00:00:00
when I say day 102 does it bring back any memories yeah it's the only YouTube video that I didn't release my name is
00:00:06
Russ Cook and I'm attempting to become the first person ever to run the entire length of Africa it was probably the
00:00:12
hardest part of my whole life what happened so I'm going down this dirt path and two blocks on a motor bike P I knew that on the bik for longer than half an hour it's bad news ended up
00:00:24
spending 7 hours on my M bike going into the jungle I was getting kidnapped your partner told us that thought you had
00:00:31
died I mean I thought I was going to die as well were you thinking about people back
00:00:41
home Russ I don't think many people know that you did all this stuff before Africa 22 years old you become the first
00:00:47
person to run from Asia to London you bued yourself alive for 7 days you pulled the car as well which is pretty
00:00:53
crazy what were you looking for that's one hell of a question man things had got pretty bad I wasn't speaking to my
00:00:59
family I was drinking and gambling I would wake up throughout the week and just burs into tears crying you had dark
00:01:04
thoughts yeah but ultimately you know no one was going to come and save me it just had to be me and I thought Africa would be the best adventure ever but May
00:01:15
30 you start pissing blood I knew it was bad it' probably end you get robbed at gunpoint they got passports money and
00:01:21
then a falling out amongst the team you've not talked about this in detail either I just blew up shout everyone
00:01:26
throwing chairs what happened well congratulations diio gang we've made some progress 63% of you that listen to this podcast regularly don't subscribe
00:01:37
which is down from 69% our goal is 50% so if you've ever liked any of the videos we've posted if you like this channel can you do me a quick favor and hit the Subscribe button it helps this channel more than you know
00:01:50
and the bigger the channel gets as you've seen the bigger the guests get thank you and enjoy this episode
00:01:57
[Music] Russ you know you're someone that has achieved and has pursued really anomalous Feats in their life Feats that most of us as Muggles would never have
00:02:15
the insanity to take on so I was I was so curious to understand from your perspective what are The Dominoes that fell in your life that led you to be the
00:02:28
guy that sits here that everyone around the country and around the world is perplexed and astonished and inspired by
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where does it start that's one hell of a question man uh I think really I had quite a normal
00:02:44
upbringing and maybe that's like the basis for why I ended up doing all this kind
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of stuff um yeah like Dad my early memories of like my dad were he was very hardworking man he cut metal for a living and I
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didn't really see that much of him when I was young he would be out working 304 hours a day coming home metal dust all
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over him mom would look after me and my brothers and um I think he kind of instilled the like that hardworking mentality in
00:03:22
me and you know a lot of the a lot of the dominoes fell from that really and what
00:03:29
was your mom like when you were growing up my mom was very what I always remember about my mom she really
00:03:36
enforced it in us to be polite that was like a big thing for her so always like yes yes please thank you
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uh whenever we'd go around to people's houses she was like make sure that we behaved well and all this kind of stuff
00:03:50
and uh you like her her dad is like military man so 18 to 65 always RAF like very well respected um I think she got that from him and that's what she passed down to us but she was very caring
00:04:05
she her her whole life was her kids really so yeah like a lot of respect for my mom the absence of your father you said a second ago that because he was quite absent your mother kind of carried
00:04:18
the responsibility of raising the kids herself do you reflect on that and as you look back in your
00:04:25
life understand how his absence had an impact on you because before before this conversation to I got to speak to my
00:04:32
team and I got to speak to lots of people around you as you know cuz I'm sure they're all yeah little snitches so we spoke to your girlfriend we spoke to
00:04:38
your dad yeah um spoke to your team spoke to everyone around you privately um and got all of their take sort of perspectives and stuff and it appeared from those conversations that the early
00:04:49
sort of absence of your father had a pretty big impact on shaping you as an individual yeah I mean I guess I think my I now I'm now I'm older I
00:05:03
just look at it like my dad was doing everything that he could to provide for his family you know I think he took that
00:05:10
responsibility really seriously um and yeah I mean it's hard to hard to really contemplate how that affected me
00:05:21
but the the this the few things I did see of my daddy was just always he ran a marathan when I was a kid and I remember
00:05:28
that being like a big you know he would always talk about willpower and he didn't say much but like he was more of
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a man of he did things rather than spoke about them so he'd go out and work really hard or he'd go and run a marathon and I'd see these things
00:05:39
happening you know he'd come home from work and he'd be knackered and he'd be on the sofa and like he kind of just that was the
00:05:46
way he led you know it's a generational thing in many respects isn't it because my my dad I feel like is very much the
00:05:52
same I don't think we had many deep conversations at all but he he led by example in the sense that he worked hard
00:05:58
loved his family yeah um that Marathon your dad ran did he do things like that a lot um not really he was he was working pretty much all the time so he
00:06:09
do he he ran two marathons one when he was 30 one when he was 40 but he used to take me out on runs when I was quite
00:06:15
young and you know he wouldn't really say anything but it was more just me seeing it that I think was important for me that's how he operated you know what
00:06:28
about affection uh yeah no my dad's my dad or my mom aren't very affectionate people I don't think I've don't think I've ever seen them
00:06:40
like even kiss maybe maybe once or twice when I was young but like you know the I
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love using I love using stuff like this wasn't words that got thrown around in our
00:06:52
family not that they didn't me not that they didn't mean it I just think that like we we our family is a bit stiff
00:06:58
like that not all families have the tools yeah do you know what I mean they just maybe
00:07:04
they didn't get them from their parents no that's I think that's exactly it you know and I think when as I've got older
00:07:09
and I've understood like where they've come from and their parents and their upbringings and it's like makes sense
00:07:16
but it didn't make sense didn't make sense at the time it's hard to like when you're young it's I find it really hard
00:07:21
to make sense a lot of things I was one of them like had a lot of questions hard to find the answers but I
00:07:28
kept digging what kind of questions did you have I guess it was more stuff like I I was finding it hard to find my way in the world and especially when I got to like teenage years and I'd be like
00:07:40
how do I do this how do I you know how do I build a career how do I make money how do I do all of these things how do I
00:07:46
navigate friendships and relationships and all these kind of complex how do I find meaning in my life not that I was
00:07:51
directly asking those questions but they the kind of things I'm proding out of that age and I think
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you know from my parents it was it was quite hard to find those answers just because I think they will struggled with
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communicating like that you know when you're 13 14 years old do you think you're different from your peers do you feel like you're different in any way or isolated in any
00:08:16
way from other people I looked at people and I was like like teachers for example
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or any kind of authority figures in my life and if if I sense that they weren't very happy in their lives they were a bit miserable I would kind of discard a
00:08:33
lot of what they were trying to tell me they I found a lot at that age had a lot of people trying to tell me what to do
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or you know do this do that behave like this and I was like if I do what you say
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then I'm going to end up like you and I don't I don't want that so I'm doing my own thing and I think that kind of
00:08:51
started a journey of trying to find my own answers and stumbling cross a lot of different things to try and find that do
00:08:57
you think you mom and dad were happy no I kind of feel bad for I want to do them a service when I'm talking about them because I do respect them a lot now
00:09:10
especially I'm old now I'm older and I understand things more but I don't think at the time I think they've had their
00:09:15
struggles like a lot of us have our struggles you know MH yeah I asked the question because I
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even look at my own life and I think whatever the source of my parents and happiness was I think as kids we
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sometimes s um our relationship whatever with whatever is making our parents unhappy often has a big impact on us and
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I you know I sit here a lot with Comedians and stuff and I remember Jimmy car I think it was Jimmy car said to me he goes listen when you sit down with a
00:09:42
comedian Steve you don't need to ask the comedian if they're depressed you need to ask them which one of their parents
00:09:47
were depressed because the reason for their behavior will be at some level a desire to please or make one of their
00:09:53
parents smile for a change or you know what I mean and and I wondered that with with your early upbringing cuz cuz you know I got to speak to your family and I
00:10:00
got to speak to people around you and the picture that was emerging was that home wasn't the happiest place and it wasn't the most loving connected cuddly
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perfect Rosy smiley yeah you know idyllic environment to say the least no yeah I'd agree I'd agree with that
00:10:23
and yeah yeah I mean I think it wasn't for the lack of trying yeah but it it's like you said they didn't have the tools and you know ultimately that is what kind of pushed pushed me to go and try
00:10:35
and find my own things which worked out for the best and when you say pushed you
00:10:41
to go find your own things um 16 17 years old you move out why well things things had got quite bad with
00:10:53
with family stuff I was I was a a piece of [ __ ] to be honest with you um very rebellious very disrespectful didn't listen to anything that they were
00:11:05
saying and very intent on doing my own thing and I think that kind of took a big toll on everyone in the family because I would you know I was stressing
00:11:16
everyone out why what were you looking for I think like deep down I was just like looking for something more in my
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life I was looking at what you know the life that the adults around me were living and I was like I
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don't I don't want that I I I want I want more than that I want to go and see I want to go and live you know
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and you know that's kind of when you know you've got a kid that's 16 hasn't done anything with his life and he's just kind of disrespecting you ignoring everything you're saying and doing his own thing coming home whenever
00:11:53
kids don't kids aren't born like that though yeah do you know what I mean they're not born acting out and
00:12:00
disrespecting people so that's why I'm asking about the cause of it cuz you know sometimes when you hear kids doing
00:12:06
that kind of thing you kind of think they're trying to they're acting out to try and get some attention and then they're kind of like rebelling from you
00:12:13
know Authority because they feel I don't know disconnected in some way or whatever I think that's maybe it you know like it's probably part of it I'm
00:12:20
not I'm not exactly sure why um but that's that's kind of what happened and I think I was I had a lot of energy a lot of motivation viciously ambitious
00:12:34
but didn't really know how to apply it where to apply it to get what I wanted and I was looking around me for I
00:12:43
think I was looking around searching for the guidance that that would help me but I wasn't really finding it so I was just
00:12:49
trying to make I was just basically discarding things that I thought weren't important or opinions that weren't important that weren't going to get me where I wanted and I was just looking
00:13:00
for looking for it and yeah that's kind of how things started unraveling and ended up moving out and that that induced a quite a tasty
00:13:12
few years in itself when you say moved out do you mean like organized the removal van and had an apartment you were moving into or what was the day like when you moved out uh it was quite
00:13:27
a messy it was quite messy for a couple of years in there like I remember my parents sent me up to my granddad in
00:13:33
Scotland one summer when I was like 15 and this was kind of the start of when things were going quite bad um your
00:13:41
parents were doing okay my parents were doing okay okay yeah but then so then and then I remember one night they moved all my stuff to my other granddad's house and changed the lock on the
00:13:52
door and they were like you're not coming back and I kick the door in and bow in so so it was kind of
00:14:00
happening for a while and then it got to the point where I remember my mom being like yeah you need to go and I was like
00:14:06
cool it wasn't like a out the door with tail between my legs or anything it was I don't need you anyway sit that like at
00:14:14
