Racehorse Sanctuary News

21st March 2007

CHARITY LUNCH

Sunday 18th February saw our first major fund raising event since being granted charitable status, This took place at Fontwell Park Racecourse in West Sussex.
Thanks to the hard work of a first class committee and major input from Beccy Green, Senior Commercial Executive of the racecourse the day went without a single hiccup and everyone had a super time and enjoyed some delicious food.

We kicked off with a champagne reception at 11.30am before sitting down to a super three course lunch at 12noon. One hundred and forty-one people sat down for lunch and after having to put up with me trying to convince them to spend a fortune later in the day were treated to a very interesting and entertaining period when Colin Brown who rode Desert Orchid to 17 of his wins went through the racecard giving his tips for the day.
After the main course the auction took place and an amazing £7,800 was raised from the following fantastic list of donated items: holidays in Spain and Turkey, a bronze sculpture by Belinda Sillars an Alfred Munnings print an antique British Hunting book a tour of Dalham Hall Stud, a box for 25 people at Kempton Park, a weekend for 2 in Bath, a tour of Dorset in an open topped Bentley and a nomination to Silver Patriarch at the National Stud.
Whilst all of this was happening Gaynor, Val (who kindly sponsored the marquee for the stand) and Jenni were busy manning our stand which seemed to be continually busy with the public, selling raffle tickets and generally explaining our work to all those that enquired.

We were extremely lucky to have Totesport sponsor a race in our name and both Dalham Hall Stud and Littleton Stud sponsoring each and every table, also a huge thank you has to go to our organising committee consisting of Colin & Pauline Passmore, Lydia Richards along with her family, Gaynor Renwick, Val Jones, Rosemary Lake and Jane Bottomley who worked day and night making sure that everything fell nicely into place when the time came. I would like to add that having had dealings with various racecourses over the years I have yet to meet a more helpful and enthusiastic team than those at Fontwell Park lead by Beccy Green, without their guidance and advice I think the success of the day would have been a different story altogether.
It was a very long and tiring day but I know that all concerned with the running of this event would have slept very well and content with an exceptional days work completed.
In case I have forgotten to mention anyone who was involved please accept my apologies as there were so many helping on that day and every single person played a very important part. Thank you all for getting us off to such a good start which enabled us to raise a total of £15,084 for the centre.