with their dogs Brandy and Meg. PHOTO: Willie Urquhart/WHFP
Thirty teams of exercise enthusiasts from across Skye and beyond have raised close to £1,000 for two charities as part of a new challenge.
Skye’s the Limit 2 began on Friday 15th and by Tuesday this week it had raised £960.
The charity challenge has tasked people to clock as many hours of exercise as they can as teams between January 15th and February 14th while raising money for Skye Cancer Care and Skye and Lochalsh Citizens Advice Bureau.
One of the teams involved in this year’s fundraising efforts is the Hiker Bikers, led by team captain Tim Moore.
The team is made up of Tim and his wife, Christine, along with their friends Ronald and Catriona MacDonald.
Tim and Christine have been married for 46 years and have lived on Skye for 33 years.
They are now both retired having run their own business, Skye Linen Services, which they built up from scratch.
Over the past 30 years, Tim and Christine have been involved with countless charities and societies on the island, Tim served as an auxiliary coastguard in Portree for 15 years, while Christine was a founder member of the committee for the Portree Lifeboat guild.
Christine now helps out at Crossroads Care, while they were both heavily involved in coordinating and distributing food deliveries during the first lockdown as part of the Skye Community Response effort.
While the two couples can’t take on the challenge together in person due to Covid restrictions, they have managed to work as a team and incorporate their exercise goals into their daily routines, as Tim explained to the Free Press.
He said: “Our goals for this challenge are for Chris and I, with Brandy and Meg [their dogs], to walk 12-14 hours each week, so about 20-25 miles, and when we can about two to three hours cycling a week – not with Brandy and Meg, who stay at home since they cannot pedal!
“Catriona and Ronald will have no doubt more time planned for cycling than we can manage, though.”
As captain, Tim has the responsibility of tallying up what Ronald and Catriona have accomplished and add that to his and Christine’s total to determine what the team has achieved for the week.
He added: “Our goals are simply to maintain fitness, help the cause, have fun, get soaked – well we get soaked most days anyway!”
Event organiser Sam Crowe said she was impressed by the response to the second edition of the Skye’s the Limit challenge.
She said: “Skye’s the Limit 2 is aimed at raising money for local charities and getting the folk of Skye fit, and it has got off to a brilliant start.
“We have 30 teams signed up and on Friday they all started exercising. Their aim is to see how much time their team can put in over the month.
“Well done to the teams for raising so much already.
“We have had lots of positive feedback from the teams involved.”
She added: “The challenge is getting folk out and about in all weathers and helping to raise some much needed money for valuable local charities. We get our first set of results from the teams this Friday, so looking forward to seeing what they have achieved.”
For more information you can visit: facebook.com/skyesthelimitchallenge