what age 15 that was about 17 okay yeah and then um I organized a flat was the cheapest flat I could rent in woring and I was still I was at college so I was
00:14:27
working about four or five part-time jobs just like cleaning I was up on my bike going to weit tros cleaning toilets
00:14:33
in the morning before college and then finished that and I went into sales at first you know when they change the locks on the door and tell you that you can't come back home yeah if I asked
00:14:46
them at the time why they had done that what do you think they would have said they would have said like this guy needs humbling he's he's he doesn't know
00:14:53
anything about the world he's very arrogant very disrespectful and then in hindsight and totally right yeah totally
00:15:01
right but you you must have empathy for that kid because you know you look back as an adult you can understand the
00:15:06
complex arrange of emotions yeah yeah yeah yeah cuz there's no kids aren't like they're not it born to be like
00:15:13
Terrors like that yeah uh I get it from I think now I'm older I just get it from both sides like it it's really difficult
00:15:21
it was really difficult for them to manage that like complex kind of personality and it was also really hard
00:15:28
for me to Express or communicate my in a way that was I was going to get myself listened
00:15:34
to I wasn't doing that I was just like totally trying to run everyone over you know you wanted to be heard yeah I think
00:15:45
so what does that mean I guess I just wanted someone to like understand and I just I think I just wanted the
00:15:59
guidance like of someone I wanted guidance but from someone that I someone that I looked at and was like I want what they've got you know or
00:16:10
like they've done life in a way that I want to do life and they could teach me the lessons but I didn't I was struggling to kind of find that at that age it reminds me of my conversation
00:16:21
with Ashley Walters and from Top booy yeah said pretty much the exact same thing his father wasn't around and so he
00:16:28
was looking for a role model or guidance answers and he couldn't find it so he ends up joining these gangs and that
00:16:34
spirals somewhere else and it's so interesting that you know a young a young man at your age that age sort of
00:16:39
you know 14 15 16 17 if they don't have someone there to model themselves on they can descend into different forms of chaos yeah like so much energy um which is in a lot of ways I
00:16:53
think a positive thing but just without those guidelines to to actually get you somewhere it just kind of becomes chaos when you moved out then so you moved out sort of 16 17
00:17:05
years old how was your relationship with your parents from there terrible really yeah didn't speak to them for a long
00:17:11
time uh even up until I would say up until probably the last year is is couple of years it's been pretty yeah but um you're 27 now yeah
00:17:25
we're talking about when you were 17 yeah yeah well it's it there was there's moments in where it's got better and then got worse and got
00:17:31
better but for for a while it's yeah it was tough when you you know at 17 years old
00:17:43
they change the locks you move out I'm sure your response was hardest geizer cuz it always is right like you
00:17:51
said it's just [ __ ] it I don't care I'll figure it out yeah but at some deeper level you're I think we're all
00:17:58
bullshitting ourselves El to if we say that it doesn't have an impact cuz I can relate I remember the call to my mom at 18 and telling how I was leaving
00:18:04
University and I remember what she said to me I can't repeat what she said because it's so vicious really yeah yeah it's like you it's so it's so vicious
00:18:10
one of the things she said to me but it was hard es Geer exterior yeah yeah yeah and then at some deeper level on certain
00:18:17
days oh yeah you know set catch me the day 100% man like and I think the hardest Gees are kind of approach like that aggressive approach to it is just like a way of coping with it but every
00:18:29
now and again you know like the emotions would roll out and yeah I'm not denying that for a second I remember seeing I
00:18:36
moved out and then I think I saw my dad maybe I can't remember how long after it was a good few months maybe a year or so
00:18:43
and it just made me cry just seeing him so like the emotions were always there but to kind of get through it it
00:18:51
was like right you know [ __ ] everyone why did you cry when you saw him just because I think like there's always a part of me that understands that my parent there is no
00:19:02
there's no one else in the world that loves me like my parents do and like no matter what they do or like how B badly
00:19:07
I felt I'd been wronged or which I wasn't really they were just trying their best I always knew that you know
00:19:14
whatever happens these these are the two people actually care about me the most and I think that just makes like when
00:19:20
things aren't going well that makes you emotional CU it's like these are the people I'm supposed to be closest with
00:19:25
and things real bad right now so you're so right I think so many people are probably in that situation right now
00:19:31
where they they love that person but they don't know how to build the bridge both people yeah and it takes two to
00:19:38
build the bridge so it really does they can't build it I can't build it so we love each other but we're [ __ ] at War
00:19:43
yeah or I think like a big part of that for me in building that bridge was actually my girlfriend when I was away cuz she she went over and she went
00:19:55
around the house and spoke to them loads and she's cuz even before I left like I
00:20:00
went around to see both my parents before I left it was the first time I see them in like maybe like a year and a half two
00:20:07
years really you Haden seen your parents in years before I left for Africa we'd spoken me and my girlfriend spoken a lot
00:20:14
about these kind of things and how like important we want family to be and she I I felt like at a loss making that that step I just didn't really know how
00:20:25
to do it what to say blah blah blah but she kind of over this year has really like done a lot in that sense people might think this is sexist but I do think women have more tools 100% 100% my
00:20:40
girlfriend's the same if my girlfriend me and my mom sometimes don't speak for PR long periods of time and my girlfriend like insists upon it yeah and
00:20:47
like dragged me down to Plymouth and was like we're going to see her yeah oh mate I couldn't agree more especially with me
00:20:54
and my girlfriend's Dynamic anyway like that's really she's I look at her like a
00:20:59
like a wizard in that sense I'm like I don't know what I'm doing but she she's got that under control which
00:21:05
is amazing so you're 17 years old you've moved out you're on your own what's the
00:21:10
plan yeah wow um yeah so I remember I had this flat in worin it was the cheapest flat available on right move 450 quid a month which is more than I
00:21:22
could afford but I was like right let's do it um was working a bunch of different
00:21:27
jobs tring of fish College kind of scraped through and then I um I actually was watching this this is so cringe it's
00:21:40
funny I was like one of them Lads that watched Wolf of Wall Street and was like this is it for me do you know what I
00:21:45
mean I'm this is the game I'm going to I'm going to become a millionaire millionaire doing sales stuff so went
00:21:52
and got a few sales jobs um made some actually not bad money for for my age but really didn't enjoy it
00:22:04
and you know ended up with that kind of lack of guidance I ended up just doing the things that felt to me like the most fun or the most like they would bring in
00:22:15
my naivity they would bring me the most meaningful experiences at the time which ended up being going out a lot with the
00:22:21
boys and drinking and uh gambling and that's kind of what my life was for the next kind of two two three years after that were you were you addicted to gambling um cuz I was reading through
00:22:35
your story and speaking to some of your friends and they told me that there was some instances where you you basically lost everything you had and had to
00:22:41
borrow money off your misses at the time yeah oh M it was it's embarrassing to even talk about like I
00:22:47
remember you know I didn't have much money but I'd done one night on roulette i' done about two I think it was over
00:22:54
two grand on online roulette just sitting there on my phone late at night just tapping away and that was kind of
00:23:00
everything I had at the time and plus the overdraft plus all the rest of it and I had to I was too embarrassed to
00:23:08
say anything so I told my M like I think I just made up some [ __ ] lies about what this XY Z and said I need to borrow money for rent and stuff this month there was a moment there where I was
00:23:19
like okay this really need stopping I just went on every single gambling website I could find and did the self
00:23:25
ban thing never gambled since and the alcohol yeah I mean I think the alcohol stuff was just like binge drinking culture I wouldn't say like I was alcoholic or anything like this that
00:23:39
was just the only way I could really the only thing I look forward to I'd I'd hate my job so I'd hate work all
00:23:45
throughout the week but I'd be like all right Saturday with the boys or Saturday drinking this whatever going out here
00:23:52
was like the thing that I look forward to that was the only thing I was really living for was there part of you throughout that period of your life when
00:23:58
when you're working in sales you're gambling too much you're drinking too much I heard you were overweight at the time as well was there a part of you
00:24:04
that sort of a voice inside your head that was saying like come on Russ like this isn't it yeah definitely um I was
00:24:12
so miserable man so so miserable at that time really struggled I remember I would
00:24:19
like wake up throughout the week just like crying just just so miserable um yeah you'd wake up through the week crme
00:24:32
just like I'd wake up like supposed to go to work just be I just be like so upset be like the worst so miserable
00:24:41
couldn't just fathom I was like why is why is life this why does it suck this much you know like I really had
00:24:52
no felt like I was kind of Trapped lack of connection I think was a big part of that
00:24:59
you had people around you though but you just weren connected not I didn't I mean I had like a few few of my boys but I I
00:25:06
wasn't speak to my family all at this time um well I guess I was just doing a lot of things that would make you miserable
00:25:17
like I was I had no control over my finances cuz I was pissing away everything I earned on roulette I was
00:25:23
the only things I look forward to was going out and getting pissed which I could which would make me me me feel that [ __ ] as well and then I would go to
00:25:31
work and hate it working every day so like doesn't take a genius to work out that's going to be a prettyful existence you know and you didn't have family around you didn't have yeah didn't have
00:25:41
like many deep connections so how old were you at that point in your life so that would be like 18 19 17 18 19 20 maybe just about so if
00:25:54
you had to give me a a word to summarize your sort of mental health throughout that period what would you how would you
00:25:59
describe your mental health toilet yeah bad pretty bad was there a worst day that you can
00:26:15
recall um yeah I mean I remember like I do remember just if you don't want to talk about it yeah you you you go your own pace tell me what you're comfortable talking
00:26:45
about I mean I remember days like I said I'd wake up crying speak to my boss I remember even one day with my boss speaking until on the phone just bursting is
00:26:59
crying and I think what was hard is that I didn't understand anything I didn't understand why you know what I mean I didn't have the tools to really make any sense of of the situation cuz you know
00:27:11
now I'm seven eight nine years older I can look back and go yeah well it's what happens when you gamble loads and you piss all your money away and you drink loads and you don't have anything in your life that's going to bring you any
00:27:22
meaning or fulfillment it's obvious but at the time I didn't know that so so that kind of sense of helplessness was a really big weight on me and it just felt
00:27:34
like I was never going to be able to shift it I think that was the the most difficult thing I was like I don't know how I'm going to get out of this you had
00:27:42
dark thoughts yeah the most dark thoughts pretty yeah pretty much that season of your life I've heard you kind of describe it as a rock bottom
00:28:04
moment and it's interesting because there's so many people that are somewhere along that Journey where
00:28:10
they're struggling they've they've got that sense of helplessness that you've described and they're searching for
00:28:17
answers and I think in some respects thinking about some people I've spoken to recently they they've kind of given up
00:28:24
believing that they can solve this because it's gone on for too long yeah and as you said they don't even know what's causing it they just feel it they feel it intensely I've got a couple of
00:28:38
friends that are really going through that at the moment and I wonder I always wonder to myself
00:28:43
like how does someone get from that moment their like personal Rock Bottom what does it take to get them starting
00:28:51
the climb cuz that's why I that's why I'm asking these questions I see it in your story I see you going further and further and further and further and
00:28:57
further and further down yeah reaching this Rock Bottom moment and then in that Rock Bottom moment you have some of the
00:29:03
I think the darkest thoughts anyone can have and then something causes you to make a decision yeah I think there's
00:29:12
a few different things that went into that Melting Pot um I think actually a massive thing
00:29:19
was like things like listening to podcasts I started I remember listening to like Joe Rogan a lot back in the day
00:29:25
and um like I remember the Jordan Peterson there was a Jordan Peterson episode age
00:29:31
ago and like a classic thing but that really kind of hit me and that's what I like I love listening to him now and I know he's a bit controversial these days and people have XY Z say about him but
00:29:41
for me like just having that was like my uh guidance in a lot of ways and I think so blessed to have been born in this generation where the guidance can
