THE thought of walking the length of Southend Pier is enough to tire out some people, but a group of fitness fanatics took it one step further with a unique challenge.
Christie Reilly, 30, and Marc Vincent, both coaches at the F45 gym in Southend, put their stamina to the test by doing burpees and board jumps from one end of the world’s longest pleasure pier to the other.
Their teammate Travis Osborne took on a slightly different challenge by doing lunges across the whole length of the pier.
The trio, who are all from Southend, completed their challenge on Saturday in about one hour and 20 minutes to raise money for the mental health charity Mind.
Alongside six other teammates, they are all planning to take on the UK three peaks challenge, which involves climbing the highest mountains in England, Scotland, and Wales within 24 hours, to support the charity next month.
Travis, a personal trainer at PureGym in Southend, said: “We’ve had our own battles with our mental health and we want to help through personal training and taking on challenges like this to help other people.”
“I was determined to do it without stopping and I did not stop until the very end,” the 30-year-old added.
Marc said the challenge had been inspired by Christie’s reputation for being the “burpee queen”.
The 37-year-old, who also works with Travis at PureGym, said: “She’s a big fan of burpees so we figured why not just do it. It’s more of a mental challenge than anything else.”
Despite battling sore legs after taking on their challenge on the pier, the trio then ran the 1.3-miles back to the shore to celebrate their fundraising efforts.
They are looking forward to taking on their next challenge to support Mind and appreciate being part of a team of like-minded athletes.
Travis added: “By having a group of us to push each other and drive each other up all three mountains is just going to keep us going.”
The group has already raised more than £900. To add to their total, click here.
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