Christie finance team, Christie fundraisers

The finance team at The Christie first started fundraising for The Christie charity in memory of former Christie director of finance Joanne Fitzpatrick. Joanne worked at The Christie for almost 30 years but sadly died of breast cancer in January 2022 after years of treatment.

To honour Joanne and celebrate her incredible contribution to The Christie, the finance team who worked with her decided to take on a range of fundraising activities throughout 2022. These included charity runs, bake sales and zip wire challenges.

One group from the finance department also decided to tackle the Born Survivor obstacle challenge on 17 September 2022. Located in the Ribble Valley, the 10km route is designed by Royal Marines Commandos and certainly isn’t for the faint-hearted.

The Christie Born Survivor team was made up of Ellie Berryman, Tony Berryman, David Pearson, Richard Postill, Sarah Chappell, Bren Chappell, John Archer, and Marc Foxall. Knowing it would be a physical challenge, the team all set about hitting the gym beforehand to make sure they were in peak condition.

On the day of the Born Survivor event itself, the team were all nervous but had worked hard to get into the right mindset. They had to face a gruelling 30 obstacles, including jumping over fire into a plunge pool and facing a 150ft drop on the torpedo slide. The team had to deal with a lot of mud and water, and said they were really pushed to their limits.

“Together, we were the absolute dream team, we encouraged each other and at times literally dragged each other round – we couldn’t have got through it alone.
“We all finished together tired, wet and muddy but were all really proud of ourselves. In fact, we all enjoyed it so much that we are signing up again in 2023 to continue with our fundraising!”

  - Ellie Berryman, Christie finance team

For their fundraising efforts throughout 2022, the finance team had a special target of £10,889 – working out as £1 for every day that Joanne worked at The Christie. For the Born Survivor challenge, they managed to raise an incredible £1,099, smashing their overall fundraising target and helping to make a difference for cancer patients in Joanne’s memory.

Do you want to support The Christie charity? Our ideas generator has lots of inventive and interesting ways you can raise money for The Christie.

Or if you fancy taking on an organised event, check out our events calendar to see what events you can take part in for The Christie.

Any support you can give will help us keep touching patients' lives today, tomorrow and beyond.