Fearless staff at Cherrydown Vets in Essex managed to raise a bomb for charity with a sponsored ‘nuclear’ obstacle race.
Cherrydown’s operations support manager Emma Blackman and vets Kim Woods, Amy Andrews and Laura Axten all took part in the daunting Nuclear Races challenge and raised £700 for Dogs on the Street London, which offers free health checks and provisions to the pets of homeless people in the capital.
The four females faced the formidable task of tackling 70 obstacles during the seven-kilometre race at the award-winning Nuclear Races course at Kelvedon Hatch, near Brentwood, getting to the end in just under three-and-a-half hours.
To get to the finish, the quartet had to wade through mud and water and clamber up, under and through some forbidding challenges with names like Blast Wall, Batterram, Cobra Attack, Cage Rage and Death Slide.
Emma said: “It was only when someone sent me a link to the Nuclear Races website that I realised what I’d really volunteered to put myself through.
“I’m a runner and I’ve run 5K and 10k events before and I’m currently training for a marathon but this was something else.
“We were bruised and battered, had mud in places we didn’t think mud could go, faced our fear of heights jumping into lakes, zip lined into water, crawled through mud and dragged each other up on ropes.”
The big consolation is that all the mud, sweat and tears was in aid of a very good cause which is close to the Cherrydown team’s hearts.
Emma added: “DOTS is a terrific charity doing great work with the pets of the homeless. They currently run mobile and static veterinary services in London, Kent, Oxfordshire, Dorset, Bedfordshire and Scotland.
“It’s all run by volunteers which we support at Cherrydown by volunteering ourselves and by donating products.
“It means the homeless can bring their dogs to us for a free health check and for things like vaccinations and treatment for flea control and worms. If it’s anything more serious then we book them into local vets for treatment and DOTS covers the cost.
“We also hand out leads, collars, harnesses and plenty of food to help the dogs stay safe and well-nourished so it’s a very worthwhile project.”
If you’d like to donate to the Cherrydown Team’s fund-raising appeal go to: www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/cherrydownnuclear.