Tuesday 8th August was go-day! Breakfast fuel-up taken care of, we had a final safety briefing and met other participants before a short bus ride to the foot of Ben Nevis which is the tallest mountain in the UK. The typical time taken to summit and descend Ben Nevis is around 8 hours and we needed to achieve this in 5 hours to be on course for a 24 hour finish time.
30 minutes into this first mountain and the pace was incredibly intense. Fast ascent over rugged terrain. There was no easing into this. The pace was relentless aside from a few recharge breaks to fuel up again. We were blessed with the weather Scotland is famous for, that being sunny skies and not a drop of rain! OK, we got lucky with the weather although as we moved through the cloud level it quickly cooled. As we neared the summit you would not have known it was a balmy 18 degrees Celsius only 100m below you!
We completed Ben Nevis in 4 hours and 44 minutes which was a great start to our challenge!
We then had a 6 hour drive to Scafell Pike in the Lake District in England. To avoid inconsiderate driving or unavoidable roadworks, the challenge recognises a total of 11 hours drive time irrespective of how long it takes you. So the final time for your challenge is 11 hours drive time plus your hike times.
We commenced Scafell Pike around 8pm in which the average summit and decent time is 5 to 6 hours. We climbed at sunset which was something I’ve never experienced before. The summit and descent was in complete darkness and with doing this at a fast pace meant you really had to concentrate at all times.
We completed this mountain in 3 hours 30 minutes thanks to an epic ascent which meant we had a little buffer going into Snowdon which was our final mountain.
Snowdon was a 5 hour drive and we all took advantage of getting some sleep, albeit disturbed before we got a wake up call 1km out to get ready. As we were against the clock, we always travelled ready to climb and we were rewarded with some stunning sunrise scenes in north Wales.
This final mountain was similar in duration to the previous one, with an average time taken of 5-6 hours. I was glad to be in the clouds as we got higher up as we had a fairly significant drop to one side of the rugged path we were climbing and whilst you knew it was there, not being able to see it helped my fear of heights!!
For each of the mountains, the descent was really hard on your knees and feet. At times you really had to run to keep the pace needed and account for the underfoot terrain. Whilst as a team we could have taken out shares in Compeed, none of us ended up with blisters which was a staggering achievement!! Snowdon was completed in another 3 hours and 30 minutes resulting in a total time of 22 hours and 44 minutes. Mission accomplished!
Of the wider group of 25 that completed this experience alongside my team, 7 failed to complete each mountain which reflected the physical and mental exhaustion that it took on you. That said, as with any challenge and experience, I have no doubt that I and those in my team were able to complete it injury free due to the preparation put in during the months leading up to it.
As I shared in previous blogs, I’m raising money for MND research in memory of Doddie Weir. The team and I have been blown away to raise over $13,000 AUD (over 6,500 GBP) for MND Research via the My Name’s Doddie Foundation. Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who donated.
If you would still like to do so, I’d be incredibly grateful. You can do this via this justgiving page. If you can’t donate, hopefully you can still take some time to learn more about MND on his foundation website and spread the word about how we can all do our bit to live in a world free from MND.
This has been an epic chapter in my book of life. Doing this with friends who I have known since childhood, who I’ll most likely not see too often given we live on separate sides of the world, and doing it all to raise awareness and money for MND has left everyone a winner.
#dreambig
James (Jimmy) Matthew
Head All Star
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