00:29:54
come through all of these online resources whereas for you know like 20 30 years ago maybe that would never have come for me and maybe 20 years later I'd still be in the same spot so like
00:30:04
incredibly grateful for that but then can I ask a question on that in that moment when you're 19 years old and
00:30:11
you're searching for do your parents know what you're going through no I don't think so do you think today they
00:30:17
know what you you were going through in that probably not no probably not I I I I reckon like I don't know I reckon my mom's probably thought about it to be fair
00:30:28
I don't know they don't know the ins and outs what are the ins and outs that they don't know well just like the day today
00:30:34
you know and I and I I I I get I'm quite like I keep a lot of things to myself a
00:30:47
lot of the time anyway so like no one really know there's a real cost to that is there there is yeah I guess there is this there you know these things I
00:30:59
always think with these things keeping them to yourself doesn't mean that they stay inside it means they express themselves in other ways yeah
00:31:05
smart I sit with a lot of people so i' I come to learn about myself but I I've come to one of the things I've
00:31:11
definitely come to learn is that keeping it in doesn't actually keep it in it just comes out in other ways it makes it
00:31:16
like a pressure chamber and then you get your little escapes yeah someone will say something you can [ __ ]
00:31:21
up yeah well some people expresses themselves in pornography addictions or gambling addictions they're trying to
00:31:27
find other ways to ease the burden of having to hold on to that all that stuff run in length of
00:31:35
Africa um so they they had no idea no if you could go back and have a word with him when he's woke woke up on that morning when you're at your your rock bottom and he's crying and he doesn't
00:31:47
want to go to work and he's thinking about dark you know dark thoughts if you could go back and just
00:31:53
have a telephone conversation with him now what would you what would you say to him oh
00:32:02
I I guess I do I do have empy for that guy I think the thing the thing that I needed to hear which was the most which actually got me
00:32:15
forc me into action was like I need to take responsibility for my situation here so like that version
00:32:23
of me at 19 1819 was very much one that looked at my outside world and blamed everyone else for my problems like oh it's cuz my parents did this or my boss did this and
00:32:36
all of these other things and I didn't need anyone else to come in and say oh it's not your fault blah blah blah blah blah I needed someone to go
00:32:48
that's the [ __ ] world mate get used like do something about it or don't up to you so that's probably the message that I would give maybe I'd deliver it in a nice
00:33:00
little empathetic way but timately you know no one was going to come and save me it just had to be me and you talk about this um I was reading different sort of seasons of
00:33:14
your life and there's this one moment where you're in a nightclub and it seems like you have a bit of I don't know whether you on something or you
00:33:20
something seems like you had a little bit of a dance Flor Epiphany moment at at 2 3 a.m. in the morning
00:33:28
yeah so I think it it had been leading up to this because I would I've been I've been
00:33:34
finding life really difficult for a while and I was doing all these different things trying to find
00:33:41
something that I could put my energy into that would give me something positive in return
00:33:47
and yeah I remember being in the arch in Brighton and just being like I need I I
00:33:53
I need to sort my life out it like what am I doing Prof for one of them like mirror bit pissed look in the mirror
00:33:58
moment going [ __ ] hell and then ran home about 11 12 miles took me ages I was so fit sorry you ran home from the nightclub ran home from the nightclub why I I don't know really it was a bit
00:34:13
Forest Gumpy in the way it was just like I just felt like running kind of Vibes and then at what time sorry like 3:00
00:34:20
a.m. 2: 3 a.m. something like this you ran 12 miles at 3:00 a.m. yeah it took me ages drunk yeah yeah I was totally
00:34:26
off it yeah um sleeping on the side of the road yeah took a little power nap in shm
00:34:34
pavement but yeah I mean so I ran that Mar I ran that little bit and then a mate of mine that I'd been mates with for a long time had just started getting into running properly and he signed up for a half Mar and he said to me like
00:34:47
come and run it like let's do it I'll train with you blah blah blah and I think that was the moment where I was like oh this might be something that I
00:34:55
can do like I'm out of ideas here you know I need something so I literally just on a win was like fine let's do it
00:35:03
signed up then he took me out training um we did the half marathon then a few weeks later we signed up did the full marathon and that process was like a huge relief for me it
00:35:19
just m it for the it made me really like it hammered in the sense that if I do something positive it will pay itself back to me you know like that accountability of like go and
00:35:33
do something good here we go and you can see the improvements coming week by week by week and it in I think that's why I
00:35:41
love running so much like because that's it in its simplest form it's like you go out run it's really [ __ ] and but then
00:35:48
you keep going you keep going and now a month later you can run a half marathon or two months later you can now run a
00:35:53
marathon and it was that process of going from someone that I like I couldn't even run around the block and
00:36:00
then I could run a marathon and I was like [ __ ] this is this I've got something here like this is how we
00:36:08
progress that's really the word is it progress that feeling of progress like you you'd learn because that becomes a
00:36:13
matter for for life like I set out to do something and I got better at it I progressed yeah and I accomplished
00:36:19
something yeah that's a that's a pretty strong transferable idea for the rest of
00:36:25
your like for everyone's life to learn that l that's kind of what happened for me I I managed to like save up some
00:36:32
money off the back of run ran these marathons and then it like stopped drinking as much St I wasn't gambling anymore and saved up a bit of money for
00:36:44
the first time and then a few months later I decided right just been off all these cleaning jobs I'm going to go and travel the world with my few grand that I'd managed to save up and where did you
00:36:56
go around the world traveling did a bit in Europe then went over to Africa got to Kenya mhm did did some I was really into my run at this point so I was training really hard every day was like
00:37:08
my living and breathing it went to the training camp C this Village called it which is like home to some of the best longdistance Runners ever uh Kip choi's
00:37:21
from there all this kind of stuff just trained with them got my ass whipped up pretty good and
00:37:28
that just I met an Italian guy who'd been cycling around the world for six years Super inspired by a story how he
00:37:35
was living what he was doing and decided like I wanted I want to do I want to try and do something like that and I was I was pretty good at
00:37:42
running by now so then I first kind of conceived the idea of running from Istanbul to London and that was the next
00:37:50
I was like right that's what we're going for I don't think many people know that
00:37:55
you did all this stuff before Africa no I don't think so yeah I don't think they do I don't think people I was speaking
00:38:01
to my mates I was like brother do you know he he like ran he was the first person to run from Asia to London and
00:38:07
people like no yeah you just know that he ran Africa and then all these other things you did beforehand but 22 years
00:38:12
old you become the first person to run from Asia to London because you ran from Istanbul to London um you completed 71
00:38:19
marathons in 66 days through 11 countries and you had no team with you yeah you basically just did it on your by yourself and your phone was dying and all that stuff yeah when you told your
00:38:31
family and other people that you were going to run from Asia to London at 22 years old what was their response because that would be the first big most of them were like yeah you like
00:38:43
you're going to you're going to die or like that's not going to happen I remember pretty much everyone being like
00:38:49
that I could probably count on one hand the amount of people actually thought I was going to do that what did your parents
00:38:54
think can't actually remember I don't know if I was speaking to them very much at this time oh really
00:39:00
yeah I remember my little brother was the only one was like yeah he's the only one I remember being like yeah he's de
00:39:05
he's going to do it what was that like you know cuz you're on your own it's different to the Africa run but this time you're on your own for that whole
00:39:15
that whole journey across a Asia to Europe yeah what's what's that like it was an amazing adventure man it really was it was it was tough though like
00:39:26
really tough being by myself the whole time I would literally run a marathon at a little bag with a hammock and toothbrush toothpaste phone I just find
00:39:38
a couple of trees at the end of the day sling the hammer cup and go again the next day so yeah did you not need like
00:39:46
friends or something like why why I think the that a lot of people said this to me at the start they like what were you going to need this you're going to need that like yeah but why actually why why
00:40:01
can't you just sleep in a hammock every day and then go run out Marathon did you speak were you speaking
00:40:06
to any any bitty back home around that time don't really you must look at that objectively
00:40:13
and go that is not normal behavior and then and then from that I ask I go so what is it that's abnormal about you because you're performing
00:40:25
unnormal Behavior it's super inspiring but it's not normal it's not typical that's a good question man I'm
00:40:31
not really sure yeah it wasn't normal yeah I guess it definitely wasn't normal I think I love that you're just figuring that out now
00:40:45
um I think you know I met this I met this Italian guy and he'd been cycling around the world for six years and he
00:40:51
showed me his setup he had nothing on him really he had like he had basically nothing but he just had a coffee kale
00:40:56
that was the only thing cared about so meeting these kind of people just made me realize like what is normal
00:41:04
who even cares about normal I don't care I just like this this is normal this guy's cycling around six
00:41:11
years why not but he seems like he's had a pretty good Adventure I want to bit of
00:41:17
that in Africa specifically Kenya I've been there certain parts of Kenya can really teach you that you don't need
00:41:23
much that's a primal exactly I think if was just a different way of looking that's what the I it is the classic traveling like oh go travel and find yourself blah blah blah but it do
00:41:36
you know sometimes meeting these people from doing the craziest stuff and from different cultures will just make you
00:41:42
look at things in a different way you know even I found that coming back to London now and it's like all of you I'm
00:41:49
I'm back into the motor like oh you need to go and get a flat and you need to go and live somewhere and blah blah blah
00:41:54
and I'm like hold on a minute like I don't I need why do I need to do any of this you know you you
00:42:00
must realize Upon returning to the UK how much people are kind of programmed yeah yeah and I just I guess the
00:42:10
uh the age Ling one was the first time I was just like let's give it a go what's
00:42:16
the worst going to happen and at the end of that run your father joins you um yeah so my I remember my dad
00:42:28
my dad came up to London and saw me it was he said that he was proud of me and I remember that hitting cuz like he
00:42:36
didn't say it often but when he says it you know it's Pro I can imagine your dad being similar like kind of thing where you know he means it when he says
00:42:43
it and I think that's like one of the most powerful things a dad can say to their son like proud of you son even
00:42:50
makes me emotional just saying it like thinking about it I'm like wow um yeah that was nice and he he ran the last day with you he ran like the last 5K I think we had yeah the last 5K and I
00:43:05
was actually joined for the last couple days by the mate that got me into running in the first place which is
00:43:11
really cool as well interestingly there was no followers no there was no YouTube views there was no headlines there was no BBC articles there was nothing yeah most people don't
00:43:24
even know it happened yeah frankly cuz you went on your own you didn't do all the Social Media stuff you then get back to the UK to much different Fanfare than
00:43:32
you got back to this time you go back to your parents house mhm couple of days in
00:43:37
everyone's looking around going yeah what's that like couple of days in yeah I mean I remember my body being pretty in a pretty bad way after that I couldn't even walk like I was really
00:43:50
struggling body was really hurting and uh uh Got Back into the country I was skinn because i' done all my D on this age line and run
00:44:03
and then my dad was like I remember weekend like what are you doing you lazy like get a job or something so I was
00:44:09
like oh [ __ ] all right and then went and got up how did you feel when you heard
00:44:15
that I it was hard at the time I just I was I was I was really struggling cuz I'd just been away for a whole you know for about a year or something done this big thing finally finished
00:44:28
finished and then I was like oh that's reality slapping me in the face again but yeah you pissed off yeah I was yeah when he told you to get a job yeah I was humaning yeah why because I was I was
00:44:42
just mentally just absolutely done in and physically done in and then he'd like just been like oh I'm so proud of you I remember being like I'm so proud of you you've achieved more in your life
00:44:53
already than I ever have blah blah blah like and it really felt like a made a bit of a breakthrough there what do you
00:44:59
mean breakthrough just like I felt like he respected me more like he'd actually seen that i' I was capable of doing something um that he thought was good
