Big rush to sign up for town race
IT is just a week or so since I advised, via this column, that the Hatters Half Marathon had passed 200 sign-ups in record time.
Well, there’s more – race director John Giles happily told the Stockport Express this week that the half marathon had now gone beyond 250 sign-ups.
Yes, with just over a month until race day on Sunday, September 2, Stockport’s premier road and trail half marathon is well on the way to being another raging success story for the town, the club and promoters, Stockport County Supporters Cooperative.
The Guardian Account, which currently stands at £45,106, is the primary beneficiary of this excellent event, and we can confirm that pre-race planning is in full swing to ensure another decent contribution from race receipts to the Guardian Account.
The course will need a litter pick and a cut back, which we will sort, and a strimmer would be handy, so if anyone out there can oblige with the loan of the same, please contact johngiles20@ hotmail.com.
Similarly please contact that email address should you be able to help us marshal the course on the day – we need another half dozen or so to do the job as we would like to. If you have already joined Team Hatters Half as a volunteer, a brief but very useful marshal briefing Sessions will be held sometime in this month.
The other beneficiary of the race will be the Cooperatives designated charity and Stockport’s justly renowned homeless charity, the Wellspring, which is again offering free race entry this year for the Hatters Half Marathon.
So, you can decide to run the Hatters Half marathon, fundraise for the Wellspring homeless charity, and receive a free place in the. No fundraising target – just email thewellspring@ btconnect.com and run for the Wellspring to help them to end homelessness in Stockport and Greater Manchester.
And a quick word on Matthew White, our Guardian Account hero, who is making the Hatters Half his first half marathon.
Matthew is well on with his training and now has a Just Giving account open as he continues to train, raising money for the Guardian Account.
To support Matthew, go to justgiving.com/ crowdfunding/ mattywhitegahero.
And finally, the Cooperative were very happy to take up the offer of a stall at this year’s Stockport Pride event in the Market area on Sunday.
It was a chance to offer support for the LGBT community, and get the Cooperatives name out there as well, and it all went off pretty well. We never anticipated a rush of membership applications, but the number we did sign up were very welcome indeed, and included Labour councillors Jude Wells and John Taylor.