Maidenhead man running the length of the UK on local streets

A Maidenhead man is running the distance from Land’s End to John o’ Groats in honour of his grandmother, who died of dementia.

Luke Sumner is running more than 1,700km, which is greater than the most direct route on the famous course between the far south and far north of the country.

With less than 120 days to go, Luke must average 12.5km a day to complete the challenge, raising money for Dementia UK.

Luke’s grandmother, June Allsopp, died in 2019 from dementia and he is planning to complete the mammoth marathon by June 22, which would have been her 82nd birthday.

“Grandma was a special woman who touched the hearts of everyone she met. She was taken from us in a way which was completely unfair, and cruel to us all,” said Luke.

“She struggled with a disease you would not wish on anyone, completely robbed of everything that made her unique, all her memories snatched from her.”

To complete his run in COVID-19 times, Luke is running routes in Maidenhead, while using an exercise tracking service to map his distance and update a map of his virtual route.

This will show how much of the route he has run thus far. Luke – who is a marathon runner and has been missing marathons since the pandemic – is starting to feel the strain.

“At first I was very motivated and now I’m getting some aches and pains,” Luke said.

“I have barely made a dent in it, and time has gone scarily quick. But Plymouth is in sight, which is giving me extra motivation.

“I’ve lived in Maidenhead my whole life and doing this has shown me roads I didn’t know existed, which is a benefit.”

Luke’s Go-Fund Me page has generated £555 so far can be found at https://gofund.me/71663419