What is the 2.6 Challenge?

Sunday 26 April was the scheduled date for the 2020 Virgin Money London Marathon, the 40th edition of the world's greatest marathon. It is a huge event in the charity fundraising calendar. Thousands of fundraising events across the UK have been cancelled due to Covid-19, with a devastating impact on charity income that means many charities are facing closure.

In response, the organisers of the biggest mass-participation sports events across the country have come together to create a new campaign to raise vital funds to help save the UK's charities. The campaign, The 2.6 Challenge, will launch on Sunday 26 April, which should have been the date of the 40th edition of the London Marathon.

This is a challenge for all ages and abilities. All you need to do is think of an activity based around the numbers 26 or 2.6 that suits your skills and complete it on or after Sunday 26 April. This could be something as simple as pledging to run 2.6 miles as your daily exercise to doing 26 minutes of yoga or juggling for 26 minutes (or maybe just 2.6 minutes) non-stop.

Who are The Change Foundation?

The Change Foundation is an award-winning charity who uses sport to change the lives of marginalised young people. We deliver targeted long-term interventions for the most vulnerable young people in our communities. Through Coach Mentors with lived experience we provide regular sport, personalised mentoring and work-related opportunities.

Being a sports charity, Covid-19 has had an obvious and direct impact on our engagement with the vulnerable young people we work with. However, our brilliant Coach Mentors have adapted their approach and we are continuing to support our young people on a daily basis, through online mentoring and sports related workshops, plus regular check-ups on the phone. We continue to create new ways to keep our young people engaged to ensure we avoid the following:

- Increased anxiety, frustration and paranoia

- Further isolation and loneliness

- Additional time spent on social media affecting their mental state as emotions are even more exposed

- Heightened levels of boredom which lead to the breaking of Covid-19 isolation rules by hanging around on the streets

- Higher risk of depression and self-harm

For these reasons, we have developed a programme of online sport at home with a timetable including: TikTok dance challenges, fitness circuits, sports challenges and the creation of a whole raft of Esports for our young people to compete in. We are also offering virtual learning courses and we continue to provide interview preparation support and CV development through a team of Business Mentors.

Across our programmes we continue to support our young people through:

- Providing a new platform for young people to connect and compete, whilst continuing to instil the values of sport.

- Providing routine to plan their time, alleviate boredom and frustration whilst having something to look forward to.

- Providing opportunities to work as a team and individually to demonstrate the learning of transferable skills.

- Providing an incentive for marginalised groups to stay engaged.

- Providing the opportunity for young Londoners across the city to connect, giving them the chance to make new friends and connections and to feel less lonely.

- Providing a platform to engage young people in something positive during social isolation.

- Providing a positive memory of this time, so that post isolation, we can continue to support them as they fulfil their potential

Our target:

We are aiming to raise £26,000 in the next 26 days.

Contact:

If you would like to know more about how we are tackling programmes please contact:

Henry Glynn, Head of Programmes - henryglynn@changefdn.org.uk

If you would like to know more about taking on a challenge please contact:

Alex Bassan, Head of Business Development - alexbassan@changefdn.org.uk

or visit www.thechangefoundation.org.uk for more information about the charity.