00:45:10
you hadn't felt that before not in that way not in that way what did you think that he thought of you growing up when you sort of 19
00:45:22
years old and you're gambling and doing uh like probably just disappointed um yeah disappointed bit of a loser you've eventually end up burying
00:45:35
yourself alive which is [ __ ] bizarre that's a ton of events I didn't I didn't see coming in your story so you do this
00:45:42
run at 22 years old um there's sort of a two-year gap between then and when you bury yourself alive what are you doing
00:45:47
for those two years so I was just working bits and pieces here and there really um back to normality pretty much like I I finished the ages learning
00:46:01
run and in in my head from then I was like I would really love to make this kind of thing a career somehow don't know how I'm going to do it but I would
00:46:12
love to be able to do that and then that kind of started like a three or four year process of working out okay you know if we make content then maybe
00:46:24
Brands will sponsor that and then I can go do adventures with that money but that it took a long time to kind of put those pieces of the puzzle together like that was never the really what I was
00:46:36
thinking of when I did Istanbul to London I've choed a few photos up on Instagram just really for my boys to see
00:46:41
be like I'm out here in Serbia camping or whatever um but yeah then you know did
00:46:50
the o line run figured out if we make some content and that's how we're going to do it buried myself alive pulled the
00:46:56
car for a marathon then the Africa planning started happening you buried yourself
00:47:02
alive you asked your parents if you could bury yourself in the garden they told you [ __ ]
00:47:07
off yeah yeah got I remember that now yeah you buried yourself alive for seven days in underground you basically just
00:47:14
dug a hole in a tin can and jumped in the tin can and then they they buried you there um and then eventually the
00:47:20
plans as you say you pulled the car as well which is crazy do you know when I I actually found out all this stuff which
00:47:27
was shocked me was I don't know a week or so into your run in Africa I saw you pop up on my feed and then as you know I clicked on your
00:47:38
profile and then I clicked on the DM box and you sent me a DM yeah and the DM you
00:47:44
sent me was in May the 5th I think it was 2022 so it was a long time ago more than two years ago now and paraphrasing
00:47:52
because I know speculative one I bet you get these kind of DMs all the time yeah I I missed it I didn't see
00:47:58
it so I didn't I didn't I didn't see it at all but um it's funny it's funny cuz I actually replied to you exactly one
00:48:04
year to the day when you sent me a message I replied to you on May the 5th as well but you emailed me on May the
00:48:09
5th 2022 and in that message you said some nice things and then you said you'll probably get a lot of these DMS
00:48:15
but let me explain why this one is special and exciting oh listen this is your sales
00:48:21
background there coming through I'm I've removed some parts cuz yeah bad no no no no no you know I'm an endurance athlete
00:48:28
in 2019 I was I was the first person to run from Asia to London in 2020 I pulled
00:48:34
a car for a marathon in record time in 2021 I got buried alive with nothing but water and I live streamed it for an
00:48:40
entire week and in 2022 I'm starting a mission to become the first person to ever run the full
00:48:47
length of Africa you sent me that DM two years ago um hoping that I could assist
00:48:52
you in some way with the the Africa leg of that and when I saw that the most shocking part was that you had done all
00:48:58
of these other things and I'd never ever heard about any of them yeah yeah and then in that message you explained to me
00:49:03
cuz it was a very like long message and you really it was a really thorough message you explained that this time would be different people would actually
00:49:08
know because you'd figured out content yeah yeah yeah and You' got some good people around you and you'd spent almost
00:49:14
two to three years thinking about this Africa run before you even you set off going yeah why Africa why was that the
00:49:22
plan well I knew that Africa hadn't been done before and it's one of the few things left that hadn't been done so
00:49:31
that was probably one of the big reasons also like Africa's not very tra like not
00:49:36
very well traveled not many people tourists not many tourists go there and I thought it would be like the best
00:49:43
adventure ever so that's why I decided to do it so you were going to run from the bottom of
00:49:49
Africa to the top yeah how long did you think it was going to take two I thought it would take 240 days that was my goal
00:49:55
I was going to do 360 marathin 140 days didn't quite work out how long did it take in total in the end took 352
00:50:03
days long time but there's lots of hurdles along the way before you set off I think it's
00:50:09
was four to five months before you set off maybe six months you meet a young lady called Emily Bell ah yeah yeah um
00:50:17
wow what girl what a woman was it six months before or something no I I I met her we first met at one of our mutual friends birthday party yeah and I said
00:50:31
to my friend like why have you never introduced me to her she's beautiful and then um then that started like a three month process of me trying to convince her to go on a
00:50:43
date luck it took a while we got there eventually got there eventually um actually we had a secret Santa going and I think one of my friends did me a solid and kind of like rigged the Secret Santa
00:50:56
so I got got her oh nice and then I got her uh tickets to go to Comedia comedy club in Brighton got her two tickets I was like well you could like you could take
00:51:07
me and then um yes so then that's that's when first started da about this Africa
00:51:14
thing was already in work so it was quite complicated but then before I left we were like right let do it and we kind
00:51:22
of like we spoke on the phone every day and m i i was one of these people if you'd asked me two years ago could that have ever worked like 14 months away we spent
00:51:33
from each other I'd be like nah that's never going to never going to work but I think we we spoke pretty much every day for hours whilst I was running if I had
00:51:44
signal and the the the kind of stuff that we got to speak about and really go through in depth
00:51:51
on is the kind of stuff that I think in a lot of relationships would just get swept away in the rig morale of the day-to-day life so I'm actually super grateful for that time and like really
00:52:04
proud of her and asked for like navigating that kind of weird situation knowing your childhood and knowing the early model of relationships that you experienced with this mother and this
00:52:17
father didn't seem like they always had the best time little bit distant the affection wasn't there when you go into
00:52:24
a relationship there must be a part of your sub conscious that still has that model of relationships front of mind so
00:52:29
you must be in some respects like I am to be fair or at least like I was until I was about 27 28 when I had my first
00:52:36
relationship I had my first relationship at your age um an avoidant oh yeah yeah cuz you hadn't learned you didn't have
00:52:41
the tools to be affectionate and to be open totally still am a bit but but when you met her yeah you hadn't done had those deep
00:52:54
conversations N I think it's her credit to her more than me she she kind of bring that out I I I didn't have the tools to
00:53:06
go to do any of that stuff to be honest you know she's just I think sometimes like I don't know I think I just think we fit really well like together what I
00:53:20
can do well she can't what she can do well I can't like it works it's so interesting because
00:53:27
we got to have a conversation with Emily yeah and the way she described you sounded very very much like me it's no it's funny because um I've
00:53:39
actually listened I remember messaging you actually about it I think I listened to you had a podcast with some
00:53:45
relationship person Esther Pell I remember and um yeah like the way you were talking about I was like oh this is
00:53:52
like this is hitting over here and we both we do that a lot sometimes we listen to podcast and talk about it and
00:53:59
like do this I'll do this I'm going to play this oh God this is going to be awkward for you but listen it's it's word for word
00:54:11
me he's not the easiest to support and hasn't been the whole time I've known him because he doesn't accept support
00:54:18
very like he's he's got so much better at it but I'm a very like nurturing like I want to help um I want to make his life easier what can I do how can I support you but for
00:54:30
him support looks like um space that's that's textbook me yeah support is leave me alone it's my love
00:54:43
language it's just acts of service and leave me alone that's really what it's about here
00:54:48
we're talking about you have different Love Languages and she goes on to explain that
00:54:54
um this is much because of the way that like your early early years you were used to Independence yeah um God she's
00:55:02
smart let me just he's changed so much since I first met him like when I first met him I was not thinking oh I could
00:55:09
actually seriously date you yeah no I remember those days you've um you've changed MH you've changed how have you changed I think I've definitely become
00:55:23
more willing to accept some I do still strug with that but I've definitely tried to do that more it's all I think for me it
00:55:34
was like I really cared about Emily so I really wanted to be the best that I could for her as well and I just think like the level of
00:55:46
desire to to make that happen was like really high so I've just I think before I wasn't very willing to compromise on a lot of stuff I was like I'm doing my thing you either fit in or
00:55:58
you don't see later whatever whereas with Emily it reminds me of me with Emily I was like oh like she's
00:56:06
special I really want to make this work and I'm I'm going to have to there it's actually a benefit to me if I can compromise because she that kind of
00:56:17
having that connection will also bring a lot to my life and I need and I need to I need
00:56:22
it she kind of got over the fence she got over the wall of the castle and managed to invade and change you from
00:56:28
inside yeah yeah yeah but you didn't want to let anyone over the [ __ ] no no is that how it's been for you as well
00:56:35
then 100% yeah I met I met a person who I cared about so much yeah this what exactly what you said that I was finally willing to compromise on things before then it was like as you say my way or
00:56:47
the highway like don't get in the way of my dreams you're either on the bus or you're off it but not like I'm willing to go in a different direction in some
00:56:53
areas of my life here and it's I think that's good news for a lot of people that are avoidance because it offers us
00:56:58
all hope that you know we we'll meet someone and they'll be worth it um and they'll help to rewire some of the
00:57:04
evidence we have from our earliest years about what relationships are and aren't and the freedom they make us compromise
00:57:09
and all of those things she sounds like a really wonderful person she is man she's great she's the best I love her to
00:57:15
bits they always say you strengthen a relationship by going through something difficult together and that's exactly
00:57:20
what happened as you ran the length of Africa the really remarkable thing was I was reading about your preparation for this trip and to say the least Russ you were ill
00:57:32
prepared you you landed in South Africa with 10K which is 4% of the money that you would need to make it the whole way I mean there's so many other things here you you knew that you couldn't get through I think it was Angola Algeria
00:57:47
Algeria you knew you couldn't get through Algeria because they don't issue visas if you're not in the country they
00:57:53
denied our Visa already yeah and they don't issue visas when you're not in the country we' already left so so you [ __ ]
00:57:58
I'll figure it out when we get there pretty much what is that mentality because there's so many people that need everything figured out and all the answers and to feel that psychological
00:58:09
feeling of I'm ready you don't seem to give a [ __ ] frankly I don't think I was afforded the luxury of being able to you
00:58:16
know wait really we were running out of money it was it was now and ever I you know make
00:58:24
it work with what you've got or don't doy basically and I was like I think we can do it where did this 10K come from
00:58:31
well we actually got 50k to start with from an investor MH that he was a mate of a mate i' managed to persuade to give us some money to get things going what was in it for him he he's got a
00:58:41
percentage of like everything we make off the back end so he's he's done all right he was a risky risk risky one
00:58:47
that's hell of a yeah risky one for sure I think he it was more like a he just wanted to see it happen you know he was fellow woring boy year younger than me made bunch of money
00:58:59
in crypto and yeah so he fronted the first bit of money to get us going and 50k was more than enough to get us going but what ended up happening is the the mission got delayed more and more we had
00:59:11
some people involved at the start that kind of long story they kind of said that
00:59:18
these things were going to happen blah blah blah Brands were going to happen all of this stuff they were trying to
00:59:23
make happen none of it ended up coming to frish did they take money they didn't take any money now they um
00:59:29
but we ended up burning through a lot of the money before we were supposed to be on startline with like 50k and we ended
00:59:35
up months rolled by we wasted money on XYZ ideas didn't come so we basically it got to a point where I kind of got rid of all these people start line 10 grand
00:59:50
I was like if we don't get funding within you know if we don't get any kind of SP want [ __ ] within the first month we this is game over cuz we've run out of money said to all my team going to
01:00:02
have to delay your wages Etc just really tightened up and then I got a message from some some bloke from dragons then like two weeks in Jes yeah no so mate I mean I don't
01:00:15
