A FAMILY of five from great Sankey are attempting to cycle the distance of Warrington to Malaysia – all from their own front room.

The Dean’s are attempting to raise money for the Healing Little Hearts charity, which sends specialist doctors to the developing world to perform free surgery for children born with Congenital Heart Disease.

Sarah, James, Chloe, Emma-Jane, and Alfie are all getting on an exercise bike and clocking up the miles – with the final destination somewhere in the region of 4,600 miles.

Mum Sarah said: “We were talking about Healing Little Hearts, and about the phenomenal work they do. Then we thought, ‘why don’t we do a fundraiser?’

“Our Alfie said that [the charity] have had to cancel one of their camps in Malaysia because of the coronavirus – so why don’t we raise some money so that when they go back there, we can help pay for anything that the charity would need for that camp.”

So far, they have covered more than 200 miles in the opening few days, with Sarah adding: “We’re just having so much fun as a family. We’ve got little challenges going on, and if you lose the challenge there’s a family forfeit – you could get pied.

“We play ‘question time’, and if you get a question wrong then silly string could explode in your face.

“We’re just trying to have as much fun as we can and raise as much as we possibly can.”

Congenital Heart Disease is a problem with the structure of the heart, which is present at birth, and can result in the abnormal formation of the heart’s valves, defects (holes) in the heart – and occasionally an almost complete absence of one side of the heart.

The disease can severely affect sufferer’s quality of life, or in some cases be fatal.

Sadly for the Dean family, they lost a baby to the illness 11 years ago, which is one reason why they support the work of Healing Little Hearts.

Barbara Gibbs from the charity commented: “This virtual ride is of vital importance to the charity because all of the staff who are associated with a visit to the poorer parts of the world give their time (and their holidays) for free.

“Children with congenital heart disease are then treated free of charge by our fantastic volunteers but there are costs associated with air travel etc and these come from the charity. The need to continually raise funds is therefore crucial.

“When the COVID-19 pandemic is over, we aim to get back to visiting around 24 hospitals per year, operating on as many 12 children in a week to give them a better life. Some of the children can barely walk when they do get to the hospital and so far, we have saved more than 2000 children’s lives. Each trip on average costs around £6,000 – so every penny is precious.”

If you would like to make a donation, you can here: https://www.totalgiving.co.uk/mypage/ridetomalaysia