One of our goals at What The Fartlek is to support some of the amazing charities that mean so much to our team and our community. We take pride in using our platform to support as many causes as possible through our running shenanigans by raising money and awareness. In addition to this we are always keen to showcase the fundraising exploits of our Fartlek Family and champion their journeys to make a difference!
Since launching the podcast in late 2020 we have raised funds for the following charitable organisations:
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Prostate Cancer UK
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Run4YourMind
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Make 2nds Count
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Make A Wish UK
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British Heart Foundation
At the time of writing we have been able to raise over £12,500 for these great causes.
Have a read below to learn more about some of our antics.
Charity of the Year 2023 - Make A Wish UK
Rob, Matt and the What The Fartlek podcast crew are joining seasoned fundraiser (and WTF core team) JP to don the Make-A-Wish®️ UK vest and up the ante with new fundraising adventures for 2023.
JP has been a big part of the Make A Wish UK fundraising team for the last few years and we want to help him continue to make a difference.
The boys at the end of 2022 took part in Movember, followed by 2 races in 2 days for Rob and Matt at the Alton Towers weekender before they then headed to tackle the Blackburn 10k a few weeks later for a VERY special fancy dress themed race.
Then in February we have had a MASSIVE raffle with prizes from Dryrobe, Run Through UK, Runr, Rasselbock, Pretty Athletic, Pockit Apparel, Fractel, Truesapien, Runderwear, Medal Munchers, Coopah Running, Altra, Exhale Coffee, Voom Nutrition, We Are Fearless, We Run Bright and Run4YourMind.
The winners were all drawn live on Instagram as part of an entertaining live podcast special.
And the main event, JPs 4 at 40 was a family affair! Sheffield Half Marathon was a mini Fartlek Family takeover, Pol joined him for London Landmarks Half then the lads get involved for Manchester and London marathons 2 weeks in a row
We continue to raise money for this amazing cause throughout the year!
Currently, in the UK alone over 60,000 children are living with a critical illness. Make A Wish UK is there to support them and their families through this awful time by granting wishes to bring happiness, positivity and respite into their lives.
If you can spare any donation to this worthy cause and help us achieve our target then please do so via the link below to our Just Giving page.
A chat with JP
You can hear more details about Make-A-Wish by checking out Series 6 Episode 1 of the podcast that includes a great chat with JP who tells us about all his previous fundraising antics for the charity.
Fundraising
Keep your eyes peeled and your ears pricked to find out about our fundraising activities throughout the year and below is a flavour of what we have been up to so far.
2023
In 2023 we were saddened to hear of the passing of Stu Brear. Stu kindly volunteered his time to our previous fundraising efforts by refereeing our football games. We therefore decided to dedicate our 2023 weekender to Stu and raised over £850 for British Heart Foundation in his memory.
We marked the mens and women’s football matches with a minutes applause for Stu and were very happy to have members of his family in attendance. Thank you so much to everyone who donated.
2022
The podcast has always been keen to promote and talk openly about mental health awareness and in 2022 we partnered and raised money for Run4YourMind; a charitable organisation that was set up by a very good friend of the podcast Oly Newton.
Oly is a a long term sufferer of severe OCD, Anxiety and Depression and with Run4YourMind is on a mission to raise awareness, support, motivate, inspire and help others struggling with mental illness to better themselves through the power of running.
The dream is to help as many people as possible and make a real difference.
In total we raised well over £1100, which is fantastic. Thank you to everyone that donated and helped support this great cause.
A chat with Oly
You can hear more details about Run4YourMind by checking out Series 4 Episode 12 of the podcast that includes a very interesting and insightful chat with Oly who tells us all about his journey and starting up the foundation.
Further details
More details about the foundation can be found at the following links:
2021
As part of our goal for the podcast, we wanted to raise money for a charity close to our hearts each year, and in 2021 that was Prostate Cancer UK.
Rob, Matt, Jack and Sammy all ran the Chester Marathon in October. With your support and donations we raised money not just by running the marathon itself, but also through some exciting challenges along the way.
Throughout the year we hosted virtual quiz nights, ice bucket challenges, raffles, one of the Fartlek family Kathy completed a 4x4x48 challenge on our behalf and the lads captained teams in a WTF Cup football match!
In total we raised well over £2300, which is a tremendous achievement. Thank you to everyone that donated and helped us achieve this target.
Fundraising Highlights
So many laughs at the quiz nights with some Fartlek Family!
Sammy inflicted the first ice bucket over Rob. A huge swell of fundraising meant Rob had to endure 17 ice buckets.
Rob made sure that Matt couldn't escape the ice buckets.
Sammy and Donna couldn't get away from the ice buckets either.
Series 3 podcast guest Ben couldn't escape the ice buckets after recording his episode.
Kathy was amazing and ran 4 miles, every 4 hours for 48 hours. She dedicated her fundraising to the podcast cause and helped raise an awesome £100 for charity.