'A cause close to our hearts'- Preston dad raises hundreds for Baby Beat with Tour de France inspired cycle
“That whole return leg until we reached Longridge was really tough but I wanted to do something to support Baby Beat”
A father from Preston has raised hundreds of pounds for a charity that supported him and his wife through several heartbreaking miscarriages.
Preston dad Rob Clay has raised £450 for Baby Beat through completing his own 106.2 mile “Stage o’ t’Tour” cycle for the mums and babies’ charity.
Rob, a keen cyclist who works as a senior technician at Preston’s BMW garage, took his inspiration from 2014’s Tour de France, which had its opening stage winding around the valleys of North Yorkshire as the race peloton cycled from Leeds to Harrogate, climbing 8,500ft.
Rob decided to emulate the stage’s climbs and difficulty but to bring the route closer to home so he could start and finish in Preston.
Explaining why he wanted to raise funds for Baby Beat, Rob, who shares a two-year-old daughter with his wife Katy, said: “Katy and I struggled to have children and went through a lot of heartache with repeat miscarriages. We’d both like to thank everyone who has supported our Baby Beat fundraising.”
He and pal Ian Harcourt, of Crewe, set out at 7 am last Saturday to pedal to Lancaster, Kendal and Kirkby Lonsdale before heading back through the Forest of Bowland, summiting Jeffrey Hill ahead of a final leg from Longridge to home.
Rob said: “It was about 8-15 pm when we got back.
“We had some fuel stops and rest breaks but spent over nine and a half hours actually in the saddle. We had 12 climbs in total, the steepest of which was Jeffrey Hill. That whole return leg until we reached Longridge was really tough but I wanted to do something to support Baby Beat, which is a cause close to mine and my wife Katy’s hearts.”
Lucy Clark, of Baby Beat, which funds bereavement services to help families who lose their babies to miscarriage, stillbirth or shortly after birth, said: “Congratulations to Rob and Ian for completing such a hard route. We are very grateful to everyone who backed them with donations.”
Rob’s online fundraising page is still accepting donations at https://www.justgiving.com/page/rob-stage-o-tour
As well as bereavement services, Baby Beat, which is part of the Lancashire Teaching Hospitals Charity family, funds specialist equipment, other patient services and comforts, clinical care, local research and training to benefit mums and newborns from the Preston and Chorley area, who use the Royal Preston Hospital’s Sharoe Green Maternity Unit for their maternity care and delivery.
The charity also supports Lancashire and South Cumbria’s specialist Neo Natal Intensive Care Unit (NICU), which is within the Sharoe Green Maternity Unit.
NICU looks after between 400-450 of the most premature and poorly babies from across the two counties and their families annually.
For further information on Baby Beat’s work and how to support the charity, visit www.babybeat.org.uk