Fundraiser and father of four, Richard Farquhar (53), will arrive at Lingfield Park Racecourse tomorrow having walked all the way from Plumpton Racecourse on the next stage of his epic fundraising venture, Walking The Courses.
Farquhar is aiming to raise £1.4million for Racing Welfare and Pancreatic Cancer UK by walking around the country connecting all sixty racecourses in mainland Britain in a chain, in doing so covering around 3,000 miles on foot.
He has already visited Plumpton and to complete the Lingfield leg of the journey in style, Farquhar will be walking around the Lingfield course itself at 1pm tomorrow. He is hoping to be accompanied by various familiar faces from the racing world and several supporters of the campaign.
Racegoers are also encouraged to partake in the lap of the track and should get in contact with www.walkingthecourses.com if they wish to do so.
Farquhar is now over a quarter of the way through his racecourse appearances, having visited 15 of the 60 already. He is, however, still less than a quarter of the way through the mileage that he started walking in March, having covered around 680 of the 3,000 miles.
By April 2016, upon arrival back at Newmarket having completed all 58 racecourse-to-racecourse walks, he hopes to be nearing his ambitious target of £1.4million, having involved people from all across the UK in his challenge and partnered with some of the biggestcorporates within the racing industry.
So far, Walking The Courses has been seen on Channel 4 Racing, Sky’s At The Races, Racing UK and BBC World’s Service’s coverage of the Grand
National, which was won by Walking The Courses’ Official equine ambassador, Many Clouds.
The Plumpton to Lingfield leg of Farquhar’s journey came shortly after his fundraising total soared past £100,000. This first major milestone has put the Walking The Courses team in particularly high spirits as they move on from Sussex to Surrey. The exit bucket collection at Lingfield Park Racecourse will be in aid of Walking The Courses and racegoers are encouraged to give generously for the campaign’s two extremely worthy but crucially underfunded beneficiaries.
Executive Director at Lingfield Park Resort, Andrew Perkins, said: “Hats off to Richard for undertaking this epic challenge. This is a mammoth fundraising effort and Lingfield Parkwishes him all the best. These are two fabulous charities and we will do our best to help the Walking The Courses team on the day.”