Straight to the Bar

All Things Strength

HELPING YOU GET STRONGER SINCE 2004

It’s a Charity Thing.

In the Goals & Goal Setting gymchat we discussed our goals for the year; as well as various ways to set them. A fascinating conversation.
Although I didn’t go into detail into the ones that fall outside the bounds of ‘fitness & health‘, one of my own is to increase awareness of and support for various charities. One of these was noted in the post The Power of Transformation – Kiva. Of course, we’ve mentioned several other charities over the years. The full list :
  • Athletes for a Cure : holds a number of events in order to raise money for research into Prostate Cancer.
  • Back On My Feet : using running to tackle complex issues such as homelessness.
  • Books 4 Tanzania : helping to re-distribute the books you’re no longer using.
  • The Fitness4Charity group : collecting your second-hand equipment (mainly the larger items). If you’re upgrading the home gym, give them a call.
  • Cancer Research UK, the Salvation Army : similar idea to Fitness4Charity. Especially for slightly smaller items.
  • Hands Across the Water : same idea as Shoe 4 Africa, just with books. Fantastic.
  • Heavy Athletics : it was Kat that first pointed me to Heavy Athletics, a group designed to change lives ‘one rep at a time‘.
  • Gazelle : recycling your old gadgets. If you’re like me, and always seem to have an mp3 player attached to you when you train, take a look at Gazelle. They’ll buy these older devices from you, taking away a lot of the ‘will I, won’t I‘ debate each time a new iPod comes out. Great company.
  • Kiva : microfinance for entrepreneurs (particularly the health- & fitness-related businesses
  • The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS) : research into a range of blood cancers.
  • Rosetta@home : makes use of your computer’s power (whenever you’re not using it, that is) to help with various types of medical research. These assist everything from cancer treatments to Alzheimer’s.
  • Shoe 4 Africa : if you enjoy an occasional run, chances are that you have several pairs of shoes that get infrequent use at best. Rather than let them sit and gather dust, consider giving them to an organisation like Shoe 4 Africa ; where they’ll be cleaned up, sorted, and given to runners in the poorer parts of the world.
  • Soles 4 Souls : same idea as Shoe 4 Africa. Your old running shoes are donated to those who need them most.
  • Summit For Someone : is climbing your thing? Definitely.
  • SportsAid : provides financial assistance to young athletes (12-18yo) – both disabled and able-bodied – to enable them to compete at events around the UK.
  • Sport Relief : part of the Comic Relief charity, Sport Relief holds a number of sporting and fitness-related activities across the UK.
  • Blind Cafe : Personal Trainer Bill Kociaba offers online group training to blind clients via this site. For more information on what he does – and how – check out Gymchat 250 – Serious Training for Ignored Populations. Fascinating discussion.
NB : Many of these groups are on Twitter. You’ll find the full list here : https://twitter.com/scottbird/lists/giving And if there are any you’d like to see added, just send me a tweet. Of course, there are also many, many fitness-related fundraising events on the calendar each year. These offer a unique way to donate money, as typically you sponsor one of the athletes or teams involved. Examples include the MS Mud Run, the OXFAM Trailwalker and the Alzheimer’s Society Himalayan Trek. And if you’d like to help support Straight to the Bar itself – thank you! – you can do that here :
Cheers. It really is appreciated.