We’re a week into the first Colt Charity Challenge and I’m extremely excited to say that we’ve already raised €40,000 for our charity partners. Colties and those in our wider community have collectively run, swam, cycled, danced, and everything else in-between to reach over 48,000km, which means we have virtually travelled from the UK to the US and now into Asia. Soon we will have travelled through Australia and we’ll be beginning the journey home through Europe, just as our rider teams would have done if the original bike ride had gone ahead.
I’ve been struck a few times during this Challenge by just how different this year would have been if the Colt Bike Ride had gone ahead as originally planned. As a triathlete, I’m used to being very active and exercising every day, so lockdown was a challenging time for me. I felt very limited during the few months in the UK where we were only allowed outdoors to exercise for one hour a day. Now that we’re able to move around a lot more, I’m loving getting back to running and enjoying the outdoors. With Hyde Park literally on my doorstep, who wouldn’t want the excuse to run or walk daily? Pools have also re-opened and I’m loving being back in the pool – it’s actually an even better experience now because social distancing means that the number of people allowed in a public pool is more limited, which gives everyone more space to swim #silverlinings
While we have gone an incredible distance in this Challenge so far – we are not done yet! We set an ambitious target of €150,000 globally and I’m really excited for us to come together for a massive push in this final week of the Challenge. We’re currently sitting at around 600 sign-ups on the MyVirtualMission app, so there’s still time to get those numbers up and get involved!
The Challenge is open to everyone, not just Colt employees, and I’d like to extend an invitation to anyone who may be reading this blog and would like to get involved in this global charitable event, as there’s still a full week to go and every person counts! The causes we’re fundraising for – find more information here – are so worthwhile and need our help more than ever in these difficult times. It’s a great opportunity to reconnect with old friends and work colleagues, or to involve your family members by challenging them to a swimming race or a lunchtime run and logging your miles together on the MyVirtual Mission app. Joining instructions can be found below.
I’ve been so impressed with what we’ve been able to achieve so far, and I can’t wait to see what next week holds. The Colt community continues to move me with our ability to show just how much connectivity matters to us, and how far we will go to ensure a successful charitable event.
How to sign up
We’ll be using an app called MyVirtualMission to track our kilometres for the challenge. Here’s how to get set up:
- Choose your charity and donate – Click on your chosen charity on this page to donate to their fundraising page (€20 minimum pp). Leave your full name so we can approve your access on MyVirtualMission. If you’re signing multiple people up in one donation, please provide everyone’s names.
- Sign up to MyVirtualMission – Click here to set up your account. Press the ‘Sign in’ button. In the bottom right of the pop-up, click ‘Sign up’. Fill in your details to create your account. You’ll be asked to select your time zone and distance unit (please choose kilometres).
- Join The Colt Charity Challenge Mission – While you’re logged in to your MyVirtualMission account, click here to sign up to the challenge. Press the ‘Join’ button, select your team (Colt Charity Challenge) and enter the charity and country that you donated to.
The Colt event team will verify your charity donation and accept you into the challenge – this may take a couple of days so please bear with us!
To install MyVirtualMission on your mobile, search for it in the App Store or Google Play Store. If you want to sync MyVirtualMission with your apps like FitBit and Strava to track your kilometres, click ‘My Account’ and select ‘My Connections’. If you don’t have any apps to connect, you can manually enter your distance travelled.
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