Send Isla to the cheerleading world championships

Colin and his friend Tim are undertaking The Buttermere Beast- on 6th April

33km, over 2000m ascent, 14 Peaks, around 15hrs on the fells. This takes in 11 Wainrights so not just a stroll.

Raising money for our daughter Isla who is part of Team England Special Abilities Cheerleading Unified Pom Team. This team of athletes from Salford will become the first ever England Special Abilities Unified Pom Team to represent England at the International Cheerleading Union World Championships in April this year. The team includes athletes with disabilities such as autism, ADHD, Down’s syndrome and other chromosomal disorders, but these disabilities certainly do not get in their way.

Isla herself has partial agenesis of the corpus Callosum meaning that she doesn’t have all the pathways connecting each side of her brain. This means it’s difficult for her to make links.

It will be a huge achievement for them. Going to the world championships will be a life changing experience for the athletes. To get there is a big challenge. The team are unfunded. They are keeping costs as low as they can, but it’s still a significant commitment. They are doing this after a long campaign by their coach, Gina Stafford who has herself represented England in cheerleading World Championships. Gina hopes that doing this can help people understand and remove barriers that are artificially placed in front of people or athletes with additional needs and provide experiences for neuro-diverse athletes that their neurotypical peers could be accessing at this stage of their life. I’m hoping we can help the group with the costs of travel and accommodation.

You can watch an interview about the team on Sky and can find out more about the team on Instagram

To quote Gina any help you can give ‘all contributes to one thing … making dreams come true whilst changing history!’