficult time. My brother, dad and I received guidance, counselling and met other families in similar positions to ourselves. Winston’s Wish were invaluable in our journey towards closure and healing; it’s like the charity turned on a light switch and showed us solace and hope that the future would get better. We felt heard, listened to and supported – precious moments during grief. It became clear to our family very early on that we wanted to say thank you and raise recognition of the amazing work Winston’s Wish do – and so Walk for Winston’s Wish was born.
Tell us about Walk for Winston’s Wish
My family and I organised our first Walk for Winston’s Wish event in 2014. The idea was to get the local community together to celebrate a fantastic charity whilst also making the most of being outside and all together. Usually, a group of around 150 people do a local seven/eight mile walk in the Hertfordshire area before having an ‘after-party’ in a local pub with live music and a raffle. Over the years the event has grown and grown and over eight years we have managed to raise £20,000 for Winston’s Wish!
How have you had to adapt the event this year because of COVID restrictions?
We have been lucky enough to organise this event for seven consecutive years now, making 2021 the eighth event. As a family we have a goal of continuing for 10 years and so didn’t want to let anything stop us – including a global pandemic!
So we began brainstorming, talking to people and gaining different ideas about how we could adapt and overcome the current challenges to organising a charity event. Our main aim this year was to make sure everyone was safe and felt comfortable with anything we organised, so we wanted to make sure we stuck to any guidelines and rules in place.
After taking inspiration from other events and ideas, we adapted this year to create a 24-Hour Relay for Winston’s Wish. The idea is that each person taking part will have an hour slot where they walk, cycle, swim or run and see how much distance they can cover before ‘passing on the baton’ to the next person. So, over the course of 24 hours at least one person will be taking part for every second of every minute for the whole 24 hours. The idea is that this will all be recorded and uploaded to our Instagram account so our followers can keep up with the action.
Tell us about some of the people taking part
This year we have a mix of friends, family and strangers (who are soon to become friends, I’m sure) taking part in the 24-Hour Relay. We put an advert on our social media asking people to get in touch if they fancied taking part and over 70 people responded!
Some people have taken part in every Walk for Winston’s Wish event and for others this is their first time. That is the beauty of this event – over the years it has grown and grown, bringing friends, family and the local community together to create amazing memories. We even have some babies making their first appearance this year (with the help of their amazing parents, of course!).
We have people taking part all over too – Scotland, Paris, Australia, England, the Netherlands… It’s amazing to see how global the event has gone! I think the people taking part during the night/early morning slots will have the most challenging time but hopefully the adrenaline of the event and good coffee will help them smash it!
Hopefully, the Relay this year is giving people something to look forward to, which is really amazing to see especially in such strange times. Even though people are taking part individually/as a family, the idea is that everyone is part of something bigger – a team working together for a great cause.
You can support the 24-Hour Relay for Winston’s Wish via their JustGiving page.
Find inspiration for your own fundraising event and get in touch with our team here.