The other night, my boyfriend and I were sat in our living room scrolling through Netflix on our laptop looking for something good to watch. We came across a documentary called Iron Cowboy. The Iron Cowboy is James Lawrence, a man who is attempting to complete 50 Iron Man Challenges in 50 states of America in just 50 days. Just from watching the trailer, we were hooked.
An Iron Man Challenge is essentially a long-distance triathlon race. It consists of a 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile cycling ride and then a full marathon, that’s running a whopping 26.22 miles! The Iron Man Challenge is widely considered one of the most difficult one-day sporting events globally. So let me take you back to the prospect of this documentary… James Lawrence is doing 50 days of this consecutively, as well as travelling to 50 different states in-between!
So why did James take on the impossible? Well, one of the reasons was to raise money for The Jamie Oliver Food Foundation. So here we have a guy who wants to push himself mentally and physically to his absolute max in order to fully challenge himself whilst he aims to raise a million dollars for his chosen charity. But I wasn’t most shocked by the challenge he was taking on, what shocked me most was the negative attitudes of onlookers and critics.
I couldn’t believe the negativity James Lawrence faced on social media during his challenge back in 2015. When I watched the trailer, I had many thoughts going through my mind. I thought “wow, I could never take on a challenge like that. Aiming to raise a million dollars, how ambitious! What an incredible person, going after what he is passionate about whilst encouraging others to support a cause close to his heart”. Well, clearly other people did not have those same thoughts going through their minds.
Sure, the documentary may have wanted to focus on the criticism, it may have been biased, it may have even blown the negativity out of proportion. But sitting there watching it all unfold before my eyes made me angry and it got me asking, why are people so quick to criticise others? Rather than show support for James, his challenge and his chosen charity, the majority of people seemed to enjoy picking holes in everything he did.
James, his wife and his family organised the whole challenge themselves. They even went on the road with him. As far as I could tell, all they were doing was their best, which is hard when you have a family of young children too. Rather than supporting James by liking his posts, leaving positive comments, sharing his story, donating to his chosen charity or joining him on the last 5k of each of his runs, many people on social media took the opportunity to question what he was doing and in a rather negative way.
Social media users accused James and his family of keeping the money they were raising for the Jamie Oliver Foundation for themselves. When the Iron Cowboy was faced with a huge storm, for his and everyone’s safety, he opted to use gym equipment to continue on with his challenge. Some criticised the use of this apparatus as it’s not quite the equivalent of doing the actual sport outside. James also used an IV drip, as many athletes are required to do so after such mammoth challenges. Social media users then accused him of doping. And the list goes on.
As we made our way through the documentary, it seemed every decision James made, someone was there to criticise him. Sure he had a lot of support from fans in person and on social media too, but it wasn’t long before the negativity got to his head and the challenge became that much harder. So these unsupportive and judgemental people who hide behind their online accounts and who also seem to lack empathy make me ask myself “I wonder if they have ever attempted a challenge like this? I wonder if they have been at the forefront of social media backlash? I wonder if they have tried to fundraise millions for charity? I wonder if they ever would do any of these things?”. I ask them to put themselves in his shoes.
I myself back in 2014 found myself in a similar situation. I signed up for a 350-mile cycling challenge in Beijing, China. This was to raise money for Women V Cancer. Having never been on a road bike or cycled more than a few miles, this was a mammoth challenge. I also had to raise over £4,200, however, £1,700 of this money was going to cover the cost of me completing the challenge. It wasn’t long before I myself began to face criticism. I was asked by friends and family why I couldn’t complete the challenge in the UK, why I was asking them to fund my ‘holiday’ and why was I putting myself through this gruelling challenge just to raise some money for charity.
As my mum had also signed up for this cycling challenge, she decided to cover the costs of our trip so that any money we were raising was going to go straight to the charity. I wanted to cover my own costs, however, I wasn’t financially able to at the time. Over 100 other women cycled alongside us on this challenge, and many of them faced the same issues and criticisms too.
So why do we put ourselves through these gruelling challenges to raise money for charity? And why are people so quick to judge us in the process? Well having been both a door to door and telephone fundraiser, I can tell you that it is not easy to encourage people to give up their hard-earned cash, even when it’s for a charity close to their heart. Life just always seems to get in the way and we all have bills to pay, we want to enjoy our money, we enjoy buying things or taking trips away. So maybe we feel the only way to convince people to donate to charity is to put ourselves through pain and hardship. For some people though, this isn’t enough and they are still very doubtful of where that money is going. They don’t trust either you or the charity you are raising money for.
One of the most common questions I got asked when I was a paid fundraiser was “but where does my money actually go?”. People want to know exactly what they are paying for, and I get it, but I also don’t. Many people want charities to spend money producing and distributing monthly magazines so they can see exactly where their monthly donation is going, but wouldn’t they rather have this cost go to saving lives or supporting vital research? The world of fundraising, charities and challenges is clearly a complex place and unfortunately, I don’t have all the answers.
So the next time you see someone taking on a challenge of a lifetime, fundraising for a charity or just trying to be their best and do something good in this crazy and chaotic world, I ask you – how will you react? Everyone needs the love and support of their family, but also from the public and the outside world. I encourage you to follow other people’s journeys, encourage yourself and others to take on new challenges, be inspiring, allow others to inspire you, do something life-changing, be a role model, send out positive messages and don’t be so quick to judge.
What is impossible? Anything is possible, you just have to try.