Group triumphs with triathlon friends
A GROUP of friends turned their sweat into salvation at the weekend; by swimming, cycling and running to raise money for charities helping communities devastated by the coronavirus.
Lex Stephens came up with the charity triathlon idea, and managed to convince friends Ellie Gallienne, Suzanne Mather, Lauri Warlow and Tim Ogier to join her.
The challenge started with a 750m swim at Pembroke, then they cycled 20km along the coast to the Imperial and back round to Perelle Garage, and then a 5km run to Grandes Rocques.
At the finish line was a crowd of proud friends and family, bearing pain au chocolats, sparkling wine, grapes and clicking cameras.
Lex said that their fitness levels were varied and she put herself in the ‘very occasional park run’ category, but tenacity and positivity got them through it.
‘Looking at the forecast we were worried because of the wind, but actually it was really flat when we swam, it was beautiful and I saw lots of lovely fish under the water, and then the wind was a bit of killer on the way down, so we cycled about 13km straight into strong winds, which wasn’t great, but then it pushed us back, and then the run was really good.
‘And we’ve got an amazing support team. I didn’t think we’d have this many out, so it’s gone really well.’
On Saturday the group had raised almost £5,000 and the money will be divided between four charities – School Farms Africa, Goal 50, UNICEF and Pre-emptive Love.
Lockdown may have forced islanders to stay within the Bailiwick, but insularity is not part of this group of friends’ vision, and Lex said that malnourished and disease-vulnerable people faced a severe crisis.
‘We’ve been really blessed in Guernsey, obviously coronavirus has affected us, but as an island we’ve been very fortunate, and we started to hear reports of developing nations that were struggling not just with the lockdown, but getting basic things like food because they live on the breadline and they weren’t getting any money.
‘We thought that if we can raise some money doing something that we would never have done normally, and along with just doing loads of exercise during lockdown we thought we could put it to good use
‘I had the idea and I messaged my friends and I told them I had this crazy idea and did they want to join it, and they said yes so I got the website up and running the next day so that they couldn’t back out so it was official.
Visit gofundme.com/f/trimeguernsey2020 if you would like to donate
