Pub bet over 100m sprint turns into huge fundraising success in Northumberland

The bet started between Bamburgh ward councillor Guy Renner-Thompson and Matthew ‘Chewy’ Logan at The Pack Horse Inn in Ellingham as a way to decide who could beat the other in a race up the road.

It soon became a sponsorship to raise some money for McMillan Cancer Support, which is a close cause to Guy, whose mother is battling cancer.

In just one hour, they raised £700 in cash pledges outside the pub and the pair completed the 100m sprint in full tweed, finishing the race by downing a pint of beer.

Kester Petronelli-Stone put together a GoFundMe page to collect more pledges and filmed the sprint ready to release on his wife’s YouTube channel.

He said: “They're not athletes, but they ran their hearts out up the road and then they had to down a pint of beer when they got to the finish line, which both of them are normally used to, but it was a struggle having just sprinted.

“So far, I think we've raised just over £1,600 and we're putting the race video at the end of a video, hoping that it might get a few more donations coming and hopefully we'll get to £2000.

"We’re a very tight knit bunch in this community. There's a lot of rural country farming and foresting, and all of us are very linked. We always say Northumberland’s the sixth biggest county in the country, but it's the least densely populated, which basically means we all know each other.

"Guy’s a local face and we all know his mum. She's a big part of our lives so it means a lot to all of us. Word spread quickly and the money came in, which was amazing.”

The race is now available to watch on Kester’s wife’s YouTube channel at ‘Nathalie Petronelli-Stone’ as part of their Off The Grid series, and revealed Guy as the winner after downing his pint first following the 100m sprint.

Having raised over £1,500 on their GoFundMe page and £700 in cash donations, they smashed the £2,000 target.

Pledges can still be made on their GoFundMe page here