How Spencer Matthews overcame grim goat’s head dinner, fly swarms and unbearable heat during record-breaking challenge
HE ran himself into the record books today by completing an unprecedented 30 marathons in 30 days in the unforgiving Jordanian desert.
And now Spencer Matthews, 36, can’t wait to recover from hotfooting it over 1,266km of sand in blistering heat with some home comforts.
Looking tanned and gaunt as he shielded from the blazing sun inside a tent, he told The Sun: “Life just needs to go back to normal for a bit, I think, before considering anything else. I've really missed pizza. I can't wait to have a pizza and a nice cold shower. A normal bed with some air conditioning would be nice.”
But before any of that, he had the small matter of reuniting with his adoring wife Vogue Williams and their two eldest children - Theo and Gigi - at the finish line.
The trio gave him a hero's welcome and lots of kisses and cuddles as he completed his goal close to the Dead Sea.
As unthinkably difficult as the gruelling feat of endurance was, it paled in comparison to the grim conditions he experienced between runs.
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However, Spencer’s smile was unwavering as he recalled eating flesh from a boiled goat's head, battling swarms of flies and sleeping on sweat-soaked mats.
He said: “The biggest low, I suppose, is that it's Groundhog Day. It's exactly the same every single day.
“The marathon has actually become my favourite part of the day because the rest of it is at the best of times pretty grim.”
Each day a camp of sorts was erected close to the end of the planned route - though they were all far removed from the sites you may pitch up in around the British Isles.
He continued: “By camp, I mean a covering like a tent, no air conditioning, no toilets, no running water, rough grounds.
“We each have a mat. They are fluffy and furry. In 40 plus degrees [Celsius], they're not very comfortable.
“You lie on them with as few clothes on as possible because it's very, very hot. You sweat profusely into your mats on a daily basis.”
Holding up the mat to camera, Spencer explained it’s about two metres by 50 centimetres and not too dissimilar to a lilo.
“You eat on those. You relax on those. You sleep on those. You nap on those. That's where you spend the bulk of your day. About 18 hours a day you spend in camp. Obviously, you sleep in that time as well.”
Sleep was difficult to come by at times, with Spencer getting as little as two hours of shut-eye some nights before having to get up and run another marathon.
Though he found little sympathy, telling me: “No one gives a sh*t if you sleep for two hours.”
The sheer scale of the desert and its remoteness surprised him, with up to 100km between towns and villages, while the local cuisine was of an acquired taste meaning he went hungry for long periods of time.
“It's not like there is nothing in these towns,” he said. “We've come across the odd chicken shop that's all right, but there's nothing. There's no supermarkets.
“It's quite a difficult place to exist unless you're from here. It's certainly very new to us. We were served a goat's head for dinner, which of course is an interesting dish, but it was a goat's head that was boiled and then put on a tray with some rice around it.
“That's it. You're just picking its face off its skull and eating it. I'm starving a lot of the time.
“I don't want to make it sound like a terrible experience because it's been one of the best experiences of my life. Camp is something I hadn't really accounted for. It is not nice.”
The camp conditions were so bad that Spencer banned Vogue and their kids from joining him days ahead of the finish.
“This is no place for kids,” he said.
“Vogue would last less than five minutes in one of these camps. That's no poor reflection on her. It's deeply unpleasant.
“Contrast that with the earlier camps in Wadi Rum Desert. Insane, amazing, no flies, beautiful, canyons, sunsets, sunrises, insane stars, shooting stars. All that's been gone for a little while now.”
Chef Thomas Straker opens up on joining Spencer Matthews in the desert...
Thomas's role in the desert challenge stemmed from a conversation he had with Spencer in his Notting Hill restaurant Straker's earlier this year. Intrigued by the adventure as well as the charitable intent, Thomas travelled to Jordan for the 22nd leg of the challenge and his marathon was documented on Spencer's Instagram. Here, Thomas tells us about his experience:
"The man's an animal.
"I mean, he was in good form. I wasn't apprehensive. I could see he had a good team around him, they all seemed to have a nice rapport. They'd been together for three weeks, you know, without seeing anyone else.
"I was very conscious that I had to go in there with good energy and be like a breath of fresh air in the camp. You know, I wasn't sure what to expect and it's a life experience; I'm very open to that sort of stuff. We slept underneath the stars on these little mats; the Bedouin chaps were cooking us dinner.
"It's a surreal experience, you know, it's like me sleeping out in the desert. Good headspace, no phone signal, perfect. Looking back on it, that experience was so, so amazing. As well as the running was great
"It was tough, man. Running on the sands, not easy.
"Sometimes it felt like you're treading water. I'd only been doing 5Ks in London, like I was just chilling, you know. I've been just like not overly stretching myself.
"I didn't do any training, to be honest. I've got this run club in London, so I was doing like a 5K on a Tuesday and maybe a couple more 5Ks, just keeping it nice and light.
"I'm quite full on with work at the moment, so I didn't want to exhaust myself. But I knew I had it in me mentally. I've done a few marathons now and I know what it takes, but it's obviously much more difficult in the heat.
