Sam’s mum Leslye recently wrote about the amazing challenges that Sam had been doing to raise money for charity. Now, he was been asked to carry the Queen’s Baton in the Commonwealth Games baton relay and has also been nominated for the Pride of Swindon awards. Leslye and Sam wanted to update you all on an incredible few months.
As many of you may know, our amazing son Sam started an incredible journey on his 30th birthday last June by completing 21 personal challenges. These included the fastest sit down zip wire in the world, flying a plane, falconry, driving a steam train jet skiing and training with his beloved Swindon Town first team. Our aim was to raise funds for charity and to also spread positive Down’s syndrome awareness by changing perceptions.
We aimed to raise £2,100 but incredibly raised over three times that amount with the help of friends, family and local businesses. We finished his challenges to coincide with World Down Syndrome Day 2022 and thought it was time to take a break after a very busy 7 months.
Little did we realise!
Sam as part of the promotional picture for the Queen’s Baton Relay
In early April we received a letter saying that Sam had been recognised for his inspirational story and was chosen to be one of the Queen’s baton relay team for the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham. Not only that, they wanted him to be one of the nine ‘faces’ to launch the advertising around the baton relay and the games. I must admit this was difficult for Sam to understand but we showed him videos and he soon understood that he has to ‘run fast for Queen‘ as he likes to tell people. We spent a lovely night in Birmingham and had to be at Alexander Stadium at 7am for photoshoots and interviews. Sam was also chosen to be interviewed live on Good Morning Britain. It was an exhausting but amazing day.
A few days later we were informed that Sam had also been nominated for a Pride of Swindon Award . On 21 April we attended the awards along with Swindon’s dignitaries and many other amazing local people to receive his award. Sam cried as they introduced him and the story of his journey. His pride was clear to see to everybody.
Sam receives his Pride of Swindon Award
Again we thought that it was time to relax. But again, we were wrong!
Since then Sam has been interviewed by local papers and magazines, he has been on both ITV and BBC news and local radio, with his story then voted for by listeners to go out nationally.
All Sam’s family and friends are exceptionally proud of Sam and all he has achieved.
The fundraising amount was brilliant but the positive awareness has been absolutely amazing. Sam has had over 250,000 likes and 60,000 lovely comments from 26 countries and even an offer to do another 21 Challenges abroad.