2017 leaver and former Deputy Head of College, Henry Blois-Brooke, completed a gruelling 50 mile (84km) ultra-marathon along the Thames Path from Oxford to Henley on Monday 11 September.
Henry, completing the distance in 8 hours 13 minutes, has been raising money in aid of Prostate Cancer and Help for Heroes. He was keen to support Help for Heroes as he is looking to join the Marines in the future.
What started out as a group challenge with peers Oli Walker and Matt Godwin, planned for December last year, the run was delayed until after Henry's rowing commitments in the summer; with Matt now in employment and Oli injured, this left Henry to complete the challenge largely by himself. However, two fellow 1st VIII rowers supported Henry along the way; Seb Newman ran 10km with Henry earlier on the route, and Christian Hjortland-Marks joined Henry for the final Shiplake to Henley leg. Henry managed to fit the run in before he starts at Oxford Brookes University next week, where he will study Sports Coaching and PE.
Speaking to Henry 24 hours after the run he said: ‘I was looking forward to the challenge and being a competitive rower I’m pretty fit so thought that it would probably be quite straightforward. However it was the toughest eight hours of my life! I set off easily and the first 10 miles were really good; as I approached the Beetle and Wedge at Moulsford (after 27 miles) it was getting really tough and continued to get harder – I had to dig deep and mentally break down the run into smaller chunks, it was incredibly hard and I was just focussing on reaching the next checkpoint – with only 5 checkpoints over the whole run at 10 mile intervals, they seemed to be getting further and further away!’
‘I’m incredibly pleased to have finished, but had no idea how painful it was going to be – 24 hours later, my legs have completely seized up and walking is proving difficult but I’m already thinking about my next challenge which may be some other form of ultra marathon but as I’m starting university next week it will have to wait for now!’
To donate to Henry please go to http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/team/ShiplakeBoys90K