"They were like, 'oh, you know, if you get tired, you can just sit in the van for like the next 10K if you want'. I was like, f**k that, man. I'm here to run.
"I've always thought about doing something cool or different. It's not cheap to do it, firstly. It takes time.
"Time is at a premium at the moment for me, especially. And then with all the new businesses and stuff going on, I just have to be there. Meeting someone like Chris Taylor, who put the trip together for Spencer, that's the kind of person who you need. Those are the kind of people you need to meet, to be like, 'right, what can I do?'
"Being a chef working in London all my career, 16 years now, sometimes you feel like you're sheltered and you want to get out of your comfort zone."
It was the relentless harassment from flies that proved particularly troublesome deep into the challenge.
“There's a real fly issue in some camps if you're near a plantation,” he said. “I don't know what they do, by the way, like grow or whatever, but they call them plantations.
“I mean you're racing around outside, eating your food. If you sat still, there'd be all of your food all over you.
“You can't nap because you're just repeatedly slapping yourself in the face to get rid of them. It doesn't sound like it would be a big issue, but I actually can't tell you the level of frustration that comes with these flies.
“They disappear at 6.30pm on the dot. It's like they're late for something. They literally just vanish.”
The military precision of the whole operation, which was eight months in the making, is what Spencer credits with helping to keep that smile on his face, as well as the knowledge that his efforts were raising a huge sum of money for Global’s Make Some Noise charity, which helps people all over the UK.
He was also joined by a stellar team without which the challenge would not have come to fruition. Those men are running coach Chris Taylor, physio Jonny Heath, Dr. Joshua Alisson, and videographer Matt Stone.
Then there was guest runner, celebrity chef and founder of British butter company All Things Butter, Thomas Straker, who decided to join Spencer for the 22nd leg of his Great Desert Challenge after an encounter at his West London restaurant earlier in the year.
The slick plan was also responsible for Spencer receiving messages from some awestruck followers who claimed he was making it look easy.
“I personally don't think that these challenges have to revolve around pain and misery and jeopardy,” said Spencer. “Jeopardy is the antithesis of good preparation.
I've really missed pizza. I can't wait to have a pizza and a nice cold shower. A normal bed with some air conditioning would be nice.”
Spencer Matthews
“If you're well prepared for something, in an ideal world, there won't be any jeopardy. I'm getting a few messages saying, you're making this look really easy. It's good.
“That means I'm doing a really good job. When I get a message like that, it just makes me think the team are professional, the plan is working.
“Every day is the same, but we are grinding through a plan that we created earlier this year. This challenge for me started in January. This isn't a 30-day thing.
“I've been getting as prepared as I humanly can be to succeed. I don't want to come out here and fail. So I've done everything I can to make sure that I don't.”
STAYING POSITIVE
Among the supportive messages he received was one from 'The Hardest Geezer', Russ Cook, who earlier this year became the first person to run the entire length of Africa.
It meant a lot as Spencer had followed Russ’s Africa run with interest and was impressed by his mental fortitude.
“I think I engaged with Russ's efforts more because of his energy,” said Spencer. “Obviously, his athletic achievement was crazy as well, but the thing that I was more taken by with him was his enthusiasm for life.
“His general nature made me very interested in him as a person, instead of what he could have been doing. I'm sure he had tons of issues along the way, but he chose to focus on energetic, positive messaging.
“Which is exactly how I would want to be in this situation, and I think how I have been.”
The driven family man Spencer is today is unrecognisable from his 20-something self.
Back then he was a party-loving Made In Chelsea star who had an alcohol problem so severe that he could have died had he not taken drastic action.
These days he runs the successful non-alcoholic beverage brand Clean Co. and very rarely drinks.
“Running's really changed my life,” he said. “I've come a really, really long way from where I was a few years ago. I'm really proud of myself, which is a beautiful feeling to have.
“I've lived for many years in shame of my own behaviour and my own actions. So, to feel like I've come out of that and, touch wood, all being well, have managed to achieve this completely unprecedented, wild task will be a new chapter in my life.
“I really don't know what will come of it, but there will be more of it, I think, because I think I'm pretty good at it. It's a nice thing to feel sometimes.”
MORE TO COME
Though he’s no stranger to endurance events having already completed the Marathon des Sables and a Jungle Ultra Marathon, Spencer believes this record-breaking feat could spur him on to even greater achievements.
He said: “I've really loved this, the adventurous side of it and the pushing yourself to extreme limits. I hope it inspires some other people to start running or increase their velocity of running or their distance or their mileage and push themselves to do that thing that they might feel is impossible. Because I can tell you that from where I was to where I am now, I believe that anything is possible at this stage.
“I find it really annoying when people say, anything is possible, but I can't tell you where I was five or six years ago compared to now. So, I do feel like with a bit of dedication, hard work and action, you can really make positive change in your life. I hope this inspires somebody to go out there and do something cool.”
There’s no doubt he has achieved that goal and then some.
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