Mud, sweat and dislocated toes!

July 25, 2011

Runners from across the Renewable Energy Industry have been putting themselves through their paces over the last few months at events up and down the country and beyond, including the crazy off road Mud Runner Oblivion, Edinburgh Marathon and Brussels Half Marathon to raise money for Renewable World.

Six brave runners from Natural Power’s Malvern office took on the challenge of the Mud Runner Oblivion at Eastnor Castle on 8th May, involving 10km of steep hills and deep mud with 10 tricky obstacles along the way including cargo nets, 6ft fences, monkey bars, rope courses and even lakes! Despite all that was thrown at them, Jon Cage, Sophie Blandford, Mike Harris, Edward Burin des Roziers, Paul Hadley and Keiran Knowles all finished in the top 50 per cent of the 1260 people entered into the race and one of the teams – the ZephIR Old Farts, disproved their name by finishing as the fastest mixed team in the event!

Back on the road, Neasa Ni Mhurchu ran the Edinburgh Kilomathon on 17th April finishing in an impressive two hours and 35 minutes and thanks to some ingenious fundraising iniatiatives including a St Patricks Day party and sweep stake to guess her finishing time, she raised an amazing £2000 for Renewable World. Sarah Azau from EWEA also ran the Brussels half marathon for Renewable World finishing in one hour and 38 minutes, which places her an impressive 269th out of 15,000 women who entered the competition.

The second year of the sucessful running4renewables initiative saw more than 50 runners from companies across the industry such as Scottish Renewables, Smartest Energy and GreenCat Renewables taking part in the Edinburgh Marathon, Half Marathon and Hairy Haggis team relay on 22nd May. The grit and dtermination of the Renewable Energy Industry showed through as Kerr Willis from Natural Power kindly agreed to stand in at the last minute for a member of the Wind Players team who had to withdraw due to injury, and Elliot Hall from the Smartest Energy team bravely ran the last three miles of his relay leg with a dislocated toe after he was pushed into a kerb by a fellow runner and had to be picked up at the finish line by an ambulance!

Thanks to vento ludens, who generously agreed to sponsor the event again and Smartest Energy who sponsored the running t-shirts, all the money raised by the runners will go directly to a Renewable World project. This year Renewable World hopes to raise £15,000 from running4renewables in order to bring solar power to two rural villages in Nicaragua which currently have no access to energy, providing power for lighting and appliances in homes and schools and for pumping clean water – improving health and agricultural production.

If you have been inspired by reading about the experiences of our runners then why not consider taking part in one of our fundraising challenges or contact Melanie Matthews for more information.

Email: melanie.matthews@renewable-world.org or call: 00 44 (0)1273 234 801