Christie’s 24-hour Seven Summits Challenge

The 25/26th of April saw climbers at MCC taking on the challenge of climbing the height of the Seven Summits (43, 322 meters) in 24 hours, in order to raise money for Christie’s hospital in South Manchester. Enormous heights were climbed, and sales of finger tape rocketed as over 200 climbers took to the ropes, including over 60 hardy souls taking on the full 24 hour challenge.

John Dunne having a chat with Dr Chris Steele with the            A busy scene at the MCC.

Lord Major of Manchester listening on.

Both photos: David Simmonite

The event was officially opened by the Lord Mayor of Manchester, and ITV’s Dr Chris Steele, along with over 70 young climbers from Manchester High School for Girls. Hollyoaks star Stuart Manning also added his effort to the proceedings.

Christie Bear also made an appearance, and even had a climb…. Guess the climber?

Photo: David Simmonite

A fierce competitive spirit quickly took over, leading to some incredible feats of endurance. Anyone fancy trying to beat the current record of 1700m without resting? The target height of 43,322 metres was achieved in an incredible 5 hours, and so further targets were needed to keep the motivation flowing!

The event was now the ’Fourteen 8000-metre peaks Challenge’, giving us a target height of just over 115,000m. Teams climbed throughout the night, spurred on by huge amounts of Gatorade and other sugary goodness, and the target was one again within reach. By 9am, target 2 was in sight. Once again, climbing was proving too easy, and so the original mountains were added back on! We were now aiming for a height of 150406.5m, and everyone was still worryingly awake…

Hollyoaks star Stuart Manning shocked that someone with          James Pearson gives it his all for the event.

a broken leg can still manage to climb.

Both Photos: David Simmonite

By the end of the event, an amazing 161,580.5m had been climbed.

The team climbing the highest consisted of world class climbers John Dunne, Dave Barrans, and James Pearson, who notched up 15,710m between them.

This event was conceived by Molly and Sophie, two 10-year-olds who are regular climbers at MCC. Molly’s mum Carol is a patient at Christie’s and the girls were inspired to come up with an original way to raise money to help the hospital continue its vital work.

The event also included a Silent Auction and Lowest Bid Auction, which raised over £4000 for Christie’s. This event is set to raise much more through sponsorship raised by the teams!

Keep your ear to the ground for next year’s event, which promises to be even bigger!

A full list of team results is available at www.manchesterclimbingcentre.com

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