Oxford ten-year-old and dog run 250km to raise money for homelessness

A ten-year-old boy from Oxford is running 250km with his dog, Nanuk, to try and raise £2,000 for Crisis, the national charity for homeless people.

Finley Appleby and Nanuk, a one-year-old Utonagan husky, have been running 5km every day for 50 days to complete the challenge during lockdown.

Finley said: "I want to raise as much money as I can to help people affected by homelessness who I am sure will be finding these times with coronavirus very hard. They will need shelter, food, clothes, medicine and as much support as possible and Nanuk and I want to do what we can to help. We are asking people to give generously and help us reach the 250km running goal to raise awareness and funds for people who are homeless."

Finley’s Dad, Simon Appleby said: "We know that people who are homeless in particular are finding these times incredibly hard right now, and Finley wanted to do something for his preferred charity, Crisis.

“He said he wanted to do a really difficult challenge, so that he could raise a lot of money. And he wanted to do this with his best friend, Nanuk. Given these dark times, it’s fantastic that he wants to find a positive from all of this.”

Richard Lee, Crisis’ Fundraising Director said: “This is an incredible challenge and indeed a lot of running for both Finley and Nanuk! We are very grateful to them both for this immense effort and the funds they are raising. Together, we can protect more people facing homelessness from the worst effects of the outbreak and make sure they are safely housed when it is over.”

The money raised will go towards supporting the year-round services that Crisis provides to help people out of homelessness for good. This includes one-to-one support, education, training and help with housing, employment and health. 

Finley and Nanuk have already raised over £1,490 and you can boost this by sponsoring them here.