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Sponsorship - to do or not to do?
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Well done on your half Wobbled!
It's annoying when people put their own limitations on someone else. Just cause they can't do it....
I'm glad to see that other people don't run for charity - this has made me feel a bit awkward recently. I'm doing my first run on Sunday ( Liverpool 10K ). Since mentioning it to colleagues and friends, they have all asked me which charity I'm doing it for.
I started running as part of an overall exercise programme to help reduce my weight and improve my fitness. I've not been a big runner in the past, always finding it difficult to maintain a decent distance, so 10K is a big milestone for me in terms of my own fitness and confidence. Try to explain that I'm doing the run for my own morale just causes blank looks and questions of why aren't I doing it for charity.
My first run was RFL and I did run that for charity, ran it for my Aunt who died of breast cancer. Collecting the sponsorship money was a complete pain though.
After that I got the running bug and started entering 10K's and then sprint tri's, cyclosportives. During that year I didn't ask for sponsorship or any donations despite people asking all the time what charity I was running for.
So, the next year I thought I'd open up a Just Giving page, list out all the events I was planning and see what I could raise. It worked quite well, I ended up completing 14 separate events and raised about £350 for a local childrens hospice. I kept a blog so people could see what I was doing and it worked well. None of the pain of actually having to collect money cos it was all through the website.
Seeing as I do this stuff for fun I haven't bothered to set another charity page up. I do it cos I enjoy it and unless I do anything huge like an Ironman fundraising is not really part of it.
My first race was RFL so I did not mind running for charity. Like you, a couple of years later, I needed to set myself a challenge. When I did everyone asked 'what charity', at which point I explained that I was doing it for myself. I guess it is to hard for most people to realise that running makes you feel good and is not about money....
*hands over soap box*
A local homeless charity organises a walk around Bath every year, with drink stations and a map. They don't ask for an entry fee so when I ran (most) of that this year I sent off a cheque to them as my "sponsorship".
I'm so glad I'm not the only one asking this question. I'm happy to pay entry for a race if that contributes to a charity, and accept that the London Marathon is an exception (as a cheering spectator I feel awkward for those non-elite runners who aren't obviously promoting a cause, just running 'anonymously') - but a recent charity 10k charged £20 entry and stipulated that this was entirely for organisation fees and that each participant was expected to generate sponsorship income.
I do feel mean, but I run because I enjoy it, and pay to enter races because someone organises them, and appreciate that if it's a real challenge, then the thought of letting a charity down will push you to succeed, but it has put me off entering some races - I guess we have the right to choose.
I won't run for sponsorship more than once every 2 years even if i do a big race.can't keep on asking the same people again and again.............
I like entering the smaller races where some of the profits go to charity but I don't like the big charity races where it all goes to admin......
I suppose its an individual thing but I do run the races for my self not charity..........If occasionally i raise money for my favourite charity then I will.
I have raise money for charity when I've done the FLM (6 times) as I view it as a fund-raising event but for any other marathon or event I would not dream of it. I even felt guilty going asking for sponshorship two years in a row.
The only other time I've run raising money is when I ran the West Highland Way solo (95 miles in 3 days)
The public perception, due to the TV coverage of events like the FLM and GNR, is the masses always run for charity - they don't seem to understand people want to run the races for themselves.
I actively fundraised twice - my first marathon I raised money for the Alzheimers society - FIL has az. Second time I got a charity place for FLM - I found the fundraising very stressfull.
For races after that loads of people asked me who I was running for and to begin with I just said it was for me - but there were so many people who had cash in hand who wanted to sponsor me that I just said that I wasn't actively seeking sponsorship but if they wanted to sponsor me then I would give the money to the local Hospice. For the Belfast marathon I was given £135.
Now, all I have to do is make it around the route on Sunday!
Not saying I never would, but so far I haven't run for charity.
I started, as many others, to get fitter, lose weight and waistline. I continue because I've now lost most of the weight, I've discovered the endorphin buzz and found I actually enjoy running, along with an occassional race.
I'd feel awkward asking for money to do something I'd want to do anyway.
This has meant I've actually avoided most of the larger events. IMO they can appear to be more about the fundraising than actual running events?
London is billed as the biggest charity event in the world, talk of how many people do it, how much is raised.
Now I've not done a marathon, so I can't and wouldn't denigrate the effort of those that have. Even if they 'just got round'.
I'm curios about one aspect of London etc tho....
What proportion ran before thinking of doing it?
What proportion do the marathon and then hang up their running shoes, happy with doing a marathon once?
I started running with a RFL, then raised money on my first 10K and my first HM.
This weekend I'm about to do my 5th HM this year and I'm on a charity ticket. I have been very lucky and had some generous sponsorship (chose a "popular" charity) and have made my target. But now I am living in fear of something going wrong/getting ill in the next few days- the pressure is totally different to the other 12 or so races I've done this year and I won't be doing a sponsored race again in a long time!
I was offered a golden bond place in the GSR, so I took it, I'm doing it for the charity because we have had a lot of help from them and it's a way of giving something back.
I'm not doing any more races for charity, I hate asking for money and have only approached family/close relatives and friends - if I don't make the target, I'll make up the balance myself.
I hate the idea that people can only enter races to raise money - great if that's what you want to do, but you shouldn't be made to feel a philistine if you don't!
I did my first HM recently and was asked "Who did you run for?" My reply - "Myself!!"
This is an interesting thread. In the past I've ran for Guide Dogs (raised 1,200 pounds), Vitalise (1,060) and Cancer Research (1,550). I didn't have to do this, but seeing as they were big races in which I'd invested a lot of personal commitment, I felt they needed a better result than just my desire to break a PB.
I stopped fund raising after my effort for Cancer Research, they were not very helpful and really treated me like a second-class citizen, so that was that. I often wonder about this and can only say that as one of the biggest charities around, they can afford the luxury of treating people like shi*e. Should I have been bigger than this, shrugged it off and been glad that I had the opportunity to raise a lot of money for them? Probably, but I don't think anyone likes seeing their efforts scorned.
Anyhow, I just finished the 2009 Loch Ness Marathon and decided, very late in the day, to couple it to an effort to raise money for Help for Heroes. Again, I didn't have to, guess I just got over my aversion to fundraising and wanted some good to come out the race other than a PB**. It's a very personal thing and I don't think anyone should be beholden to it. I race/run for fun, but have got some satisfaction from seeing a deserving charity benefit from my sweat and tears.
Will I do it again? Yes, there are lots of other charities that support cancer victims and I'll probably choose to support one in the future. Just not Cancer Research, their admin staff are a bunch of twats.
NE
** I did get the PB
Shows how your thinking can change.....
An aquaintances mortality has now got me reconsidering
I have raised money for charity and found people can be very generous, but one or two were very hostile even though I hadn't asked them to donate. Not all of the charities treat their runners a just numbers.
Someone I know ran for B:eat (eating disorders charity) last year, and the B:eat web site had a profile on the runners which to me showed that they really were grateful. Given how awful and unglamorous eating disorders are, it was genuinely moving to see that these people had managed to train and run a maratho when their families were under such strain.
I got very cross watching the London Marathon, where most of the commentary emphasis was on how much people had raised for charity, when most of them could only take part by raising large amounts of sponsorship.
Fun runs for local charities are good as any amount you raise, even if it is just the entry fee, helps.
Otherwise, i suggest creating a justgiving page and letting people know that should they like to donate something (and lots do) then that's your suggested charity.