The scenery might have been pretty, but that’s about where the pleasure stopped as Mark Nugent tackled the Lakes District Commando Challenge earlier this month.
The branch manager of interior building products distributor CCF in Liverpool completed an endurance course modelled on the training of a Royal Marine.
It was “the hardest physical endurance I have felt so far in my life”, said Nugent.
He undertook a total of 10 miles of canoe rowing, 12.5 miles of cycling and a 6-mile mountain climb to finish the lung-busting challenge in just over 10 hours.
In the process, he raised funds for the Happy Days Children’s Charity, which provides outings for disadvantaged young people in Liverpool.
Part way through the challenge, after a difficult canoe row into headwinds across Ullswater, and a hairy climb up Striding Edge, near the summit of Helvellyn, Nugent said “there was a flood of emotion as the achievement hit home”. And that was with a 15-mile cycle and 3-mile row to go.
He urges readers to donate to Happy Days by visiting: www.justgiving.com/commandomark
rebecca.kent@estatesgazette.com
