Race Against Blood Cancer and Telford Park Run joined forces in the early morning of Saturday 23^rd January to raise awareness for the charity and its efforts to give every single blood cancer patient an equal chance of finding a suitable donor.

With the initial goal of partnering to put a spotlight on the charity and its efforts, it quickly became clear to our team that the partnership would not reach its full potential unless we gave Telford’s early risers and their supportive spectators the opportunity to sign up on the day as well.

And so, as the park run team was busy setting up the day’s course, our volunteers were setting up their registration stand at the end of the course. Bustled in a small gazebo at 8:30AM, our volunteers hadn’t even finished setting up the stand that a few eager participants were already lining up to sign up as potential donors!

Our message for the event was that it didn’t matter whether you were big or small, fast or slow – simply taking part in the event was already a great sign of support. So by 9AM, the start line looked more like a sea of red than the usual multicolored crowd as runners and walkers turned up in their red attire in honour of Race Against Blood Cancer. And the buzz was amazing. So much that the Telford Parkrun actually managed to break its attendance record with 462 participating in the hour long event!

When the fast runners started crossing the finish line, our team starting seeing a continuous flow of runners come over to sign up while supporters and crowds willing to help walked around collecting donations along the course. Crowds started dissipating at 10AM by which point the team had successfully signed up 37 donors and raised a great amount of awareness around the charity and the cause.

After such a successful weekend, we would like to thank all of the Race Against Blood Cancer team of volunteers including Alex Morrison, Natasha Brown, Joe Bates, Gail Fisk, Emma Brown, Jason Cook, Ben Westwood, Sarah Drummond-Everitt, Rebecca Headley, Rebecca Walsh, Vanessa Postle, Bethan Brown and Liz Powell who all helped to make the event a great success.
We would also like to thank the Telford Parkrun Team of volunteers for allowing us to work together and all those who came out to show their support. We’ll definitely be back and, who knows, maybe be present at some more parkrun events around the country soon!