know this is another thing that people probably don't know that you're like such a massive part of the story like you know when when you messaged I I
01:00:23
remember being in South Africa I think it was about 10 days 2 weeks in or something like this got a message from
01:00:29
you that was like oh like just see what you're doing something like this love it like if you need any help let me know
01:00:35
and I was like you should have see I rang Emily up I was like you're never going to believe
01:00:41
who just messaged me like it was crazy you know obviously y got sorted out perfect head got sorted out two unbelievable sponsors and kind of changed the whole mission
01:00:53
man like I can't even put into words how great that you messaged me that like it was
01:01:00
that was like you know sometimes when you have like a moment where you're like wow like that's like that you were that
01:01:07
moment for me really yeah yeah but you did that I no I you did no but like no you did I'll tell you why you did that because two things the first thing is you had messaged me a
01:01:20
year earlier and I just had totally missed it but the second thing is you went and did some so you planted a seed there then you went and did something so
01:01:27
awesome that the world brought it to my attention and when the world brought it to my attention I looked at what you
01:01:33
were doing um I think you were two week roughly two weeks in and I just thought it was awesome I thought you were a cool
01:01:39
guy and I could play out how this Mission goes in my head and I thought this is really [ __ ] cool I I I'm an
01:01:45
investor in I'm a part owner in various companies um and there was two companies that I I'm very close to perfect Ted and
01:01:51
hu who I felt were just perfect because no pun intended because perfect ter like an energy drink company that I met on
01:01:58
Dragon's Den you need energy and they're all about positive energy and um the founders are very much like you and then obviously hu on the nutrition side of things I thought they were perfect for you as well and I messaged both of them
01:02:11
and they were both down instantly I just sent whatsapps I said there's this guy he's running the length of Africa he's
01:02:16
so cool he's really he's like going to do it and both Brands were like down in one message I messaged both the founders
01:02:23
on WhatsApp and they were like we're in so and you had done that you had because
01:02:29
you had messaged me most people I say this because sometimes people can see things like pivotal moments in their
01:02:35
Journey as Lu but I think it's important to highlight that you plan to a seed a year earlier when you literally sent me
01:02:41
like three pages in a de yeah I I guess I'll describe it like I was knocking on the door but I needed someone to open it
01:02:47
you opened it so like it's a kind of a jewel thing there I think you planted a lot of seeds yeah and I was on a few
01:02:52
doors yeah yeah yeah yeah and I'm sure there's lots of messages you sent that would never replied to yeah so I'm
01:02:57
really glad that I saw it I'm really glad but I saw it because you were doing something awesome and it just popped up in my feed one day and I went down a
01:03:04
rabbit hole and I was like this is [ __ ] cool this guy is cool it'd be dope to be you know to do anything we can to see him see this through so that
01:03:11
that gives you a little nudge forward those two incredible Brands um you get going on the mission you run into a
01:03:16
bunch of health issues I mean it went around the internet for a while I think at this time you've got I don't know you didn't have many followers at the time
01:03:22
20 30 40,000 followers yeah it kind of grew it grew a lot quite quickly um early doors but we started I started the mission with I think 20K on Insta 6K on
01:03:33
12 t on YouTube and you start pissing blood by like day 30 is there a part of you at day 30 when you're you're running through Africa and you're pissing blood and you go I ain't gonna be able to do
01:03:44
this nah I knew it was bad you're running out of money yeah couple weeks before then you start pissing blood for most people either one of those things would be okay
01:03:57
let's get let's get a flight well I just I knew that you know it was a bad situation but it would it would probably
01:04:05
end eventually and then carry on going you get robbed in South Africa which is the
01:04:12
first sort of minor robbery incident thieves approach you they try and take your stuff think you give them a lift
01:04:19
home yeah that was two two guys came up to me whilst I was running at night one one came in front of me one came behind me and I kind of instantly knew this was
01:04:31
a bit shaky and I um I just went a bit mad just like weighed up the situation just started acting a bit crazy started like beating my chest and shouting and stuff
01:04:41
to try and like put them off cuz I could I got the feeling like okay they're going to this is an attempt but they
01:04:47
haven't gone straight in with the robbery they're kind of feeling it out so I was like trying to give them enough of a reason to think I'm crazy enough
01:04:53
it's just not worth it kind of worked sorry you started beating your chest yeah yeah yeah I started beating my chest I started shouting I was they cuz they just joined I was mid-run and they
01:05:04
join me running like one in front one behind they were running it like they I think they it was a situation where they
01:05:10
were trying to fill me out you know like should we rob this guy this kind of yeah
01:05:17
and I just thought if I can put him off enough so can you describe to me what you I literally beat in my chest yeah
01:05:25
was just like we're running by like just going totally a bit just to make them think like oh this guy's a bit you know he's a bit off it
01:05:37
maybe we'll just get the next one did you learn that somewhere or was that like a plan you had no that was
01:05:42
just purely like I you R differently to different situations like we've been robbed at gunpoint where there's a gun
01:05:48
in my face and I'm not going to start beating my chest cuz I don't want a bullet in my head but then there's other
01:05:53
times where you think like you kind kind of looking at them going he's actually a bit nervous to rob me so if I can put
01:05:59
him off enough then he's just not going to bother which was that that situation so what happens then you start beating your chest acting like a Lun start beating my chest acting like a lunatic the one the run the guy running behind
01:06:10
me ended up dropping off so then it was just a guy in front of me he was he was quite a small guy anyway and I was like
01:06:15
I don't reckon he's about it and then um did you tell him you're the hardest keys
01:06:21
and then we ended up speaking a little bit and he was like oh like my friend was going to rob you but we're not he
01:06:28
but he's gone we're not going to rob you and I was like oh your friend was going to rob you was yeah like nice um and
01:06:34
then you know I actually ended up speaking to him and he was just saying like he's just he needs some money to
01:06:41
like feed his family and stuff he was living in a Township next next to the road which was like pretty bad
01:06:46
conditions and I was like look mate my boy's going to come pick me up in a couple minutes like we'll give you some
01:06:52
food and he's like all right sweet you fed the robber yeah so then the boys came and then we ended up giving them a
01:06:57
lift back yeah what a nice story yeah it's going to be a movie one day that this whole thing's going to be a movie you get to um Angola and then you
01:07:10
get robbed at gunpoint yeah robed the gunpoint L go that was um day 50 yeah I mean they were a bit more successful
01:07:16
that time they got a lot of our stuff what happened so ran 30k I was on a lunch break we sat in the van me Jared Harry my sport team and we were
01:07:29
just chat and [ __ ] like usual two three guys pull up on a Mot bike two of them get off come up the side of the van
01:07:36
crack the door open gun in all of our faces started speaking portes um then they took a bunch of
01:07:47
stuff yeah that was a nightmare to be honest they got passports money cameras drone phones was long have you processed this stuff I
01:07:59
don't know I don't think so man like the the the thing is is that these things happen just you're on the road again the next day
01:08:11
so you know because you say it such a casual sort of Blas way but if someone had a gun pointed at them most people would would be in therapy trying to resolve the sort of
01:08:23
complex set ofy IC implications that causes and when I asked you the question I could see your demeanor changes a
01:08:29
little bit because it it's not as Blas as you you sometimes make out is it I don't know man I guess it just is what it is I haven't really I don't know if I've deeped it that much at this point
01:08:43
you know we're over it nothing bad happened in the end I mean we got robbed but no one died you lost the cash you
01:08:48
had the equipment and and your passports which is probably the most annoying thing of all those things yeah that that cost us like at least two or 3 weeks in
01:08:55
terms of going to re get visas and things day 50 you get to day 100 and you're day 102 when I say day 102 does it bring back any memories a couple
01:09:07
couple um Congo Congo DRC yeah that was one hell of an experience that you described this as probably the hardest part of the whole trip probably the hardest part of my whole life
01:09:19
really you've not talked about this much in detail either for some reason so we made a YouTube series online which kind
01:09:25
of followed the whole thing it's the only YouTube video that I didn't release because it was
01:09:32
quite I mean it was quite it's a difficult one at the time as well because it was the hardest time for us as a team and we we there was a lot
01:09:44
of arguments a lot of fallouts around that and I didn't think that the video that
01:09:51
we made was really what told the story how I wanted it to be told what happened so yeah you're emotional about this yeah I mean
01:10:10
it yeah that whole thing was was mad the so we got to DRC I think day 100 we got to DRC it was hostile from the start um we' we'd been warned loads
01:10:23
about it about the country it's one of the poorest countries in the world it's quite known for
01:10:30
corruption and we we've been sent the videos of the craziest things happening there and I think we're all a bit apprehensive you've been sent what kind of
01:10:41
videos the crazy like people getting shot chopped up all kinds of stuff um yeah it was it it definit I mean I
01:10:54
don't know much I can really I what I would say about DLC is that we spent a few days there and my experience was
01:11:00
very subjective it's to it's a massive country loads of people loads of great people but my personal experience of the
01:11:06
small amount of time I spent there was was a bit rough but yeah we I mean we landed in the country crossed the border it was a
01:11:12
very chaotic Border Town we had people from the GetGo very not not very happy to see us at all shouting at me whil I was running trying to like exploit us
01:11:24
for money officials all this kind of stuff get trying to get money out of us and we'd
01:11:29
heard about all of this from people traveling so we kind of half knew what we were rolling into but it was it
01:11:34
really created a kind of atmosphere that was difficult challenging um yeah I mean the day before day 102 we
01:11:48
had a guy come up to guy came up to me with a rock spikes in the Rock and he was like I'm going to like smash your head in with this when he speaking French so I don't really get it but
01:11:59
Harry spoke French so he's basically threatening us with this big spiky rock that he had in his hand saying like give
01:12:05
me three quid the equivalent of three quid or I'm going to like start smashing you all
01:12:11
up and uh so we I gave I think gave him a quidd in the end I'm not getting my head smashed in over three quid ball so I didn't want to like get word around that there was a bunch of people just throwing money around to anyone that
01:12:23
would threaten them so yeah I mean woke up day 102 I was running 100K that day and I felt very anxious from the get-go
01:12:38
really like really finding it difficult already ran left my left the boys in the morning like I normally do ran 20K then ran another
01:12:50
20K start we took a turn off onto a dirt road to the boys are plan this route took took went down this dirt road then the van basically the support
01:13:01
van couldn't get to me so the boys sent a guy on a motorbike and so I'm running along this dirt parking this guy on a motorbike
01:13:12
keeps trying to stop me and I was so like scatty already that I was I didn't want to stop for he was trying to get me to stop and I was like nah I'd had it the day before people trying to stop me on motorbikes and it was all a bit
01:13:25
didn't didn't feel great like I was I was quite anxious about the whole thing anyway eventually I did stop he gave me a note that basically said like the boys can't get round to where we were going
01:13:38
to meet but they're going to go to this other place and meet there and um it was
01:13:43
about 20K Through the Jungle no roads like barely even a path I was just kind of like whacking my way
01:13:49
through bushes to get to this meeting point where I was going to try and find the boys run out of water
01:13:56
phone has got no signal and I'm going through these these bushes stumble into this Village and cuz I think because of the experience that I
01:14:06
already had in the first couple days of DLC I was very much like I just want to get my head down and get through these
01:14:12
places as quickly as possible with less fuss as possible so I'm running through this Village and like people shout at me
01:14:19
and stuff and I'm like hey this is happening all the time now like just car on going car on going but I think I upset quite a lot of the village by
01:14:25
doing that and then the chief of the village comes over and then you know before you know I'm like surrounded by
01:14:31
half the village they're all like very upset they don't get what I'm they don't get who I am what I'm doing why I'm
01:14:37
there and they start trying to like say that I need to give them money I didn't have anything on me so then like the chief of the village
01:14:48
kind of got some people away and he got two blos took me out into the bush with machetes and I was bricking it yeah I was absolutely bricking it um
01:15:02
thinking like every all every my mind's totally racing at this point I'm like what like what is going on here why why
