Mansfield Town staff taking on epic walking challenge for mental health support
Three members of the Mansfield Town Community Trust team are preparing to take on an epic 77km walk next month.
Alex Cartwright, Mitchell Scotford and Bradley Giles will be walking from Huddersfield Town FC’s John Smith’s Stadium to the Stags’ One Call Stadium between December 5 and December 7, aiming to arrive in Mansfield in time for the Stags clash with the Terriers on the Saturday.
The challenge is in aid of Mansfield Town Community Trust’s mental health support sessions and the trio are aiming to raise £2,000 to aid the continuations of session which they say are key in providing peer support, tackling isolation, and providing emotional wellbeing to those who need it the most.
To help with the challenge, the team is now seeking out support from local businesses to either support with services, equipment, donations, or financial contribution towards the trek.
To help support the walk, visit https://tinyurl.com/mtctwalk
Anyone supporting will have their business shared through the trust’s social media channels and will automatically become one of the trust’s ‘community partners’.
Alex said: "I think the furthest the three of us have ever walked before this is from the ground to the pub, but we’re all fairly fit, so we’re hopeful we can achieve this.
"The distance isn’t too bad, it’s the elevation that will be the challenge.
"We’ve had few businesses reach out to us already, but we’re looking for more to come through and we thought this was a nice fixture to focus on and we thought we could make something of it and the Huddersfield Community Trust people will be there to see us off at the John Smith’s Stadium too.
Alex says the reason for doing the walk and raising the money is to ensure the trust’s vital mental health support services can continue.
He continued: "With the purse strings tightened by the Government, we want to ensure we keep these sessions going for the people that benefit from them so much.
"We’ve felt the effects close to us through one of our staff members tragically losing his brother a few years ago and since then we’ve worked a lot more closely with mental health services in the area and seen that connection and support through the local community and we’re hoping to progress that a bit more.”