by Tom Watson
‘Through #Adventures4Health, I want to show other people what is possible as an individual and how easy it is to access so many different activities, in every part of the country,’ I stated in the OIA press release. ‘We face a growing inactivity epidemic in the UK and it’s killing people, but it doesn’t have to be this way.’
Over this half-year period I’d also be raising funds for four different charities: the Albion Foundation (West Bromwich Albion FC’s community scheme); SpecialEffect (an organisation that uses video games to enhance the lives of disabled people); Lumos (an NGO founded by J. K. Rowling that promotes an end to the institutionalisation of children around the world); and the Cystic Fibrosis Trust, which funds research into therapies and treatments to help those with the condition live longer and healthier lives. All four causes were very close to my heart, and many of my friends, colleagues and family members were kind enough to donate to my fundraising webpage.
‘Two years ago, if you’d have asked me who’d be a hundred pounds lighter and climbing Snowdon, you would have been last on the list,’ said Dave Ashlee, my old mate from school.
The first of the four challenges, the trek up Snowdon (or Yr Wyddfa), took place on Saturday 18 May. As an experienced hiker and climber, Andrew Denton had given me plenty of advice beforehand to ensure that I was well-prepared and well-equipped. Sturdy, ankle-supporting footwear was essential, as was a decent waterproof and layers of extra-warm clothing (not forgetting a flask and a lunchbox). While Snowdon was one of the most accessible and enjoyable mountains to scale – thousands did so each year – every climber had to have their wits about them. Weather conditions on the peak were unpredictable, even in spring and summer, and the environment could easily become treacherous. ‘Four seasons in one day’ commonly occurred on Snowdon, which often meant starting the ascent on a warm and sunny morning, yet still meeting thick clouds and plummeting temperatures as you reached the summit.
Our 20-strong climbing party stayed overnight at the Plas y Brenin National Outdoor Centre, waking up at 4.30 a.m. to catch the minibus to the foot of the mountain (by arriving earlier, we hoped to avoid the weekend throng). As we drew nearer, and I caught sight of the summit dominating the skyline, I could barely believe this was happening. Eighteen months previously I’d struggled to get up a stepladder, let alone a mountain, yet I now found myself preparing to tackle the highest peak in England and Wales (the site of Sir Edmund Hillary’s pre-Everest training, no less).
In our group that morning, other than Andrew and some industry representatives, were members of my Westminster team, including my parliamentary assistants Jo Dalton, Sarah Coombes, Haf Davies, Danny Adilypour and Nicole Trehy. It was something of a cross-party affair, too, since also joining us that day was the Conservative MP for Wyre Forest, Mark Garnier, and his wife Caroline.
‘How are you feeling, Tom?’ he asked as we assembled at the starting point.
‘Nerves are starting to kick in a bit,’ I replied. ‘Fear of the unknown, I reckon…’
We were accompanied by an experienced guide, Jason Rawles, who had kindly agreed to donate his time and his vast experience to keep us safe on the ascent. We took the Pyg track, which is considered one of the easier-to-follow paths and so was well suited to those, like me, with limited hill-walking experience. Nevertheless, the first few hundred metres of the climb were incredibly tough going – the incline was steep, and the terrain was rugged – and, as I dug in my heels, and inhaled the thin air, I could feel panic starting to rise.
I’m not so sure I can make it to the top, I thought, as I puffed and panted up the rocky path.
‘You’re doing great, Tom,’ said Andrew, hanging back from the front of the group, and falling into step with me. ‘It levels out soon, I promise.’
Indeed, for the next couple of hours the intensity of the slog relented and, as I finally relaxed into the climb, I even took the opportunity to rekindle my love of Ordnance Survey maps. I could vaguely remember how to navigate using an OS and a compass – I’d done a spot of orienteering in my teenage years – and really enjoyed deciphering the map symbols and figuring out the grid references.
‘It’s a lot easier navigating this than Brexit, that’s for sure,’ I said to Nick Giles, the MD of Ordnance Survey, who had come on the climb with us and had despatched a few handy hints and tips along the way. I also found myself having a great chat with Simon McGrath, Communications Director of the Camping and Caravanning Club, who got me thinking about investing in a second-hand campervan one day in the future and travelling around the UK’s glorious coastline every weekend.
