Binley Business puts in the miles to help local lifesaving charity

The team at TalentTech Recruitment, a specialist Technical and Technology recruitment consultancy, have completed a virtual half marathon to raise vital funds for the Warwickshire and Northamptonshire Air Ambulance (WNAA).

Last year TalentTech announced the lifesaving service as its charity of the year, and fundraising plans were put in place but – due to the coronavirus pandemic – all plans and events were sadly cancelled.

The passionate team wanted to show their continued support and decided to carry over their partnership with the charity into 2021 setting their first fundraising challenge as the Coventry Half Marathon – with an aim to raise £1,500.

“It all started in 2019 when we became established and chose WNAA to be our 2020 charity of the year. We wanted to connect with a local charity that we all felt makes a significant impact to people’s lives in their hour of need,” said John Ahearne, Executive Recruiter and Founder of TalentTech.

“Due to the pandemic all our fundraising plans had to be put on hold, so it wasn’t until November last year when I challenged TalentTech Director Nick Goodwin to run 1km as part of his weight loss programme. Nick completed two miles, so we then decided to enter into the Coventry Half Marathon,” John added.

With restrictions halting the official Coventry Half Marathon, the TalentTech team didn’t let that stop them or their fundraising, and they decided to run their own virtual event.

What started as a team of five, soon became a team of 24 runners as Nick and John began to garner interest from friends around the country, and on the day of the challenge, the team had runners donning the air ambulance yellow in Brighton, Coventry, London, Stourbridge, York, Fylde, Stratford and even Dubai.

The team of runners smashed their initial target and raised over £3,400 for the 24/7 frontline service which delivers the highest level of critical care across the West Midlands and further afield.

“We have now raised a total of £3,441 and it’s still growing – we are delighted to have raised enough for two potentially lifesaving missions,” said John.

Grateful for the team’s brilliant efforts, WNAA Fundraising Executive Lee Bunting said:

“I am thankful to the TalentTech team that, rather than cancel their plans when the event was cancelled, they used their initiative and desire to raise funds for the charity and decided to take on the challenge themselves.

“I’m also grateful to all of those who joined them in this challenge to help bring in extra donations and additional awareness of our charity – a special mention must go to Nick Goodwin whose journey has been inspirational as he ran his first two miles just four months ago, so to then run 13 miles in March, is a huge achievement.

“I really enjoy working with the team at TalentTech and we have already discussed their future challenges, including our Earth, Wind and Fire series!”

To support the brilliant TalentTech team, please visit their JustGiving page here.