Students on the Swimming and Triathlon team at De Montfort University Leicester (DMU) gathered outside in the bitter cold this week, for a 24hr static cycle raising money for Kidney Research UK.
The event, which the club compete annually, took place between 11am Tuesday 7 and 11am Wednesday 8 February at the university Food Village.
Currently the club have raised a total of £480 in online donations, surpassing their £250 target and that’s before donations in buckets have even been counted.
In previous years, the event has been completed in aid of mental health charity MIND with great success.
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Joe Roland, a 2nd year Criminal Investigation with Policing Studies BA (Hons) student, said: “I decided to take part in this event as the charity is very close to home for me as I have recently lost a friend to kidney disease.
“This is my first time taking part in a major charity event for the university and I will definitely be taking part again next year, as it is for such a good cause, which is beneficial to people who have had similar experiences to me.”
This is the first year where the team will be working with Kidney Research UK, which is Britain’s leading charity, funding research into the causes, treatment and prevention of kidney disease while relying almost entirely on donations from the public.
Emily Walton, 21, a 3rd year Fine Art BA (Hons) student, said: “Although the most important thing is raising money for the charity, the event really helped to promote the Swimming and Triathlon club and it’s always a positive to have good publicity from doing something like this.
“This has been our most successful year by far as a total of around 10-15 students were involved and we have raised far more money than we expected to.
“It has been such a fun experience, as I was able to do this with my friends on the team and it was great to have them next to me for support.”
William Preston, 21, a 3rd year History BA (Hons) student, said: “I really enjoyed taking part in this as it really helped with team building and creating a stronger support network within the team, as well as giving our team more recognition.
“The event is very beneficial to a lot of people as it not only raises money, it also helps to raise awareness of the important research the charity does.
“I have taken part in this event for the past two years and I will make sure that I do it again next year, hopefully we can carry on building on our success.”
For more information about Kidney research UK or if you would like to make a donation, please send an email to kidneyhealth@kidneyresearchuk.org, visit the website at kidneyresearchuk.org or call 0300 303 1100.
Posted on Tuesday 14 February 2017