Sheffield man set to conquer 24 peaks in 24 hours for charity after death of close friend

Matt Truswell, 32, from Greenhill in Sheffield will take on the ultimate 24 Peaks challenge with friends in the lake district this September to raise vital funds for a heart charity after close friend, James Murgatroyd unexpectedly died of an undiagnosed heart condition over four years ago.

The 24 peaks challenge, taking place between September 10 and 12, is a two-day challenge in the Lake District involving strenuous exercise and a walking distance of 31 miles, testing both endurance and strength.

Money raised will go to Cardiac Risk in the Young, a charity that aims to prevent young sudden cardiac deaths through awareness, screening and research, and they also give support to affected families.

Matt said: “It’s the equivalent of climbing Mount Snowdon twice each day, so it's one of the hardest walking challenges in England; it's harder than the national three peaks type of thing.

“We're doing it for cardiac risk in the young charity as one of our friends passed away from an undiagnosed heart condition about five years ago, and effectively, over the last year, lots of fundraising has been cancelled.

“We've had events cancelled that we normally run, we do a charity gig every year, which raises a few thousand, and we’ve missed out on that.”

He added: “The main thing is that the charity has had to cancel free heart screenings, so all the money we raise pays for heart screenings for 14 to 35-year-olds, and anyone in the UK can go and access them, you can find them online, and you can go and get checked out.”

The group have set up a fundraising page and are hoping to collect £6,000 to cover the cancellation of a charity gig held every year.

They need to raise at least £4,500 by the end of June to hit targets set by the charity and company managing the challenge on the day.

Speaking about the fundraising, Matt said: “It's a really big target that we’ve got, and it's a really hard challenge, we chose it because it was so difficult and we didn't want something that we could easily do, the whole point of it is to be challenging.

"Fundraising that we've done in the past has diagnosed heart problems in people and has saved lives in the past.

"So the big thing is that we don’t want anyone else to go what we've been through, so we want to help save more lives.”

The 32-year-old has been preparing for the challenge by doing 15, and 20 mile walks in The Peak District to get his body conditioned for the 12-hour back-to-back walk.

To help Matt and his friends raise vital funds, you can donate to the fundraising page at www.justgiving.com/fundraising/milesformurg and also visit https://www.c-r-y.org.uk/ for information about heart screenings.