Why Am I doing This

Many people said to me after the tragic death of my daughter Ellie that I should not make any impromptu, rash decisions for a good while.

Well that lasted about 5 weeks when an advert popped up in my browser about The Race of Your Life. I was at the time half way through filling out an application for Channel 4 reality TV series The Island with Bear Grylls.

Ellie and I often watched this series together and she told me to sign up many times as I was shouting at the weak, lazy, incompetent competitors through the television, but bringing up your daughter and knowing the coming of age would soon have her take her solo steps in life, you don’t want to leave them for months on end so I never did.

As soon as I saw the Clipper Race advert, I pressed the button and took myself straight to the application screen. As a young man I always wanted to climb Everest but over the years it became apparent that it was environmentally harmful and far too commercial. NOT FOR ME THEN!

I trawled the application form waiting for the stumbling block, Too Old, Too Fat, Too Unhealthy but it was not there. This was an extreme adventure to top them all!

I needed to reinvent my entire life after losing Ellie and I believed this would give me the springboard to do just that plus, Ellie would be very proud of me if I make all 40,000 nautical miles.

The mouse was clicked and my application was in. My first interview was by telephone on the side of a French Autoroute as I was traveling back from the UK to Les Gets. The woman from Clipper was delightful and convinced me I was doing the right thing, that she thought I had what it took to be a crew member.

By the time I had my second interview with Clipper I was ready to throw the towel in. The interviewee a previous crew member told me that she had done the race some 10 years ago and managed to raise £20,000 to do it with out having a cause anywhere like mine.

To raise awareness of mental health in young kids. To help young athletes reach their potential and dreams. She said “I know of Ellie’s story, you must do it and that people from all over the world would love to help you do it, for you and for the foundation. Clipper Ventures will help promote the Foundation and all it does.”

She went on to say that if I didn’t do it The Foundation would miss out on an amazing world-wide publicity opportunity with a huge existing captive audience of a wealthy sporting community.

Hence, I’m now asking for your support.

Clipper Ventures, Race of Your Life have officially granted me a Crew allocation to circumnavigate the world, this costs a staggering £49,500 including kit and four weeks training. The race itself sets off from the UK at the end of August 2019 and will take some 11 months to complete, crossing 6 oceans, 8 Legs, 14 individual races, 11 70-foot yachts racing in some of the hashish conditions nature can throw at you, all this and I have never sailed before.  That’s not strictly true as a scout I went sailing for a week from Portsmouth, lasted 5 hours before the skipper scuttled us on a reef off Bournemouth and had to be rescued by the RNLI another story.

Thank you in advance for your support

Tony Soutter

The Ellie Soutter Foundation and what we do.

Following the tragic death of Team GB athlete Ellie Soutter on her 18th birthday, her family has committed to continue fundraising in Ellie’s memory.

We want to support promising winter sports athletes, both financially and personally, to help them fulfil their potential and achieve their dreams. Traditionally, winter sports are regarded as elitist pursuits, reserved for the wealthy.                                                                                     Therefore the pressures on young talented athletes from less privileged backgrounds are immense. Coming from a family without the significant wealth required to reach her full potential, Ellie battled with the pressures of funding and performance. Ultimately they became too much for her and she took her own life in July 2018.

The Ellie Soutter Foundation hopes to provide a safety net for inspiring talent, just like Ellie. As much as possible, we seek to alleviate these pressures so athletes can focus on their performance without constant financial worry. We hope to promote social mobility by making winter sports more accessible to those athletes from less wealthy backgrounds.

We’ll seek to assist young people in developing the skills they need to deal with the pressure and stress of everyday life.

We’ll provide assistance to those for whom the challenges of performance may have caused or be causing mental health issues.   The purpose of the Foundation is to identify and provide support for young people, who have a demonstrable talent for winter sports and would otherwise be unable to maximise their potential because of a lack of financial resources. This will be achieved by providing grants for equipment, training, travel, competing and accommodation.

The grants will be restricted to those individuals who can demonstrate that their own family circumstances dictate that the opportunity to develop their talent would be denied to them, without this financial support.

For more information and to follow Tony's progress, head to www.theelliesoutter.foundation