Women runs 520 miles on treadmill in 7 days but doesn't get WR as Guinness says her witness doesn't count

Ultrarunning Judge wrote:

ukathleticscoach wrote:

She's claiming a free Ibiza holiday off the back of charity supporters.

If people are stupid enough to sponsor her to run on holiday more fool them?

so you're ok with her exploiting the kindness of well meaning yet naive people and using the sport we love as a vehicle?

Dave Keighley wrote on facebook this:

"Dave Keighley

September 10 at 9:57am ·

This year has been pretty shit. But last night I got to take my 8 year old son to his first concert, something I have wanted to do since he was born. Made even better by the fact it was The We Are Manchester concert. The re opening of the venue after the terror attacks. Dylan loved every minute of it especially Noel Gallagher & The Courteeners. As NG said "Don't look back in anger has become a song of defiance. Last night 15000 sang in defiance even the Cheif was moved.

This concert won't solve my heartache but it's reminded me that music brings people together and gets you away from other things for a period of time. It helps being with the two people who have helped me the most in Dylan & Amy.

So if your not feeling 100% today take some time to whack your favourite album on and take some time out."

I wonder if it was letsrun.com's fault.

nope wrote:

Ultrarunning Judge wrote:

If people are stupid enough to sponsor her to run on holiday more fool them?

so you're ok with her exploiting the kindness of well meaning yet naive people and using the sport we love as a vehicle?

She isn't lying about this one? You can't protect stupid so why try?

Nobody else is doing anything about it, I'm just not pretending to care.

With the lack of any identifiable source of income for Amy apart from her charity, I guess it’s safe to assume that the charity will be paying for her and her support staff (probably her partner) to have a jolly jaunt around the Balearic Islands.

I’m not privy to the funding model used by the 53 Foundation however, this does look very much like an inefficient use of charity funds. I get that she needs to raise the profile of the charity however, surely there must be more cost effective ways of raising the charity profile without the need to fly out to remote Mediterranean islands.

I would love to see a breakdown of the charity accounts showing how much money has been raised how much has actually been used for charitable causes and, how much has gone on administrative expenses / overheads etc.

And you won't get a breakdown because that would expose them. If this was a US charity you could look at their Form 990 and find out how things are broken down.

Do we have any proof that money was donated, or was it just "donated" via press release?

Can we just be very clear. If they have used funds to pay themselves then they will have to behave within the strict Chrity Commission guidelines. These place very strict limits on what services a trustee can be paid for.

In addition the following rules must be met:

Legal requirement: before paying a trustee, you must have regard to the commission’s guidance on paying trustees for services. It explains how you must:

•produce a written agreement between the charity and the trustee (or connected person) being paid

•specify the exact or maximum amount to be paid

•make sure the trustee does not take part in decisions made by the trustee board regarding any aspect of the agreement

•agree the payment is in your charity’s best interests and reasonable for the service provided

•not allow payments or other benefits to half or more than half of your board – the number of trustees receiving any payment or benefit must be in the minority

•make sure your charity’s governing document doesn’t prevent you from paying trustees for services

Clearly with only 3 trustees listed for the organization if Dave and Amy would be in violation of several of these terms if they are taking an income from the charity. They will be due to send accounts and once these have been received and reviewed by the commission then I would expect any untoward payments to be challenged.

But doesn't someone have to report the charity to get it investigated? How would a review be initiated?

I can't decide whether to care about this latest fake run or not, but charity fraud does piss me off. When the truth comes out, it makes people less likely to give to legit charities. I'm not a big fan of charity runners in general but some of them are real and give to great causes. When people like Amy poison the well, it hurts more than just the naive people who believe her BS.

One last thing, I'm glad it has been a shit year for Dave. I can only hope that

a guilty conscience is part of why, and the same for Amy too. They should come clean and things would get much better.

But doesn't someone have to report the charity to get it investigated? How would a review be initiated?

I can't decide whether to care about this latest fake run or not, but charity fraud does piss me off. When the truth comes out, it makes people less likely to give to legit charities. I'm not a big fan of charity runners in general but some of them are real and give to great causes. When people like Amy poison the well, it hurts more than just the naive people who believe her BS.

One last thing, I'm glad it has been a shit year for Dave. I can only hope that

a guilty conscience is part of why, and the same for Amy too. They should come clean and things would get much better.

I don't think it needs to be reported, a charity has to submit its accounts and the commission would look at them. Given it's a first set being submitted I'd suggest that they may do a more in depth look.

