South Birmingham College gets involved with Top2Toe

Hello. I’m Mike Hopkins,the Principal of South Birmingham College – one of the most successful colleges in the Midlands.

The College and I are supporting local hero ‘Blind Dave’ in his epic challenge of running and cycling from the top to the toe of the country in ten days! In August, Dave will run and cycle, and I will cycle, 1000 miles from John O'Groats to Land's End to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support.

Each day will start with a marathon run of 26.2 miles, then a cycle to the next destination – an overall average of 100 miles a day.  I will be cycling the marathon legs and I will be the front-rider of the Dawes tandem that Dave will do each cycle-leg of the journey on.

So, how did I get involved in this Challenge? Well, I’m a keen cyclist and compete in road races, time trials and cyclocross. Alongside this, the College, our staff and our students have supported Macmillan Cancer for many years.

However, my involvement with the Challenge was in fact 'engineered' by Steve Dourass from Macmillan. I've known Steve for years and he's always involving me and the College in his fundraising ideas. Last year he asked if I'd speak to Dave about the cycling aspect of the challenge and give him some advice, little did I know that the meeting was in fact to persuade me to take part as the front rider for Dave!

I found out later that they'd assumed that I was going to do it before I met with Dave. But, it didn't take much to persuade me and those who know me weren't too surprised!

I am also very pleased that the College is able to provide help and support to Dave’s Challenge in other ways as well. A group of our media students will be coming along on the Challenge to film the highs and lows and create a film of the event, and spread the word of our progress to the media and through social media. It will be great experience for them to put the skills that they have learnt at the College into practice in a real-life setting.

We are also providing college vehicles to transport the support team along the whole journey.
I will keep you updated on our progress here – so stay tuned.

Dave is hoping to raise £100,000 for Macmillan Cancer Support. If you would like to help Dave in realising his goal, please donate by going to his Just Giving page on the right hand side of this blog.