The Three Peaks Challenge - What's it like?
By
Steve Williams
05 August 2009 10:34
LFTOer Steve Williams and his mates recently took part in the Three Peaks Challenge to raise money for Help For Heroes.
Here he describes the toughest parts of the challenge...
I thought your readers may be interested in my recent experiences of the Three Peaks Challenge
Some of my Metropolitan Police colleagues and I decided to tackle this event in June.
Our jobs require us to be fit but climbing Ben Nevis, Scafell Pike and Snowdon - all within the same 24-hour period – would require something extra in our training.
Our target of £1,500 for Help for Heroes gave us added impetus.
Because we couldn't train together we had to focus on individual training regimes.
We all followed a similar pattern, running, country walks and extensive gym work, concentrating on cardio-vascular and leg-strengthening exercises.
Boy, were we glad of the extra training!
On Scafell Pike, our worst moment, we started the ascent in total darkness after a six-hour journey from Ben Nevis.
The rock strewn summit approach is steep very tough on the legs.
At 3am the body is at its lowest ebb, so the worst part is the mental effort to keep going.
Sometimes the only way to is to withdraw into your mind, ignore physical pain and focus on driving forward. Our sponsorship target provided additional motivation.
We achieved our aim and finished in a total time of 22 hours, 55 minutes. The exhilaration of completing this challenge made the hardships fade into insignificance.
We have now raised over £2,700 for Help for Heroes. If your readers would like to contribute towards our total, click here.