As the final ascent began, however, via a long, steep and arduous incline, my capacity for conversation diminished. We had been climbing for almost three hours and my energy levels started to dip; instead of chatting, for the last stretch I concentrated solely on my breathing and my footing.
It was around 10.30 a.m. that the group finally reached Snowdon’s majestic summit, 1,085 metres above sea level. My first #Adventures4Health challenge had been completed. It felt tremendous to conquer this giant of a mountain, and to achieve this personal milestone, and there were many whoops, hugs and selfies as #TeamSnowdon celebrated our feat.
‘So when are we tackling Ben Nevis and Scafell Pike, then?’ I asked Jo as we headed to the Summit Café for a much-needed refuel. My tweet later that day summed up my feeling of euphoria.
@tom_watson
Two years ago – aged 50, weighing 22 stone, with T2 diabetes – climbing to the summit of Snowdon was unfathomable. Today, 100lb lighter and in remission from T2, I’ve done it. Thank you everyone for your amazing support and inspiration.
The second component of my #Adventures4Health challenge – the kayak paddle, in partnership with British Canoeing – took place two months later, on Saturday 20 July. The plan was to wind my way down a nine-mile (14.5-kilometre) stretch of waterways in my native West Midlands, commencing in Tipton and culminating in Birmingham city centre. As the event drew nearer, I took some time out to promote the ‘Clear Access, Clear Water’ campaign. An initiative spearheaded by British Canoeing, in conjunction with key stakeholders like the Canal & River Trust and the Inland Waterways Association, it called for cleaner, healthier waters, and championed increased public access to our amazing ‘blue’ spaces. Nine million UK citizens live within a five-minute walk of these waterways – there are more canals in the Black Country than in Venice, believe it or not – but only 4 per cent of waterways are open to canoeists since, on the whole, they flow through privately owned land.
The challenge itself was more toilsome than I’d expected. There was no current on the canal to buffet me along, and I was faced with a stiff breeze and a steady drizzle. However, thanks to the previous week’s practice session with British Canoeing, I managed to stay afloat without capsizing. Encouraging me mile by mile were my fellow paddlers, a diverse group that included novices like me as well as elite athletes like Lizzie Broughton, a world champion canoe sprinter; I could only watch in awe as she effortlessly glided through the water, barely causing a ripple (unlike my rather splash-happy self).
As I weaved my way through my West Bromwich constituency I passed countless joggers and dog-walkers on the towpath. They included an elderly lady with a Border collie, who looked on with amusement as her bedraggled MP lifted a kayak over a canal lock.
‘Good morning, Mr Watson,’ she said. ‘Having fun?’
‘I think so,’ I said with a smile, before scrambling back into the kayak.
Around the halfway stage, my son Malachy, together with his good friends Ned, Frank and Oscar, donned their life jackets and safety helmets and joined our flotilla. It had taken some cajoling the previous day to persuade them to take part (these teenagers were way too cool to canoe) but, as it happened, he and his pals had a whale of a time doing something a little different with their Saturday. Just before lunchtime, we arrived to a warm welcome at our final destination, Birmingham’s Brindleyplace complex (named after genius ca
nal engineer James Brindley, and home to the Malt House pub where, during the 1998 G8 Summit, Tony Blair had bought Bill Clinton a pint).
Completing this three-and-a-half-hour paddle – arm-achingly gruelling though it was – may not have provoked the same sense of euphoria as climbing Snowdon. That didn’t mean that I felt any less proud of myself, however, for clambering into a kayak and testing my mettle.
A week or so later, I found myself back on the water. I had caught the kayaking bug – I’d loved the peace and tranquillity of it all – and when my mate John, an amateur canoeist, had invited me to join him I’d leapt at the chance.
‘It’s a lovely evening, Tom…’ he’d texted after work one Friday. ‘Fancy a paddle down the Severn?’
‘You betcha,’ I’d replied.
