Throughout the course of 2025, we’ve heard of some remarkable fundraising endeavours across the MAN v FAT community. And, as the year wound to a close, one of the MAN v FAT HQ team took on one of the hardest yet.
Joe Hemmingsley, Regional Coordinator for the South Region, participated in a gruelling 24 hour challenge to raise funds for Alzheimer’s UK.
The aim of the challenge was to run 5k on the hour, every hour, for 24 hours. In that time, Joe covered a remarkable 105km, which came to over 100,000 steps and 13,000 calories expended.
With the dust having settled on that event, and Joe now able to walk again without aches and pains, we caught up with him to find out more.
Tell us a bit more about the back story to why you got involved in this event
A fundraiser had been on my mind for a while. After seeing both my Nan and my partner’s Nan suffer for such a long period of time with dementia, I felt a duty to. After losing both of them weeks apart, I was on the hunt for a challenge – to do something in their memory and raise money for such an amazing cause at the same time. I chose the 24-hour event as I wanted the challenge to be brutal. I watched them go through a living hell for months, if not years. It seemed fitting to throw myself in at the deep end – what is 24 hours after all?!
What actually happened on the night? How did you get on during the course of the evening?
We started at 7.00am on the Saturday and finished just after 7.00am on the Sunday (the last 5k took over an hour!). The first half of the challenge was relatively comfortable – each 5k was completed sub 30 minutes, but that QUICKLY changed. At hour 12, we both fell off a proverbial cliff. The original plan was ‘you go, I go’ format, meaning 60km a piece over 24 hours.
After 8 5ks back-to-back, I had no choice but to press on. Spirits were very high during the day, and we had a lot of support. As the night closed in, that is when the challenge became mentally very difficult.
Was it harder than you imagined? How did you make sure you reached the end?
Most definitely! I was under the impression that however hard it got, I could at least walk each 5k within the hour, comfortably. When you are physically that sore, walking 5km within the hour becomes extremely difficult as it is more of a hobble. Injury prevention and management was key to reaching the end. Over the first few runs; I had in my mind that I was going to attempt every hour. However, I had to go against that 8 5kms in. If I hadn’t made that decision, I think reaching the end would have been a struggle. In the end, I completed 105km out of the 120km total.
What did you learn about yourself through the course of the night?
You learn a lot about yourself in those early morning hours. You learn that physically you are a lot more capable than you imagined and mentally you are a lot more resilient than you thought you were. I feel as though management of emotion during those 24 hours has great carryover to the everyday challenges of life. It also makes going out running a lot, lot easier now.
What’s your next challenge?
I have a marathon booked next April, which I am strangely looking forwards to. Following that, I plan on looking into some ‘ultra endurance’ events. What that looks like, only time will tell.
Want to reward Joe for his efforts?
This was a gargantuan effort by Joe and one that the rest of the HQ team are very proud of him for. His fundraising page remains open and you can donate to a very worthy cause here.
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