On the 11th May I will start a ‘triple Ironman’. That is a 7.2 mile swim, 336 mile cycle and a 78.6 mile run continuously. The photo above is me in quite a lot of pain, quite early on during a double Ironman which my family kindly supported me for- an endurance feat in itself. So logically after finishing that I will attempt the triple. I will likely not stop exercising for about 45 hours other than the odd 10-20 minute break. You can imagine the resilience that is required to do this both physical and more importantly mental which leads me on to my next point.

I will be doing this to raise funds for MIND charity. MIND charity started under the name of the National Association of Mental Health in 1946. Since then and in particular in the last decade, it has significantly raised the profile of mental health issues. It has been part of a movement of normalising and reducing the stigma behind them. This normalisation is what allows one to accept and talk about problems and then hopefully take action which is often very simple such as talking about or reading books about it. There is no magical solution to many of these issues but the increased awareness made by charities such as MIND allows normal people to be made more aware of the problem. By being more aware of these issues it is you and those that surround you that can make a difference. 

Please dig deep to allow MIND to continue raising awareness and more importantly I urge each one of you to be more aware of ways of addressing mental health issues for yourself and those around you. 

I will be posting updates of my training on my instagram feed: bell_charlie 

Thank you for reading.

Charlie