Thank you for being an #Oarsome organiser

Hello!

We are so thrilled that you've signed up for The Soma Leo Foundation Row-a-Fun. The Challenge is designed to help your team get fit, have fun doing it, whilst raising some funds for our charity.

This page has been put together to give you everything you need to get started. Please take some time to read through the information as it contains important details to ensure that you get the most out of your participation.

There are a few things you need to do ahead of the Challenge. These include getting everyone involved to watch some videos on safety and rowing technique and completing some forms. We also recommend you nominate a Challenge administrator to act as our day-to-day contact in the run up to, and throughout the Challenge.

We have set up a web page specifically for the participants, which can be accessed here. It contains all of the information they are likely to need.

If you have any questions your Soma Leo contact is Christine Jones. You can email here, or call of her on Tel: 01473 346009.

Now let's get started...

How the Row-a-Fun will work

The premise of the Soma Leo Row-a-Fun is simple. In teams of up to 10 people, row as far as you can during the month of May. Get sponsorship for your #Oarsome Challenge, with a view to raising a minimum of £600 per team.

You will be provided with a rowing machine, the Concept 2 Indoor Rower (Model D), which will be delivered to your office in late April and collected in early June.

Challenges will be set throughout the month, and prizes awarded for exceptional rowing prowess. We'll publish a league table every Monday of the Challenge, so you can see how you're doing compared to other businesses competing across the county.

Once the Row-a-Fun wraps, we'll be celebrating everyone's achievement with a party in Ipswich, and no doubt a few last rowing competitions.

What do do next?

There are a few important things we need you to do before you pick up your 'oars' and get started.

Things to do as soon as possible:

Nominate a Challenge Administrator

This is someone who will liaise with us in the run up to, and throughout the Challenge. Your administrator will be responsible for submitting a weekly update on the distance rowed by your team, set up your fundraising page, and keep your participants involved and motivated. Please contact Christine Jones with contact information on your nominated Challenge Administrator as soon as possible.

Put your team together

You can have up to 10 people in a team. If you decide to include more people in the Challenge, we will send you additional rowing machines for each team. If you do intend to enter more than one team, please let us know, no later than 1 April 2019.

Set up your Virgin Money Giving page

This will be your main portal for your fund-raising activity. Once set up, your team can email (and share via social media) the link to their friends, family and business associates to ask for support via sponsorship. Remember, if you enter a team of 10 people, they only need to raise £60 each to reach the £600 target. You can find details on how do set up the page here.

Things to do during April:

Decide if you'll offer Matched Giving

Will you incentive your team to reach their fundraising goals through Matched Giving? If you will, you can do this in any way that suits you. It may be that if your team hits their target, you add an extra amount into the pot. Or, you may prefer to cover all of the costs and not actually do any fundraising. Whatever your approach, if you offer any type of Matched Giving, let us know by 30 April and we'll invoice you after the event for your contribution.

 

Complete our surveys

The Soma Leo Row-a-Fun is supported by Most Active County, whose goal is to make Suffolk the most activity country in the UK. Adam Baker, County Project Manager comments: "It is clear that efforts made in the workplace, alongside wider strategies to increase physical levels, could help improve people's health significantly and bring business benefits such as reduced sickness, absence, increase loyalty and better staff retention.

"With this in mind, the Most Active County partnership is supporting The Soma Leo Foundation on this Challenge, in order to explore whether an initiative of this nature is effective in encouraging employees to get active or increase their activity levels. To achieve this, we are asking participants to complete two online surveys at the beginning and end of the Challenge, which will allow us to assess its effectiveness."

The surveys, which are quick and easy to complete, are available on the Team Oarsome page, and we ask that you get all of your participants to complete them.