WALKING side-by-side for 100 kilometres is how a group of keen Ballarat bootcampers are trying to help stop world poverty.
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RPH Bootcamp has 28 walkers, with a team of support staff, set to trek the Dandenong Ranges in the Oxfam Trailwalker Melbourne from 9.30am Friday.
The Ballarat team hopes to complete the course in 24 consecutive hours. RPH Bootcamp co-director Richie Wynd said the group’s aim was to ensure everyone finished, even if it took a little longer. Mr Wynd said the team wanted to defy the event trend that 58 per cent of teams finish with four walkers.
“We did it before with everyone finishing Tough Mudder and we want to do it again,” Mr Wynd said.
"It's going to be hard - not only physically but mentally. One hundred kilometres is a long way and to walk it in 24 hours is brutal. Our body will be tortured. We'll have no sleep, but we just need to remain focused on the hard times people all round the world face on a daily basis. That's our motivation.”
The trail walk will be the first endurance event for most RPH Bootcamp members. They train twice a week at 6am and in the past few months, have stepped out about the region for longer walks each weekend in preparation.
Mr Wynd said his group had racked up a whole lot of blisters but they had really enjoyed exploring Ballarat and its surrounds from a new perspective.
“Labor Day weekend we went up to the Grampians, which was beautiful and there are heaps of trails about Ballarat, like the Goldfields trail that between here and Daylesford,” Mr Wynd said. “That’s a lot of training together. We all knew each other but by spending so much time together, we’ve made some really good mates out of it.”
The Ballarat group primarily consists of police officers, nurses, teachers, hairdressers and business people. About 15 support crew will meet them at each check-point and feed stop.
Mr Wynd said stops would be brief because it was so hard to get going again.
RPH Bootcamp has exceeded its target to raise $20,000 for the walk. People can still add to their growing tally can do so via event website, trailwalker.oxfam.org.au, and search for the RPH team of any team member by name. Oxfam Trailwalker raises more than $7 million each year with its events in Australia for its programs.
