EMMET RYANon why he is going to walk 500 miles in 28 days and how he is going to do it
WALKING FROM Malin to Mizen is a risky endeavour for anyone but the problems are compounded when you’re larger than the average athlete.
On Saturday I will start off on a 28-day and 500-mile journey that begins in Malin Head and ends in Mizen Head, taking in most of the western sea board along the way.
Suffice to say I had a few drinks on me when I first thought about doing this challenge, which is in aid of the Cystic Fibrosis Association of Ireland. The prospects of chaffing or other problems caused by my weight of 20 stone would not cross my mind for several months after that fateful trip to the pub.
The Proclaimers' song 500 Mileswas the inspiration for the distance of the challenge. The aim of the route, which stays west until turning inland at Limerick, was to find a path that took in the most towns possible to ensure plenty of access to supplies and accommodation.
Over the four weeks my body, in particular the lower half, will be subjected to an unmerciful beating.
“This is an extremely difficult challenge,” according to Denise McGrath, a PhD researcher in biomechanics at UCD.
“I see shin splints and tight calves, low back pain, neck and shoulder pain, chaffing, and blisters, blisters and more blisters.”
My weight will not help in avoiding these complaints. Listening to my body will prove critical throughout the walk in order to stave off injury.
“In the presence of fatigue, the continuous loading imposed on the body in walking these distances will become too high for the body to adequately attenuate, and the probability of injury increases massively,” says McGrath.
“So while fatigue will be your constant companion over these 28 gruelling days, it is very important to keep it at an acceptable level by taking regular rests when you feel you need it,” she says.
“It is reasonable to suppose that a man of your size may experience fatigue sooner than a lighter counterpart for reasons that Sir Isaac Newton presented many years ago.”
Even taking these measures however won’t prevent some nasty irritations occurring over the course of the four-week journey. Spending several hours on the road every day is going to cause some problems no matter what I do.
“You will sweat for long periods while walking, so chaffing of the inner thigh, groin area, armpits and nipples can be a problem,” says McGrath.
“This is especially true for bigger people where body parts such as the thighs are touching off each other, and it can make for an extremely uncomfortable experience.”
All in all it sounds like a rather unpleasant experience. On top of the irritations, McGrath cites some rather serious injuries I should be concerned about.
Repetitive stress on one part of a body, usually as a result of over-use, can cause substantial problems.
“Every time you take a step, your joints all the way up your body are going to have to absorb the ground reaction force,” says Dr Brian Caulfield, head of the school of physiotherapy and performance science in UCD.
A 500-mile walk comprises over one million steps, that’s a lot for a body’s joints to absorb. The excess weight I have to lug around will make this feel even longer.
“Anybody who is carrying extra weight will have extra loading to absorb. That means more strain on their joints, more work required by the muscles and more strain on the tendons and ligaments,” says Caulfield.
A good walking style can reduce the toll this takes. By keeping my toes pointing forward, the strain on joints is far less than if they are pointing overly inward or outward.
“Your knee cap runs along a relatively shallow channel that is created by bony structures of your femur and your tibia,” says Caulfield.
“If it is moving up and down in an orderly fashion, then it shouldn’t bump off anything it isn’t supposed to. If you have any kind of mal-alignment, then the patella isn’t going to rub up and down perfectly,” he says.
This can cause friction on the underside of the patella and cause patella-femoral pain.
“You are likely to end up with some knee pain. Around your heel area, over the course of 28 days, you will end up getting a lot of problems with skin break down,” says Caulfield.
All of this sounds rather nasty, to put it mildly. It begs the question, what could motivate someone, not just me, to take on such a difficult challenge?
This weekend Gerard Fay is walking around a GAA pitch in Drogheda for 24 hours, only taking breaks to go to the toilet. Earlier this summer a group of 10 people from Dublin walked a route slightly different from my own from Mizen Head to Malin Head. Both of these were for the same charity as the walk I’m doing.
Having a cause of any kind plays a key mental role in enabling people doing such challenges to complete them.
“Usually what happens is there is an intellectual decision beforehand; that you want to do this and why you do this, which in your case is to support the Cystic Fibrosis Association,” says Dr Brendan Kelly, senior lecturer in psychiatry in UCD.
“Once you take the first step, as you go on, it becomes more about completing the task. That’s really useful because it allows you to put the intellectual agonising as to why you should do this completely to bed,” says Kelly.
“It’s really interesting for charity walks. It lets you be more mindful of what you are doing in the moment because your motivation can not be questioned.”
Comparatively, were I just walking 500 miles for the hell of it, Kelly says I would be far more likely to give up in the middle of it.
“There may be more efficient ways to raise money for charity but you are managing to twin it with something you like doing,” he says.
“You largely deal with the ‘should I keep going?’ question as there are now people relying on you and you have made a very public commitment.”
While this may sound like a score line of Emmet 1: psychological issues 0, there are going to be mental issues to address during the walk.
As I’m walking solo for most of the journey, my ability to interact with people when I’m not walking will be affected.
“What’s going to probably happen is that as the days go by, and you have six or seven hours alone, you are going to start resenting meeting people,” says Kelly.
“My guess is that you will become very comfortable being on your own. As the evening comes you will mildly resent meeting people,” he says. “You will have this interesting mix that will be mildly unsettling.”
To maintain sanity, Kelly says I should focus on the moment and the immediate environment. With one million steps ahead, it will be tough not to let my thoughts wander.
Trotting out the numbers
■ One million: steps along the route of the walk.
■ 40,000: steps every day.
■ 500: miles covered over
the journey.
■ 125: hours walking on the road.
■ 30: kilometres walked on average every day.
■ 28: days continuously walking.
■ 19: marathon distances covered over the course of the four weeks.
Emmet Ryan is walking the 500 miles in aid the Cystic Fibrosis Association of Ireland.
You can follow his progress with daily blog updates at www.walkforcf.ie or via Twitter at twitter.com/walkforcf