On the Dave thing I am not glad. I am pretty sure the reason it has been a shit year is the death of his father. I feel for anybody going through that. Any grief his shitty behaviour has led to I have zero sympathy for but family matters are a different thing.

Ultraboy wrote:

On the Dave thing I am not glad. I am pretty sure the reason it has been a shit year is the death of his father. I feel for anybody going through that. Any grief his shitty behaviour has led to I have zero sympathy for but family matters are a different thing.

Well I didn't know his father died or I wouldn't have said it. I don't pay attention to their personal lives, just saw the fraud story here and figured it might have caused them a moment of introspection. In hindsight I realize that was naive of me.

We thought that Dave had a shit year because people are questioning their charity and the fake treadmill record.

Their charity site says charity formed 2015.

Charity commission says 2016.

http://beta.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-details/?regid=1169380&subid=0

http://the53foundation.co.uk/

This is how easy it is to set up a charity.

There are 160,000 charities in the uk

https://www.gov.uk/setting-up-charity

There are actually about 167,000 registered charities in the UK, or 1 registered charity for every 389 people. And this doesn't include all those charities/foundations/whatever that stay under some income thresholds. I am shocked there is so many of these "charities". Surely most of them cannot be legitimate and are used for some other reason like tax avoidance.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/charity-register-statistics/recent-charity-register-statistics-charity-commission

" The 53 Foundation was founded by Dave Keighley and Amy Hughes in April 2015 and since then the charity has gone from strength to strength.

The 53 Foundation has inspiration at its core and works hard to make active opportunities available to those with disabilities who would otherwise not experience them.

Everyone associated with The 53 Foundation has a passion for helping to create more active opportunities for people with disabilities.

Please get involved. All those who benefit from the funds we raise very much appreciate your support."

I am sure Amy is appreciating her little running trip in the next couple of weeks.

Amy forever wrote:

" The 53 Foundation was founded by Dave Keighley and Amy Hughes in April 2015 and since then the charity has gone from strength to strength.

The 53 Foundation has inspiration at its core and works hard to make active opportunities available to those with disabilities who would otherwise not experience them.

Everyone associated with The 53 Foundation has a passion for helping to create more active opportunities for people with disabilities.

Please get involved. All those who benefit from the funds we raise very much appreciate your support."

I am sure Amy is appreciating her little running trip in the next couple of weeks.

Neither her or Dave have jobs, so must be drawing money from this "charity" claimed as expenses. How else are they funding these holidays and running trips? Their only income is coming from this scam

Funded by the "charity" wrote:

Neither her or Dave have jobs, so must be drawing money from this "charity" claimed as expenses. How else are they funding these holidays and running trips? Their only income is coming from this scam

Only one of them will be drawing a salary, so as not to violate the charter. The other will undoubtedly be collecting a whole raft of benefits off the welfare state (child, housing and job seekers).

I assume she gets paid a reasonable amount for the tv work, the various brands she promotes on social media (Red Bull etc.), her personal trainer clients and so on. Seems to be quite a few young women making an income off brands paying out to instagram/ facebook "influencers."

British Fan wrote:

I assume she gets paid a reasonable amount for the tv work, the various brands she promotes on social media (Red Bull etc.), her personal trainer clients and so on. Seems to be quite a few young women making an income off brands paying out to instagram/ facebook "influencers."

Ey? She isn't famous in the uk! What tv work? Her Facebook doesn't get much interest so she isn't making anything off that.

The naïve sponsors likely just give her gear not hard cash.

She may make money from personal training. Probably did one of those 6 week courses to "qualify".

She aint famous! wrote:

British Fan wrote:

I assume she gets paid a reasonable amount for the tv work, the various brands she promotes on social media (Red Bull etc.), her personal trainer clients and so on. Seems to be quite a few young women making an income off brands paying out to instagram/ facebook "influencers."

Ey? She isn't famous in the uk! What tv work? Her Facebook doesn't get much interest so she isn't making anything off that.

The naïve sponsors likely just give her gear not hard cash.

She may make money from personal training. Probably did one of those 6 week courses to "qualify".

Spot on....the only thing she's 'known' for is claiming to of ran 53 marathons in 53 days and claiming to of ran a WR on a treadmill. Outside of a small group of Instagram followers she's not known at all. I'm UK based and bet if I walked into my running club tonight, asked the members if they'd heard of Amy Hughes that not one single person would say 'Yes'. She's a legend in her own mind...