BBC Radio Sheffield's Football Heaven commentator Adam Oxley aims for rounders world record in £10,000 appeal for Ashgate Hospice - in memory of sporting hero dad

Adam Oxley, who covers Chesterfield FC, Sheffield Wednesday and Sheffield United on Radio Sheffield’s Football Heaven, has organised two bumper challenges in support of Ashgate Hospice which cared for his dad Glen at the end of his life.

The 38-year-old will lead a team of sporting stars for the Guinness World Record from July 29 to 30, drawing inspiration from his dad who was a celebrated rounders player and represented South Yorkshire and England.

The challenge, at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield, will see the same group of 30 players attempt to achieve the longest rounders marathon by playing the game non-stop for 24 hours.

Adam said: “To set a rounders world record would be a perfect way to honour my dad’s remarkable contribution to the game. Rounders was such a huge part of his life so a Guinness World Record in his name would leave a real legacy and write his name in the history books."

He has organised the other challenge for the weekend of July 22 and 23. A 64-mile walk – the age that Glen was when he died – will follow a route between Ashgate Hospice in Chesterfield to Glen’s family home in Eckington.

Friends and family taking part in the walk will pass places where Glen worked, lived, liked to visit and played sport, including Matlock, the Peak District and Sheffield. As well as being a celebrated rounders player Glen was also an established non-league footballer and represented the world’s oldest side Sheffield FC and second oldest Hallam FC.

“It promises to be an action-packed summer,” said Adam, “and I’d love to raise £10,000 for the hospice in total.”

The challenges have been timed to take place around the fourth anniversary of his father’s death. Glen was diagnosed with prostate cancer in March 2018 and died the following year.

Adam, who lives in Halfway, said that the hospice had “made Dad’s final few weeks as comfortable as possible.

“Dad was a fighter and we ended up spending three to four days sleeping overnight with him at the hospice when we were told it was nearly the end.

“When he died our wider family were able to visit and we were all given the time and space we needed thanks to Ashgate. We’ll forever be grateful for everything they did for him.

"The support Ashgate gave my dad and us as a family was incredible and I’m planning to raise some money for them in his memory.

“We had planned to do something in previous years before Covid but then came the birth of my identical twin boys! Sadly, he never got to meet his grandsons Edward and Joseph, who were born 15 months after he died.”Glen had lived in Eckington since his 20s and worked for Sheffield City Council and Derbyshire County Council as a senior administrator and manager.

To make a donation to Adam’s campaign go to www.justgiving.com/page/glen-oxley-6424

If anyone wants to get involved with the walk or the rounders event, they should contact Adam directly, message @GlenOxley6424 on Twitter or visit the ‘Glen’s Ashgate challenge’ page on Facebook.