A SWINDON team has raised more than £1,000 for children’s leukaemia by racing to Benidorm in a banger modified to look like a tank.

Team SN1 competed in a four-day whacky race against 32 other cars to get to the Spanish resort for the Race to the Sun challenge.

The team of five, dressed in full army gear, also added a water turret to a £300 Kia Sedona capable of shooting jets of water 30 to 40 ft.

Team member Mike O’Neil, from M & B Auto Repairs on Chapel Street, helped to weld an old oil barrel onto the roof which was connected to a water pump and fed by two 25 litre water tanks in the boot.

Team leader Nigel Bushell told the Adver: “It was a pretty shocking car but it went all the way, it did well to get there. There was a lot of banter going on.

“Because we were dressed up as army soldiers, everywhere we stopped the locals wanted photos because the cannon on the top was linked to a water jet and a motor, so kids wanted to go on it and all the locals loved it.”

“The more we got to know the other teams the more of laugh we had and sabotaging each other’s cars. In the morning we got to the car and someone had put dead fish in there so we had to clean it all out.”

“When we got out of the car I said I would never get back in there again.”

The team were raising money for local Leukaemia charity CALM which was close the heart of team mate Ashley Murtough, whose nephew Sebastian Murtough died from Leukaemia aged two and half in 2014.

Richard Crowley, chairman of CALM, told the Adver: “We’re delighted that they’ve done it. It sounds like it was great fun. Because we’re a parent-run voluntary charity, for us it’s really important that locally people get involved and help us with fundraising.”

“Quite often we do have people that we’ve supported families and then they get involved with the work we do. Particularly when it’s done by people that have got connections to our families it’s kind of extra special to us.”

“To have £1,000 donated from what sounded like a really fun adventure from the SN1 team is really valuable for us. Especially when there’s so many great causes in Swindon that people can choose from. If people can have a great time while they’re doing fundraising, then that’s fantastic so I’m all for that.”

The team also managed to win best dressed out of all the other teams competing and are still raising money for the charity through their Justgiving page.