PRESS-UPS, playing musical instruments and dribbling a football were some of the challenges children and adults took on at an awareness day on Saturday.

The family fun day was held by the Cheshire Down’s Syndrome Support Group at the Macdonald Portal Hotel in Tarporley, and attracted 450 people.

Support group trustee Julie Duff, from Davenham, was delighted with the support for the event, held to coincide with the 10th anniversary of World Down Syndrome Day.

“The aim of the event was to raise awareness of Down’s Syndrome and to have a celebration of World Down Syndrome Day,” said Julie.

“We had unprecedented support this year, and it was amazing how many people turned up.”

Julie attended the event the day after representing the UK at the fourth World Down Syndrome Day Conference at the United Nations headquarters in New York.

Julie addressed an audience of 250, the title of her 10-minute talk being ‘The Journey to Empowerment’.

“It was an amazing experience to speak in such an inspiring location,” said Julie, whose eight-year-old son Joshua has Down’s Syndrome.

About 70 per cent of those who came along on Saturday have children with Down’s Syndrome, and adults and children took part in a variety of 21 in three challenges.

March 21 is a special date for the support group, as it represents three copies of chromosome 21, which is unique to people with Down’s Syndrome.

Among the challenges were 210 press-ups in three minutes, 21 skate boarding tricks, playing 21 instruments in three minutes and dribbling a football between 21 cones in three minutes.

There was a Superstars challenge to see how many squats, push-ups and sit-ups people could do in three minutes, and a rock climbing challenge on another day involved scaling three rock faces in 21 minutes.

A golf day was held at the hotel on Friday, schoolchildren wore odd socks and baked cakes to raise money, and Julie completed her own challenge of giving up her three loves, chocolate, biscuits and sweets, for 21 days.

Saturday’s event also featured Bella Beauty and Serendipity, businesses which had been set up by adults with Down’s Syndrome.

“I would like to thank the hotel for its fantastic support, as it gave us the room for free and provided some amazing raffle prizes, and for everyone who came along on the day and helped us to raise awareness and money,” said Julie.

The golf day, family fun day and other events have raised more than £11,000.