IELTS LISTENING
Run-well Charity
Lecturer :
I’m very pleased to have this opportunity to tell you something about the run-well charity on the work we do. I’ll give a brief overview of what we do and I hope you may be able to help on. Then there’ll be time for questions at the end.
Run-wells founder Mike Hughes took up long-distance running in 1987 raising money by doing sponsored half marathons and in Q11 1992 established the charity as we know it today.
Attempt full listening test…
By 1997 the runs were being filmed by local TV and today they appear on national TV every year. All the funds collected by run- well go to the Q12 hospital with the idea that those fit enough to run use their energy to assist the provision of people who are unwell for whatever reason.
Now, if you want to race and I assume that’s why many of you are here. Let me explain a couple of the basics. Races are run by teams, so you need to form and register a team. What you wear to run in is up to you and I know some teams come up with some pretty wacky ideas. We have a standard design for your Q13 numbers, which we ask you to reproduce, so you make them up. According to that standard. We don’t want to spend valuable funds on doing that ourselves.
Now the race is run as a kind of relay. So while you won’t actually compete side by side, we do recommend that you Q14 train as a group. This helps to optimize performance on build team spirit. It will also give you a fair idea of how much you need to eat and drink over the race distance. This is clearly essential for an effective performance, so please make sure you come along to the race with sufficient Q15 food and drink.
Again, we don’t spend money on providing that but you do need to keep yourself going for the 20-kilometer course. The course goes through the town, then out through High Field Park, concluding in the Q16 main square where the applauding Spectators will be ready to greet you. There are many different prizes, including oldest runner, youngest runner, team with the most sponsorship, team with the best costume that one’s donated by Zoom fashions. The mayor will introduce the Q17 minister for health, who will hand over each prize to the winners, and then the hospital president will make a short speech.
Okay, that’s the big race. But I know there are many people who don’t feel they are up to running a 20-kilometer race, but who would nevertheless like to raise money for run-well. Over the years, we’ve had experience of many ways of trying to collect money, some very successful others less so.
Now, Of course, 20 kilometers is too far for Children to run, but there was a sponsored Q18 swimming event at the local school last year and that did very well. People have also tried to organize food-based events such as selling, homemade cakes, and bread, and so at the market and there was a large picnic arranged in four bright gardens. Although these events failed to justify the efforts put into them, though I’m sure they were very tasty.
These days so many people are out of work all day that going from house to house to collect money isn’t very effective. But it is possible to raise useful funds by selling small promotional items such as Q19 badges with the run well motif on them. We’re currently checking to see if postcards, perhaps showing the races winners each year, might also be a good idea or not. We do appreciate the efforts that have gone into selling second-hand goods, but to be honest, the returns have not been very high on this.
One very dedicated group organized a team Q20 quiz recently, which went very well on. It would be good to see more such activities. There’s also been talk of a concert, but we’ll have to see how plans for that progress. Now, Are there any questions at this stage…