8 January 2020, Oliver Holman -
In August last year, 10 intrepid medical students from University College London completed the Three Peaks Challenge in 24 hours to raise money for The Urology Foundation. Here TUF Warrior and organiser of this event, Oliver Holman, talks of his experience taking on this fundraising challenge,
As a medical student there are many questions you ask yourself about what you want to do in the future as a doctor , furthermore what can I do now to help me decide and prepare for such a career. I have found the specialty of Urology fascinating, and after meeting a urologist at the Royal Free Hospital and being told about The Urology foundation, I knew I should get involved.
The TUF Warrior programme was an excellent chance for me to get involved in this charity; to build relationships within the field and to develop my skills in leadership, teamwork and organisation. After contacting TUF I became the student representative.
I decided that the National Three Peaks Challenge in 24 hours was a difficult but fun and exciting challenge that could inspire my fellow medical students to sign up to and get involved in the TUF Warrior programme. I then went about putting the word out via social media and had an excellent response, managing to get 10 students to sign up.
Training to be a doctor as well as trying to organise people to climb up mountains naturally brought about some difficulties. We had to work out when we could train for the challenge, as there were varying levels of fitness in the group. I also had to work out when we could do it, and found the only weekend available was the one immediately after our end of year exams, the day after our results! I overcame these issues by creating spreadsheets and WhatsApp groups to organise people and answer their questions. I also had to find two people to drive the 17 seater mini bus, asking family members and friends to help us out which they were more than happy to do.
Then came the fundraising aspect of the challenge , personally I set a goal of raising £500. With the help of friends and family I managed to smash my target and raised over £750. Together as a group we raised over £4,000, which was a stunning effort by all for The Urology Foundation.
During the challenge , we faced cold, rain , darkness , sunshine, sleep deprivation and sitting on a cramped minibus all weekend as well as climbing the the highest mountains in the UK. We covered the distance of a marathon on foot, nevertheless the feeling upon completion on the Sunday was incredible and definitely worth it. I understood what it meant to lead a team in a difficult challenge, how you need everyone in the team to pull in the same direction for the best result. I also learned about cooperation and communication to ensure safety of the team completing all the mountains. Most importantly we built and consolidated friendships and comradery with the end result being a large sum of money being raised for an inspirational charity.
I would highly recommend anyone looking to get involved with TUF. I look forward to future things I will do for the charity.
If you would like to follow in Oliver's footsteps and raise money for The Urology Foundation, please contact fundraising@theurologyfoundation.org
