Ella to cycle 65km per day from her home for CF Ireland

A 21-year-old Mayo woman is planning to cycle 65km every day this week in aid of Cystic Fibrosis Ireland from her home in Westport.

Ella Burns, who lives with the condition, had decided to take on the challenge to help raise funds for CF Ireland.

This was supposed to be 65 Roses (so titled because young children with CF when first saying the words sound them like sixty-five roses) Awareness Week throughout Ireland but Covid-19 has meant it has had to be cancelled and all the associated fundraising activities have been cancelled too.

But many young people like Ella have decided not to let the disruption ruin everything and they are going ahead with their own innovative ideas to help raise much needed funds for CF Ireland.

In Ella's case it's also about her own personal challenge after a very difficult ten months living with her CF.

She spent most of the months between September and Christmas in St. Vincent's Hospital, Dublin, as her care team fought to control a particularly nasty infection. It meant that the third year genetics student at UCD had to miss the first semester in college but gradually her infection came under control and she was able to return to college after Christmas.

Normality took a while to return and she had to wait until early March before she was able to finish taking thrice daily antibiotics. In all she spent 163 days on IV antibiotics.

A competitive swimmer since primary school in Westport, Ella had built up a reserve of fitness prior to her health setback and it is this that her team believed helped her deal so well with her infection and allowed her bounce back after finishing her treatment.

But it wasn't just the physical demands of her sport that stood to her as she herself explains: “Swimming allowed me push my body and particularly my lungs to the extremes but it also helped me in so many other ways. It gave me discipline and because swimmers train every day of the week it gave me the resilience to keep on going. I think when things were not going so well in the last number of months that definitely stood to me.

“I would have love to have been able to carry out the challenge in the pool but that's not possible so it has to be done at home and on the bike. I know it will be difficult enough but I'm confident enough that my fitness will get me through it.

“It's important that people like me do what we can when we are able to for the CF association. They do great work for us in terms of advocating and in areas like giving exercise grants to allow people exercise and that is so important for people with CF.”

Ella is indebted to everyone who has already contributed to her campaign. Every cent raised will go directly to the CF Association and as of tonight (Wednesday) the public have contributed over €4,000. That huge sum was raised in less than one day and after initially setting her target at €1,000 she soon had to revise it upwards first to two and then to three and then four thousand euro.

She's also extremely grateful to Anthony Murray and Loraine Mulchrone from the Westport Bike Shop in helping her get up and ready for the challenge. They supplied all the equipment she needs for the week and now all Ella needs to do is to complete the trip which will see her cycle 325km without leaving her home.

If you want to contribute to Ella's daily 65km challenge you can do so by following the link here: https://give.everydayhero.com/ie/daily-65km-for-65-roses-week