Teenagers walk for MIND raises over £5k on day five

Three soon-to-be Lymm High School Sixth Form pupils are walking around 10 hours a day as part of the fundraiser. Just five days into the walk, they have already beaten their original target five times.

Adam Boardman, Kristian Coulter and Reece Connell are taking on the challenge following Adam and his dad’s experience with someone preparing to jump from the Cantilever Bridge who was stopped by a woman who gripped him firmly, hence their starting position at Cantilever Park.

The ‘hike for help’ will finish at The Emirates – Arsenal’s home ground - which is the team supported by a family friend of Adam’s who recently took his own life.

“I found the first day quite comfortable, by the second day I started to get blisters. My body wasn’t affected apart from my toes and my toes were in so much pain,” Reece said.

“I’m fine now, my feet are recovering but we’re just speeding up a bit now, getting further and further.”

Adam added: “You see on social media the comfortable side of us getting to stadiums but it’s a bit of a slog for 26-miles getting to each stadium.

“Everyone misses the parts where we get our feet wet and we’re drying socks in trees.

The 16-year-old’s have visited Crewe Alexandra, Stoke City, Hednesford Town, Wolves and West Brom and Birmingham City's grounds so far.

The teenagers took to St Andrew's, the home of Birmingham City on their walk on Wednesday afternoon

Adam continued: “It’s brilliant because I’ve been to a lot of them before through watching City, as it’s been so long since we’ve been able to go, everyone’s been really friendly when we see them.

“West Brom and Hednesford Town have invited us and people who see us walking about have just been really nice to us.”

Two nights in the Premier in West Brom, two nights in Northampton and a couple of nights in St Albans will help take them to a planned finish next Tuesday.

Did they expect this level of support? Adam puts it plainly: “No.

“It’s absolutely phenomenal.

“My original idea was to walk the distance to London, so to not actually go to London just do a few marathons, since Reece said ‘actually why don’t we just walk to London’, it’s just gone crazy so I didn’t expect anywhere near the support that we have got.

“The school and the local community have been brilliant, we’ve had people come out of the Co-op to congratulate us and tell us to keep going, it’s perfect.”

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