01:15:07
am I going out to the bush like this doesn't make any sense like is this a Shakedown like what
01:15:13
is the worst happening don't know and then got out into the bush I basically emptied on my bags had some biscuits gave them the biscuits and then just DED and then I was just like right line for
01:15:25
this meeting spot and mine's totally frazzled at this point I've got I'm hearing motorbikes
01:15:31
coming I'm hearing people I'm jumping in bushes like totally just out kind of off
01:15:37
it here um kind of get through this jungle bit get to this meeting spot the boys aren't there now I'm really like H this is bad
01:15:49
cuz I'm about 50 something K in I'm dehydrated I got no water I got no signal and I don't know where the boys are I don't know how where how to get to them and I'm in the middle of the Jungle
01:16:06
and I know that there's like I've I've set a lot of people in the local area and I've just run away from them all I'm
01:16:12
like ah like this is bad this is bad news anyway I figured out that the tarmac the last nine bit of tarmac was I think about 15 or 20K away and I
01:16:25
was like I reckon I can just about make it there and if I make it there then that that makes sense that the boys that
01:16:31
that's the last bit they could get to so had you just sprinted away from the guys with the machetes pretty much yeah yeah
01:16:39
like it was I they they walked me out into the bush and I didn't really I didn't know what was happening but I was just so like like this is bad gave him biscuits
01:16:49
and just died and then like I've I've ran off and I can just hear loads of like going on and I'm just running
01:16:57
through this jungle it's it's all quiet it's yeah I mean it's all quite mad I'm like adrenaline going through the roof um I was like
01:17:10
yeah were you scared yeah I was petrified man I was absolutely petrified I I think what didn't help is
01:17:17
that I didn't understand any of the language like local like lingala the local language I didn't know any french
01:17:23
either which would have helped um and I didn't understand I didn't have a very good understanding of the culture or anything so I think if I went through it again a lot of these things would
01:17:34
have been rationalized in my mind easier but because I was so unaware of the situation and i' had all of these horror
01:17:40
stories built up in my head and the first couple of days in DLC was quite rough and I was just like in this spot
01:17:45
where it didn't take much for me to kind of just assume the worst of everything so it really just got me into a place
01:17:51
where I was like quite scatty um but yeah I mean I find I find this I go see the bit of time I'm not right
01:18:03
let's head there it's about you know two hours away I could probably make it there and as I'm going there I'm going down this dirt path another two blocks
01:18:10
on a motorbike P up and you know I'm I I was like this I just don't want any part of this they're trying to stop me you know I'm mine's totally gone
01:18:26
and they they were trying to I think they were trying to communicate to me like oh we're going to take you to your
01:18:31
friends blah blah blah and I'm I'm thinking about I'm like are these guys who are these guys sent from they sent
01:18:38
from this Village or that Village is there like a bush Telegraph of there's a white guy running around here he's upset
01:18:43
like go and get him kind of thing so I'm like nah not doing it blah blah blah thinking you know the boys they send a note with the driver if it's from if if
01:18:54
it's from them and this guy these guys had no note and I was like it was you know getting later and later I was like I've got no water I've
01:19:04
got no signal I've got no way of knowing where the boys are they're probably no further than 10
01:19:10
or 20K away so if I'm if I get on this bike and I'm on the bike for longer than half an hour or an hour then I know it's
01:19:16
bad news so I just thought [ __ ] it get on the bike how long were those two men on
01:19:23
the bike following you and asking you to get on the bike a while like probably we probably about 20
01:19:31
minutes um so yeah got on the bike half an hour went by then now went by I start like kicking off I'm getting off the bike I'm
01:19:43
having a g them but like the language barriers just no one understand a word anyone's saying and then yeah ended up
01:19:52
spending 7 hours on that M like going into the jungle which was like terrible seven hours seven hours yeah what goes through your mind in those seven hours I thought well I assumed after about an
01:20:04
hour and a half I was like okay well I am getting kidnapped then like we're this is it you know and then I was
01:20:10
thinking rationally I was like had such limited knowledge about DRC or any of this kind
01:20:17
of stuff I was like they're probably just going to they probably just want money but then you so St think well maybe they're just going to kill you
01:20:29
and the stories that I'd heard about DC and that wasn't the craziest thing you know you like people get stabbed for FIV literally like a couple of quid
01:20:40
people get stabbed um people get killed for the you know a watch so I was really trying to like I was really trying to be rational about the
01:20:52
situation but just just like very quite quite emotional as well and then I mean at for the last few hours I was just like you know what God has for me has he
01:21:06
has for me you know whatever it is it is and that's fine and I was just trying to be like you know it's out of my
01:21:12
hands um but it was very scary I was like so nervous like just shaking they took me to this Village in the jungle
01:21:25
late at night no electricity it's like wooden little Shacks with tin corrugated roofs and stuff and got me off the bike took me into this little Hut then loads
01:21:36
of the men of the village came into the Hut they all arguing about money and this kind of stuff and then the second Chief of the village walks in and says to me like you speak to me in English
01:21:49
very slowly and he he understood a few words and I said to him like this is big mistake you know like call my friend and he speaks French and like and and then he
01:22:01
can come and like we've got money and we can sort it out and then they spoke on the phone and then basically we agreed like
01:22:11
the boys would come we got the money and then it took the boys like I think about 36 48 hours to get there because it was so rural there was no roads going there it was all dirt paths
01:22:24
they tried to rent some motorbikes got scammed then they then they ended up trying to borrow the police a police
01:22:31
Chiefs 4x4 who also scammed us so B yeah so then I mean the boys got there eventually we gave everyone some money
01:22:43
and then I was free to go I was just looking as you're talking about how fast 7 hours is and for people in the UK 7 hours is London to Edinburgh
01:22:57
yeah it's not in DLC so if I go from London to Edinburgh on a car yeah that's 7 hours just to give people an idea of like how long that is on the back of a motorbike with strange men going through
01:23:08
the middle of we're literally going through the jungle so it's like little tiny paths that are going up and down
01:23:13
through Rivers through over Mountains for seven hours seven hours yeah I was like gripping on the I was absolutely
01:23:20
done in by the end of it and you got to that Village they wanted they wanted money mm did they explain anything did they say
01:23:26
anything to you about who they were and I think I think they were I think they were actually just
01:23:33
they were more scared about who I was and why I was there and all the rest of it and
01:23:40
the I mean after the after the phone call with the team things seemed quite settled like the they they were pretty
01:23:47
all right with me and they I think they you know it was I was I was just in a state
01:23:54
of like totally totally whacked what you mean just exhausted but like petrified and I
01:24:07
was just very nervous around everything Twitchy you know yeah have you suffered with
01:24:15
anxiety I don't know I think I I don't think so but like I do obviously I'm human I do know why anxiety feels like and I do get it some times but I was I was anxious then for
01:24:28
sure you you're speaking to Emily back home your partner throughout um The Journey on most days but for this period of time sounds like you were out of communication with her and she seems
01:24:40
like she was very very worried about you she was yeah in fact she told she told us on a research call that she thought
01:24:47
you had died yeah I mean I thought I was going to die as well did you actually yeah genuinely thought you were going to die
01:24:57
yeah and how did you how do you sort of rationalize that thought how do you deal with that thought when
01:25:02
you what comes to mind like what are you thinking when if you if you really believe you know I think I'm going to die here like I mean it's I guess it's
01:25:09
different for me I was just like you know if this is the way that God wants it then I guess it is that's it you know and there's more for me
01:25:20
elsewhere that's how I was what that's how I was trying to make sense in my brain were you thinking about people
01:25:27
back home yeah I I mean I was thinking about I think about like H all the things that I wish I had the chance to repair
01:26:04
that I haven't like relationship with my parents um was thinking about all the things that you know I wanted to do with my life that I wouldn't be able to do I was
01:26:16
thinking about what it would do to you know everyone that got myself killed in Congo for just trying to run the length of
01:26:30
Africa I felt stupid cuz I was like you know this was these were like mistakes that have been made that were like quite should have been quite easily preventable that
01:26:44
we didn't do and you know that's openly my responsibility as well so it was yeah it was a hard few hours
01:26:56
thinking about things that you should have repaired with your parents it's interesting in moments like that people always talk about how they have a a
01:27:04
retrospective like Clarity on their life and their priorities that most of us will never understand because we've never been in a situation where we've genuinely believed
01:27:15
there was a chance that we weren't going to make it out when you say you were thinking about
01:27:21
how you should have repaired relationships with your parents what do you mean I don't know I guess it it's like
01:27:28
you said it was a Moment of clarity where I was like I've probably wasted a lot of years there holding on to things that weren't
01:27:39
necessary you know for [ __ ] reasons and like life Doo short for that what' you been holding on to like resentment and pride
01:27:59
and you know not not trying to understand or like avoiding things and not trying to connect with people that that love me and these kind of
01:28:13
things you think these are your last hours you've obviously got a person there in your life who has loved you and
01:28:19
has shown you a different way to connect and to be and to into intimacy and all all of those things which is Emily are you thinking about Emily in those moments as
01:28:30
well yeah I was yeah I mean I was thinking of like all the all the things that we talked about like our future together and everything that we wanted to
01:28:52
build and like the like having kids together and all these things that just felt like
01:28:59
they were just and how like just felt like I was letting her down and you know I
01:29:12
wasn't like delivering the things that I I was going to run the length AF we're going to do this going everything's
01:29:18
going to be all right like don't worry about you know all these danger no it's going to be fine babe
01:29:25
and uh yeah I knew how much how hard that was that time was for her as well guess I mean especially I'm in the thick of it you know I'm in the thick of it she's like at home just think about
01:29:46
it all the time there was a few moments like that when we didn't have signal and things
01:29:56
your boys eventually find you mhm they pay off the uh the guys in that Village and they let you go
01:30:03
mhm doesn't really stop there though does it because there's so much now to process and to figure out and kind of that was I think the hardest point for
01:30:14
us as a team of the mission was like the aftermath of that it's very difficult because I think we were all struggling everyone was right their limit
01:30:27
and probably because that no one had any spare energy to think of anyone else in
01:30:32
that situation it was all like well I'm struggling so that's it you know and yeah I mean there's a good few arguments people don't really know about
01:30:44
this moment no because people like me that just watch from YouTube and from social media we just think oh they're
01:30:50
they're all getting on it's all fine oh he's pissing blood again ha funny but when I when I did those research calls
01:30:56
and spoke to members of your team and spoke to you know people around you and even members of the team that were out
01:31:01
there with you this was really a a falling out amongst amongst the team that no one in the public ever got to see it's difficult one to talk about cuz I don't want to throw anyone under the bus or paint anyone in a bad like bad
01:31:14
like we were all timately just trying our best I think for me what I recognized that I did wrong in that situation was I set us up in a bad
01:31:27
way like I'd hired so heavily on content side because I knew that you know we started with no money we had to get content out there to get Brands to sponsor us that I basically recruited three people that were almost entirely
01:31:39
there for Content reasons being able to make YouTube videos take photos record documentary this kind of thing I
01:31:46
completely blindsided the logistics element and like having knowledge of Africa and
01:31:54
all of this kind of stuff I just thought that's a luxury we can't afford right now because of that i' ended up asking a
01:32:02
support team that were mostly there for content to basically be like Logistics African Logistics experts and that's put them in a position it's obviously going to be
01:32:13
really difficult so yeah I mean that the whole situation could have could have been ided with different different plan and I recognized that and I thought off the
01:32:27
back of that I was like right I'm going to get a 4x4 because the van can't travel up any of these dirt roads and
01:32:32
I'm going to hire two new people one of which is going to be like a proper Logistics guy that's going to get us