With his second-hand, two-man craft strapped onto the roof of his car, my mate and I headed off to Arley, a quaint riverside village near Kidderminster, before spending an idyllic couple of hours messing about on the river while reminiscing about eighties music, all against the backdrop of a mellow summer sunset.
Spending quality time in the great outdoors altered my whole perspective on fitness and exercise, and led to a certain change of heart. Back in London, I’d still been attending the upmarket gym in Mayfair and was nearing the end of my intensive 12-week weight training programme. Having benefited so much from the Snowdon climb and the Midlands paddle, though – on a physical, mental and social level – I soon realised that indoor iron-pumping was nowhere near as enjoyable. Working out in the gym was a largely solitary endeavour, taking place in a high-pressure environment, and I often found it a little dull and monotonous. To be frank, I think an element of vanity had taken over, too. Buoyed by my ‘transformation’, I’d become a tad obsessed with the pursuit of looking better and feeling stronger, and had been seduced by the lure of a swanky gym. The weight training had helped me lose over a stone in two months, granted, but I didn’t feel that this schedule was sustainable in the long term. Not only did it sap far too much of my time and money, the associated four-meals-a-day diet regime had become increasingly difficult to implement. All the measuring was an onerous responsibility, even for me, on quite a disciplined nutritional programme anyway, and it just wasn’t as enjoyable as cycling in and out of a keto diet.
So I decided to stop attending the posh gym, for fear of turning into a shallow, self-obsessed London luvvie. There were no hard feelings with the staff – they were superb at what they did, and I genuinely appreciated their expert tuition – but it just wasn’t for me any more. I would still work with weights (albeit on a much smaller scale, at a much cheaper venue) but would now place much more emphasis on outdoor, health-by-stealth recreational pursuits. I would instead burn up those calories by walking up a hill for five miles, with the sun on my skin, fresh air in my lungs, a friend by my side and nature all around.
Within two weeks of the paddling challenge, on Sunday 4 August, I was preparing to cycle the Prudential RideLondon. Attracting thousands of cyclists of all abilities every year, this hugely popular event was one component of a weekend-long festival of amateur and professional cycling, which saw eight miles of the capital’s roads being cordoned off to make them totally, blissfully, traffic-free.
To say that I was nervous, however, was an under-statement. If truth be told, I was absolutely bricking it. The whole ride was being broadcast on TV, there’d be thousands of spectators on the sidelines, and the potential for the public humiliation of a prominent politician going arse-over-tit on his bike was huge (I still had nightmares about catapulting myself into a thicket of nettles). That week I’d not done as much pre-ride training as I’d have liked, either, since there’d been a raft of Brexit-related crises at Westminster. However, I did manage to shoehorn in a couple more Bikeability sessions. I had never really mastered my new bicycle’s gears, especially when going uphill, so asked the instructor to explain, in the simplest of terms, the difference between the big cog and the little cog.
‘When you’re approaching an incline, Tom, you have to move down the gears by using the shifter on the handlebars,’ he said, demonstrating on his own bike. ‘This then moves the chain to a different cog, and you’ll find there’s a lot less resistance.’
‘Ah, I get it,’ I said, as the penny finally dropped.
On the morning of the ride I fuelled up with a supersized full English breakfast, and glugged down plenty of water, before heading out to Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in east London. The weather was perfect – warm and sunny, with a gentle breeze – and I felt a frisson of excitement every time I spotted a fellow cyclist sporting a race number on their back. At around 10 a.m. I met my pals James and Mark at the starting line, as well as a colleague of mine, Ruth Cadbury MP, who was the chair of our parliamentary cycling group. While all three were far more experienced in the saddle than me (they’d each completed similar ‘sportives’ in the past), they promised to ride alongside me for the entire course, which I really appreciated.
As our little group wound our way through Canary Wharf, and then Hyde Park, my friends handed me energy gels and protein bars (so that’s what those little back pockets on cycling tops were used for) and, whenever they noticed me struggling up a hill, despite my much-improved gear control, they offered me some welcome words of encouragement.
‘C’mon Tom,’ said my pal James. ‘Work those calves…’
‘Doing my best, mate,’ I panted.
