More than 100 schoolboys from a Christchurch high school ditched their lids in the fight against cancer.

St Bede's College students swapped their running shoes for clippers as the usual charity run for CanTeen, run every second year by the school, was replaced by a mass head-shave because of Covid-19 alert level 2 restrictions. Read more

When they crossed the finishing line last week each of them had run the equivalent of a half marathon each day for the past five days.

Their 120-kilometre effort raised more than $100,000 for CanTeen, a charity supporting teenagers with cancer.

The 154 St Bede's College pupils were joined by six other students from other Catholic schools.

The boys were split into eight 20-person teams, each running to Christchurch from a different South Island location, including Nelson, Cromwell, Motueka, Haast, Karamea and Mt Cook.

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Source

• Stuff.co.nz
• Image: Facebook

The 20 boys and 5 staff and parents arrived at Haast on Wednesday 26th, and after spending the night at Haast, set off at 7am on the first 100km leg of their 500km run to Christchurch.

The 20 boys are divided into 4 teams of five members, each team having a spread of age groups. Each team runs 25km each day. The average speed is around 11km/hour.

The run generated lots of community support, both from the South Westland parish, and from the wider community. Accommodation varied according to the town. In Haast, the hotel, in Fox Glacier the local school, in Harihari the Canterbury University lodge, and so on. Food was generally supplied and prepared by the local people, who turned up in force to feed the athletes and their support team.

Being South Westland, even whitebait patties and crayfish formed part of some menus!

Friday's run saw two major sets of hills to be negotiated, the Fox hills between Franz Josef and Fox Glaciers, and the Mt. Hercules hills between Whataroa and Harihari. By the end of the day there were sore muscles, blisters and tired bodies.

During these days, other similar teams from St. Bede's are running from other locations in the South Island, each team starting about 500km from Christchurch. They will meet up on Monday afternoon at St. Bede's for the finish.

Only on rare occasions, since the graveyard at St Mary's was closed in 1861, has permission been granted for a burial there. The last was in 1935 although the spreading of ashes of relatives of those interred pre-1861 has been permitted.

Permission was sought for Carrie because "the cathedral had captured her heart" and her "love and cheeky smile" meant the Allens shared her with many, her father said.

Carrie was diagnosed with a rare soft tissue cancer shortly before the family moved to New Plymouth in 2009.

Carrie was a year 8 student at Devon Intermediate and as part of her honours programme organised a concert last month to raise funds for Child Cancer and CanTeen.

After meeting New Zealand singer Dave Dobbyn while receiving treatment at Starship children's hospital this year she put in a call to her "friend" asking him to sing at the concert.

Dobbyn and Carrie performed together to a crowd of more than 500 and raised $8000 for charity at "Carrie's Concert".

Yesterday, Dobbyn sent a message of support from Auckland.

"It's a pure delight to know Carrie," he said. "Her light shines bright and my heart is with the family in grief at her passing."

Mr Allen said his daughter was exhausted, on heavy pain relief and yet completely focused on completing her honours project five weeks ago.

"Her only reservation was over the naming of the concert."

Source

• TaranakiCathedral.org
• Image: Stuff.co.nz