01:32:39
through all these tough situations a team member actually departed around this time as well yeah
01:32:45
that that was a difficult one um we actually we had a big argument me and Harry had a big argument on just after this Congo thing we were traveling
01:32:56
back through these Villages he'd obviously had a rough time as well trying he'd been scammed for motorbikes had this this dealings with the police
01:33:03
chief and as we were coming back he was buying like [ __ ] and and alcohol and stuff in all these little tiny Rite Villages and I I had an issue with it because we're going through some of the poorest places in the world there's kids
01:33:15
running around with like M Irish bellies can't even feed themselves and you know as Europeans if we bow through these
01:33:21
Villages drinking and smoking blah blah blah then it's giving off the sign we got a lot of money to spare and that's
01:33:28
why we're getting scammed so much for extortionate amount of money so I had an issue with it and I told him and I
01:33:34
probably didn't say it in a way that was how good leadership would say it you know so we had a big argument about that
01:33:41
I've obviously just been in this rural Village for a couple days I'm already I'm I'm tightly strong already so is he
01:33:47
and then we get back to the other the other boys these guys had no idea what just happened and they were all struggling themselves so they were very much everyone was just concentrating themselves and they were all kind of
01:34:00
like everyone was a bit pissed off of each other and then we had a meeting and I just blew up just blew up
01:34:08
start shouting everyone throwing chairs about completely lost my call it's not not obviously not the way to act
01:34:16
um and yeah I mean it was it was awkward was awkward few days off after that I was I just went straight back to running wanted to get out of DRC as quickly as
01:34:30
possible it was everyone was in eggshells we got to cabinda which is in angolan exclave and then I said to I was like how are you're going on
01:34:41
holiday and I said to the other boys you'll all be going on holiday at some point I think at that point I'd
01:34:49
realized that for me I'm running every day my body's very stressed I'm very stressed in general I'm managing a lot of things and I can't have the people
01:35:02
around me also being at the edge of what they can do because then it just leaves me in a totally [ __ ]
01:35:09
spot so I tried to kind of put some reorganize reshuffle things so that wouldn't happen by sending everyone holiday hide Gus hire Jamie another Editor to take some workload off down
01:35:21
the gizy was working like 18 hours a day trying to get two YouTube videos out a week whil recording it and producing it
01:35:26
I was like right we need to change something there Gus X power from Dutch military he cycled up and down Africa by
01:35:34
himself absolute Beast of a bloke like he's coming in he's going to do our Logistics and one of the best recruits I've ever made so um that's kind of how
01:35:46
the aftermath happened I'm going to let you in on a little secret what is in the
01:35:52
Diary of a SE Cup this cup that sits in front of me when I interview these people sometimes for 3 hours and
01:35:58
sometimes three people a day and the answer is this perfect de I invested in the company on Dragon's Den and since
01:36:04
then they've gone from an idea to the fastest growing energy drink in the UK it is a mat energy drink and it is absolutely delicious but that's not why I choose to drink it on this podcast the
01:36:16
reason I choose to drink it is because it gives me what I call all day energy I don't get the same crashes that I used
01:36:22
to get with other energy drinks if in the middle of a conversation or you're in the middle of a talk on stage or in the boardroom the last thing you want to
01:36:28
do is have a crash you don't want Jitters and you need focus and that is why they now sponsor this podcast not only is it delicious but it gives me a significant competitive Advantage if you
01:36:39
haven't tried it go down to a Tesco go to a waitrose or go online and use the code diary 10 at checkout and you'll get
01:36:46
10% off and when you do try it let me know how you get on as you continue on you have all of these issues you have a
01:36:52
bunch more health issues your your back starts to give out I think around uh around two day 205 and 206 you
01:37:00
completely stopped because you had back issues back the back was probably the worst injury I don't it's not even
01:37:05
healed still but basically my back started season up and I would get like shooting nerve pains coming down my leg and it would just totally like
01:37:17
totally jar I wouldn't be able to move or yeah I mean God knows what happened there I mean there's a chance that you've done permanent damage to your back probably yeah I mean I ran the marathon on Sunday
01:37:28
and it was still going a bit so did you have to stop no but it's basically been on and off on and off very painful for the last kind of well whenever that was day 205
01:37:43
since then Emily said around that time that sort of 200 day Mark you were like you were pretty
01:37:50
done what does she mean by that when she say pretty done I was in a lot of pain like every day
01:37:59
so I really just wanted it to be over at that point and I still had like five months to go still have five months to go yeah yeah was there I I've heard you
01:38:11
answer this question before but what what day was the closest to quitting the closest where you thought
01:38:17
you know what maybe the thought the only the only time I ever really had the thought was in the Congo really on the
01:38:24
on the motorbike yeah like that was the only time I actually ever actually thought like why am I doing this this is
01:38:29
stupid you know like I'm going to get myself killed of this and it was a fleeting thought came in and then I thought I ain't got a [ __ ] choice I got to do it now anyway December time which is day 241 you're you're in um I
01:38:42
think the Ivory Coast MH and uh the Ivory Coast think you're a spy so they took you to the local police
01:38:48
station because they thought you were a spy yeah they were very confused did they tell you that they
01:38:54
thought you were a spy or did you just kind of piece that together yeah it was more piece than that together like they
01:38:59
were very confused about her was while I was there while I was running in the middle of the night um and yeah they
01:39:08
they made sure they did all their checks on me that so that I wasn't any suspect individual January
01:39:15
comes around the New Year how did you celebrate Christmas out there and that and all that stuff we it was Back to
01:39:21
Basics kind of Christmas we had um chickens on the fire had got a bit pissed miss the
01:39:29
family Yeah Christmas would have been a bit of a weird one for my family anyway but yeah like
01:39:35
um I mean it was business as usual I was I think it was pretty much focused on the job and had a couple drinks and that was that one uh a day shortly after that
01:39:47
um that really I think things took a bit of a turn in terms of publicity was when you reached Alger and you had the issues
01:39:54
with your Visa because Algeria um as we said is a country that doesn't Grant visas unless you're in your home country currently and so you were advised by the FCO not to travel there
01:40:08
um I believe I can't remember a lot of people advis us not to travel travel there and the Algerian authorities were saying absolutely no to you to get to you getting a Visa um so you decided to
01:40:20
start an online campaign to try and like it's such a it's such an interesting thing
01:40:25
because very few people would have a country say we're not going to give you a Visa you cannot come into our country
01:40:32
and you decide that the way to overcome that is with some tweets yeah it was bold strategy it was we were we were
01:40:40
strategizing for a couple weeks before that like right this you know we are backs against the wall here what are we going to do and we kind of you know Gus and Stan had were putting together these
01:40:52
kind of plans to get residency in morania and then potentially you know do all of these little things to try and somehow get a visa and
01:41:04
um just got to a point where I said like boys let's just hell marry it just get the just let's just blast it on socials because it's going to take someone right
01:41:15
at the top to to say yes you know swing for defenses and that's what happened um you launched this kind of online campaign LED predominantly by Twitter to get
01:41:28
someone in Algeria someone high up or a politician in the UK to speak to Algeria yeah the campaign goes pretty viral
01:41:35
everyone's posting it in the UK so much so that even Elon Musk tweeted at one point which is mad basically saying that
01:41:41
this is what this platform's for what he loves about the platform that's sick and then Algeria tweet you basically saying
01:41:47
we'll give you a visa on the spot which is mad isn't that mad actually mad when you think about where you came from yeah
01:41:54
you've got Elon Musk tweeting and the like algeria's Twitter account tweeting out you going come on in we're gonna
01:42:01
we're going to change our laws yeah so that you can come through here and Elon musk's tweeting that it's just mad it
01:42:07
was mad it was absolutely crazy and then you get through you get your visa you're able to
01:42:14
enter Algeria the um Sahara Desert was another big challenge for you you get to day 313 the truck breaks down in the
01:42:21
Sahara Desert 250 kilomet away from the nearest road what I found so interesting about this little chapter in the story
01:42:28
was that when we spoke to Stan who was part of your team on the research call he says that you weren't really
01:42:34
concerned because everyone just assumed everything would be fine we'd been through much worse um Stan said that the
01:42:39
resilience they had built up was accumulative and gradually they became less and less concerned about SE
01:42:45
setbacks and I read that and it was really inspiring to me because it says something about life we all have these
01:42:51
like subjective setbacks that we can like fall into a dark hole thinking like the end and it could just be like Jenny
01:42:57
at work sat in our seat yeah yeah yeah whereas you're in the Sahara Desert and your truck is broken down 250 km from the nearest Road the repair team can't fix it and you guys just shrug it'll be
01:43:09
fine barely even thought about it mate can't lie really yeah I remember just thinking Ah that's a minor
01:43:17
we'll figure that out because you had so much evidence that you guys had been able to figure out so many other things
01:43:23
yeah yeah and I think like by the end as well like the team was so it was slick like the way everyone was operating we everyone knew what they had to do no one
01:43:35
needed you know no one needed telling we all just got on with our jobs and the amount of output for four people was crazy that really is what resilience is
01:43:48
people always ask like how do you become more resilient but it seems your story taught me that it's like go through some
01:43:54
difficult [ __ ] together and come out the other end and you'll have evidence yeah and even if you you know go through some
01:44:00
difficult [ __ ] and it doesn't work out then you've got few lessons in there right so at least you survived right
01:44:06
yeah that's a lesson um and then you get to the final leg of the trip and all of the people around you tell me that there
01:44:11
was a noticeable increase in your sort of happiness and demeanor when you could start to see the Finish Line definitely in your mind you get what two weeks out in the social Med media interest goes
01:44:23
pretty [ __ ] crazy yeah it did yeah yeah even like mainstream media kind of picked up I think the last few days last
01:44:30
few days yeah the whole of the UK only had one thing to talk about really yeah I'm sure it was you know very much the
01:44:36
case in other parts of the world I saw news reports in America and and other parts of the world but it felt like back here in the UK the UK was just talking
01:44:43
about one thing really it was following you you know there surely you your girlfriend and stuff Master have told you it was [ __ ] pandemonium it every
01:44:50
social you know I'd go on social media and anyone that I I knew was was posting about you um running that last leg
01:44:56
driving money to those Charities that mean a whole lot to you um as you come into that last leg that last day crowds of PE like hundreds of people flew out
01:45:07
there it's niut absolutely nice and they're running with you a lot of them I was heard from some of your team I think Stan that was saying to me a lot of people flew out there but they were Keeling over and like collapsing on the
01:45:18
side of the road cuz I don't think they anticipated that this isn't London mate it was fny like um Tunisia at that time
01:45:25
wasn't even that hot coming from the UK everyone's just absolutely cooked and and you um you come into that that last day and your dad is there as well yeah
01:45:40
yeah it was emotional day man I met my dad came and ran like he could only bang a two or three k these days but he came ran and um like put his arm around me
01:45:50
and that and you know it was special your relationship with him started to pick up mhm um as you got closer to the Finish Line it seems yeah I've heard that from a few people yeah uh
01:46:04
throughout throughout the whole mission really I think but Emily's definitely a big part of
01:46:10
helping that what was it like to see him and where did you see him was it on the last day on the last day
01:46:17
um yeah we ran a little bit couple tear just like what were the tears for I don't know like I guess it was like a signal that it was like this is actually over now you know like my Dad's
01:46:32
here um and like you know everything everything that I've been through but also like everything he'd been through everything his dad's been through felt like it just felt like a moment you
01:46:44
know he was proud of you very very proud of you very very proud of you we got to
01:46:51
speak to him on the phone and hearing how proud of you he was was one of the most moving things I actually of this whole experience of speaking to your friends and family hearing just how
01:47:02
proud your father is of you was it it moved me when I heard it I actually um I couldn't believe it's my son you know um crossing the line and and um
01:47:15
