CHARITY CHAMPION
Cancer survivor Andrea Mason, 40, became the first woman to swim, cycle and run over 330 miles in five days to complete the gruelling Sea To Summit triathlon. She hardly slept or ate during the challenge in the French Alps, which involved swimming around Lake Annecy, and cycling and running up Mont Blanc. She did it in four days and 23 hours.
Andrea, who lives between Blackpool, London and Chamonix in France, said: “My main motivation was raising awareness about cervical cancer.”
She was found to have cervical cancer after she had a hysterectomy for endometriosis in 2017.
After she recovered she set up the charity Lady Talk Matters to raise awareness.
Care worker Vanessa has the most gruelling commute in the UK. Vanessa, 33, and her husband and son, are sole occupants of the remote island of Eilean Shona, in Loch Moidart.
For the past five years, to
Veteran fundraiser Lloyd Scott’s challenge of climbing the Three Peaks wearing his 130lb deep sea diving suit raised £163,000 in aid of the Lord’s Taverners youth cricket and disability charity.
Former professional footballer and fireman Lloyd, 58, of Theydon Bois, Essex, began fundraising 30 years ago after recovering from leukaemia.
Since then, he has raised more than £5million at the London and New York marathons wearing the diving suit, a Mount Everest marathon, an underwater marathon at Loch Ness, and cycled 3,000 miles across Australia on a penny farthing. “I want to give people who are suffering all kinds of ailments or situations hope” he said. get to work at an elderly people’s home on the mainland, she hikes for 30 minutes across fields, completes a treacherous solo row of between five and 50 minutes, depending on the weather, and drives for over an hour. Her worst journey saw her blown so far off course she ended up back on the island.
She rang husband Jeff who shone a torch across the water to help Vanessa find her bearings. She said: “Finally, I spotted a beam of light.”
Businessman Frank Rothwell raised more than £1,100,000 for Alzheimer’s Research UK by becoming the oldest person to row 3,000 miles unassisted across the Atlantic. Frank was 70 when he set off from the Canaries on December 12, 2020, and crossed the finish in Antigua on February 6. His brother-inlaw Roger was diagnosed with the disease and died, aged 62, while Frank was at sea.
Former Royal Marine Mark Ormrod, 38, lost both legs and an arm in a bomb attack in Afghanistan in 2007. He
Retired Army major Michael Stanley raised £45,000 for his local hospice after building a tin boat and sailing 100 miles along the Chichester Canal. Michael “Mick” Stanley, 80, built Tintanic 1 from corrugated iron sheets, curtain hooks and hosepipe. His plan was to raise £1,000 for St Wilfrid’s Hospice, Bosham, West Sussex, but national publicity boosted the amount to £45,000. Mick, of West Wittering, near Chichester, sold Tintantic 1 for £480 to boost his charity funds and built Tintantic 2 for more fundraisers around Britain on behalf of Alzheimer’s Research UK. has since run 3,500 miles across the US, cycled 3,000 miles around the UK, and won 11 medals at the Invictus Games raising hundreds of thousands of pounds for charity. Mark of Plymstock, Devon, said: “I never wanted to be a burden on anyone.”