There was plenty of support from the spectators on the sidelines, too (one boisterous group virtually willed me up a steep hill in Wimbledon) and a fair few people spotted me along the route. About halfway through the ride, another cyclist – a forty-something guy sporting a Motor Neurone Disease Association T-shirt – pedalled over.
‘Great to see you, Tom,’ he said. ‘I had to come over to say hi. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t be doing this today. I read an interview you did last year, which shocked me into sorting out my own diabetes. I’m in remission now. Can’t thank you enough.’
‘That’s brilliant, mate,’ I grinned. ‘Enjoy the rest of the ride.’
The last leg of the challenge saw our little peloton cycling past Parliament Square, where hundreds of people had gathered to cheer on the riders. Ruth and I couldn’t help but laugh when we caught sight of this. In our day job we were accustomed to this large expanse of grass being overrun with Leave and Remain protesters wielding loudhailers, haranguing passing MPs and disrupting media broadcasts. On this occasion, however, the vibe had changed completely.
It was at the junction of Horse Guards Road and the Mall, with fifty metres of the ride remaining, that I caught a glimpse of Malachy and Saoirse, standing on the corner with their gran. Their cries of ‘Go, Dad, go!!!’ were ringing in my head as I crossed the finish line, feeling exhausted but exultant.
My final #Adventures4Health challenge – a half-mile open swim – promised to be the most punishing task of all. Swim Serpentine, organised by London Marathon Events to raise money for the charity Children With Cancer, was arranged for the morning of Saturday 21 September. As with the cycle ride, my preparation had been somewhat limited. The Brexit situation at Westminster, including Boris Johnson’s proroguing of parliament, had been all-consuming and, save a few lengths of the pool during a week-long summer break in Spain, I’d hardly swum a stroke.
I had managed to get my hands on a few related books, however, which introduced me to a subculture of open-water swimming that I never knew existed. One of them – Pondlife: A Swimmer’s Journal by writer and poet Al Alvarez – was particularly brilliant, detailing as it did this elderly gent’s invigorating, all-weather swims in various pools and ponds around the north London suburb of Hampstead.
‘The water was just above freezing, the wind howled, the rain stung my face when I swam on my back,’ he wrote after one such dip. ‘I came out feeling wonderful.’
As things transpired, though – and much to my disappointment – I was unable to tackle the Serpentine swim that S
aturday morning. I had to rush down to the Labour Party conference in Brighton much earlier than anticipated, faced with a crisis that required my urgent attention. The event organisers were very sympathetic, however, and I pledged to undertake the swim when it next came around.
Between May and September, I’d experienced three diverse challenges, each with their own set of demands. But it happened to be another event that summer that left the deepest emotional impact. The third annual RunForJo – set up in memory of my friend and colleague, the late MP Jo Cox – took place on Sunday 23 June at Oakwell Hall and Country Park, in her former constituency of Batley and Spen in West Yorkshire. My lack of fitness had prevented me from taking part in the two previous events (I couldn’t have even walked the 2.5-km family fun run, never mind jogged it) but, this time around, I was delighted to enrol. It was a case of being more willing than ready, though. I had never tackled an organised run in my life, so had no idea how I’d fare. I would, however, have my very own running mate to spur me on.
‘Dad, can I do the RunForJo with you?’ Saoirse had asked a few weeks previously, extremely keen to get involved in this worthy event.
‘Of course you can,’ I replied. ‘You can be my pacemaker.’ I had to really steel myself as I drove through Jo’s home town of Batley that morning, with both Saoirse and Malachy in the car (my son had come along to offer moral support). In 2015 I’d campaigned with Jo on those very streets and doorsteps, when she was first running for parliament. This particular constituency was by no means a nailed-on hold for Labour but, as we visited community centres and chatted with residents, I was convinced that this impressive young woman was the ideal candidate. Highly intelligent, innately compassionate and in possession of a warm and sunny disposition, Jo attracted a string of admirers wherever she went.
Jo will go far, I remember thinking to myself as I watched her campaigning that day, winning over locals with her effortless charm. A natural-born parliamentarian…