and it was sort of like not real sort of thing you know it's like you know but it's took a while s still sinking in now really and he went on to say I couldn't
01:47:27
be more proud of my son yeah it's nice it's powerful when your dad says that is it always
01:47:39
always you cross the line how does that feel ah yeah I mean that Finish Line honestly felt like a [ __ ] mystical
01:47:53
thing that was never coming for the longest amount of time so the fact that it finally came was
01:48:00
just like wow it's finally over you know like we actually did it so yeah very grateful it's quite complex emotions I can see it in your face yeah
01:48:13
what are those emotions I guess it's just like grateful that it all worked out you
01:48:19
know and like all the hard work paid off and all the hard times paid off your girlfriend said that you um you walked over to the edge of the water you
01:48:31
reached the northernmost point of Africa and you're saluted and to her that salute meant more than just a sort of random token
01:48:42
gesture it was a salute in many respects to say you know there's certain chapters closed in
01:48:50
my life now and there's certain things that I've I've proved I think maybe the right word there is
01:48:59
proven yeah I think so hopefully what have you proven I guess um I'm capable you know I can do it your mom was there as
01:49:13
well the whole game the whole team was that the best feeling of the whole journey that that end moment with your family was cuz I heard you describe
01:49:24
that the start was amazing the first day M and in that moment I imagine it's overwhelming for so many reasons it's so
01:49:30
much the process overwhelming people are there and screaming and the cameras and the Sky News are running alongside you
01:49:36
it's like it looked B [ __ ] crazy I was watching Christ it was totally mad I think the Finish Line was one of them things that was just so over like I don't know if you had it like when
01:49:46
there's so much going on and it's so overwhelming you kind of like you it almost feels like an out of
01:49:53
Body Experience mhm and you're someone that's like lived most of their life in relative isolation yeah you like being
01:49:59
alone yeah Emily told me this she because I think he's happiest when he's when no one's there yeah I do like being alone I do
01:50:07
like it interesting still is like you get back to the UK and you've been running this crazy
01:50:14
you've done this crazy thing for more than a year right it was 3 352 days I was out there for 14 months 14 months get back to the UK your land the
01:50:25
weather's different obviously society's completely different yeah now everybody knows who you are here so wherever you
01:50:32
go someone's got oh hardest G guy ever a [ __ ] picture lad like how how is that um still think I'm kind of working that out at the moment
01:50:44
don't really know it's it's definitely different but everyone's so nice and I think like the like the stories of people that they come up to me and they're like you know
01:50:57
I was running the marathon on Sunday and people are like you're the reason I'm here and stuff and I'm like that's kind of mad but that's sick as well you know
01:51:07
so are you feeling overwhelmed yeah definitely how' you know because I'm I'm trying to distance myself from everyone and everything at the moment really
01:51:20
yeah like yeah just I think um my social batteries run out quite quick and once that happens I'm just like well I need to be alone like
01:51:32
immediately done can't speak done and you're getting all these emails now yeah yeah yeah and it's just like well I
01:51:38
think there's a lot of things happening as well that I'm not that I don't know how to handle properly like emails and
01:51:43
all these other things you don't have management you don't have anyone an agent nothing I kind of need a moment to
01:51:49
work out what I actually want to do I think but it's fine like I'm not running Ultra
01:51:55
marar desert anymore I can't like it's it's all right you you were running that Marathon you ran the London Marathon
01:52:01
like like two days ago or something yeah that's a very public place to be yeah I
01:52:08
didn't quite anticipate anticipate that I had some people that saw you down there and they were a little bit concerned really yeah cuz you looked a little bit overwhelmed yeah it was a
01:52:21
little bit there was just a lot of people grabbing at you and stuff yeah yeah I mean people were nice so like they would
01:52:28
they only had nice things to say to me it was just like so much like stimulation you know what I mean like
01:52:36
just I was like I'm not used to this it's I find it fascinating so you're at the very top of this mountain in terms
01:52:42
of like publicity and attention and everyone's screaming and grabbing at you and wants you for stuff you've just done this incredible adrenaline inducing feet
01:52:49
running the length of Africa there's all of these chemicals your body the adrenaline the endorphins all that stuff
01:52:55
that comes from Endurance Sports and then done done zero like stop yeah how's that um my body needed it yeah it's absolutely you know bashed
01:53:12
in but it is also it was it's it's been quite difficult to I had the like such a solid routine every day for a year was like get up run break eat run do the same you
01:53:25
know every single day and now the schedule's like wildly different it's like okay wake up interview here or go
01:53:32
and do this and then this and you know meet this person chat to that person and uh I'm kind of missing that
01:53:41
that routine of exercising all the time kind of want to start that back up again pretty soon maybe maybe not 60 or 70k a
01:53:48
day but like I need I actually need that you know so how's your mental health I think I think it's fine I just need to get like I just need to get a few things
01:54:03
sorted like I haven't got a place to live yet or I don't really I don't know the immediate next steps like career-wise what I'm going to do and a lot of things have changed
01:54:15
obviously so it's just working out a lot of all of this stuff but I think when there's that many
01:54:22
UNC in your life it's always going to create a certain level of like mental challenges so I just need to
01:54:28
figure them out and then I'll be all right you know you must get bored of people asking you what's next because it's so this is what everyone asks when
01:54:35
everyone does when anyone does anything interesting they like what's next they want to know yeah yeah the next
01:54:40
challenge or I have got a lot of ideas I think like one of the big things I would be really what I really love to do
01:54:49
is in some way be part of like documenting other people's Journeys when they go on you know they're starting
01:54:56
from somewhere and they they've got this big thing that they want to do and just like either helping them or being like
01:55:01
in some way do it MH uh so I'd really love to try and do more of that the last year as well like one of the things I struggled with is
01:55:13
it like it was so much everything was geared towards basically helping me run and I've had enough of that you know all of my support team were there basically to
01:55:27
facilitate me running as far as I can every day and it would be nice to do things for other people more than just
01:55:34
everyone doing things for me that's an interesting thought you've had enough of that enough of it being
01:55:41
about you yeah it's interesting R because you're someone that quite clearly through your story wants likes being alone and like lowkey under the
01:55:49
radar do their own thing spend time in my own head M and then exactly that doing exactly that in in you running the length of Africa being alone out there in the Sahara Desert alone has built
01:56:01
this massive [ __ ] audience yeah and all these people watching you that are now like very much compromising in some
01:56:07
respect obviously there's so much privilege and stuff that comes with it but they're compromising the very thing that you loved the most which is you
01:56:14
running from London to Asia alone Asia to London Alone um on your own with the hammock it's never quite going to be the same if you know what I'm saying you can't even walk down the street in London you're like a really distinctive
01:56:27
not recognizable guy as well cuz Ginger beard and stuff well I think it will like it will die down like eventually so I think it's going to be all right it's
01:56:43
just different yeah it's just yeah it's just different just different new set of problems I guess yeah to manage and
01:56:49
stuff yeah you did all of this you know to have the experience you inspired all these people along the way and obviously Central to this was the running charity they do incredible work for people kind
01:57:01
of like yourself that are in that situation where you're looking for guidance yeah you're looking for a sense of purpose and meaning etc etc um how
01:57:09
much how much what was the goal fundraising goal yeah what's your fundraising goal a million a million
01:57:15
yeah and what are you on at the moment when I checked yesterday I think it was 970 I'm not exactly sure what it is now
01:57:22
you've been down to see the work that this charity do haven't you I've worked with the charity for like years you know I used to before I
01:57:30
left I was the adventure guy so I take people take groups of people up climbing mountains or out into nature and we do
01:57:37
stuff I did stuff with fundraisers who were raising money for the charity I mean I I did the AG L Run for
01:57:44
the running charity as well so I've been involved for for four or five years well I have to say Russ you um you inspired
01:57:53
millions of people you don't know this but like when I'm in the gym yeah and I start thinking about quitting the whole
01:57:59
time when you're in Africa I was like [ __ ] Russ is running three marathons today like what the hell am I doing thinking about quck and I it it was this
01:58:05
thought in the back of my head that helped me over and over again when I was in difficult moments when I'm in the gym when I'm thinking about quitting when
01:58:11
I'm thinking about not even doing the workout and I'm like that guy's going to be up today running another 20 well 60k or 100K yeah so it was it was even like
01:58:17
this motivational Force for me in my life and I'm really really appreciative of that but I also know because I've seen the messages and I've seen the
01:58:24
dmss that for many people out there that are Russ at 19 that don't know the path
01:58:30
forward that don't have guidance that don't have something to aim at you've given them a blueprint for how to turn
01:58:38
your life around and there's you've given 19-year-old Russ all the 19-year-old Russ is out there a
01:58:43
blueprint for how to turn your life around and you've given them evidence that it's possible and people in that
01:58:49
situation as you are they don't always believe in it's possible you described the hopelessness and the helplessness of
01:58:55
that situation that's exactly what you've done and also you've raised a [ __ ] ton of money now your goal was to
01:59:02
raise a million pounds which is a ridiculous amount of money um so before we sat down I made a few phone calls you know I'm an investor in a few
01:59:13
companies and I'm on the board of a few companies so I called Julian Hearn at hu and I said listen wouldn't it be
01:59:20
great if uh hu could get behind this and and make sure he hit that Target now there you go wow they've donated the remainder of the cash to you for your
01:59:33
fundraising so you've hit the million pounds and we wanted to say a huge well done and congratulations on behalf of
01:59:40
all of us here D so much man is em Emily here there she is coming in oh sweet thank you so much man man thank you absolutely incredible and I know the
02:00:16
the team at perfect head here they've could you Chuck me this um daqui thing on here this one here again I'm an
02:00:24
investor in this company and uh we we have a partnership together they also energy produced the hardest energy which is a limited edition strawberry daquiri flavored perfect Ted which will be on
02:00:35
sale and I think the proceeds much of the proceeds of this will be donated towards this campaign as well um it begs
02:00:42
the question why strawberry daquiri for some people that don't know why straw daer I don't even know like it just
02:00:47
ended up becoming a thing that I was saying towards throughout the mission I'd be like get me to Tunisian beach for
02:00:53
a strawberry derer and it was in my head and then we finally got it done eh and they're here as well so we'll we'll
02:00:59
include up the link to buy this in the description below so anyone that wants to celebrate your incredible achievement with us will be able to do so we do have
02:01:05
a a last tradition on this podcast it's not not usually how they end but um where the last guest leaves a question
02:01:10
for the next guest not knowing who they're going to be leaving it for S is a good one H there's two questions
02:01:17
interestingly I'm going to ask you both questions cuz they're both applicable okay so first question is if there was a movie about your life which I'm sure
02:01:23
there will be who would you want to play you Ron Weezy really okay in question number two what place do you feel the most comfortable
02:01:34
in and why one of the things I just love doing the most is mid run going to Tesco
02:01:42
getting some snacks and just sitting outside Tesco on the pav and eating my snacks my favorite place ever love doing
02:01:50
that very relatable as always for us thank you so much honestly everything I said then about the inspiration You'
02:01:56
given me is completely true and I I I know that there's so many people out there that feel the same way and you've
02:02:02
made me want to aim higher in in some of the things that I do in my life and pursue bigger challenges and really push myself to the limits because as you've
02:02:07
proven in your life all of the good things are on the other side of some form of discomfort the purpose the
02:02:13
meaning the connection is you proven and like so many people at the moment in society are suffering with their mental
02:02:19
health with a s a lack of sort of a sense of meaninglessness and you're this like this shining example for all of us
02:02:26
this North Star of this first step we have to take to go on that incredible journey so thank you so much Russ mate
02:02:32
thanks for everything you've done I can't honestly I can't thank you enough you made it happen as well so amazing
02:02:41
[Music] oh [Music]