Meet the Perth legend running 60 marathons in 60 days to raise funds for mental health

For most of us just tryna get those 10K steps in each day is a step too far, but for WA local Mitchell Grey 10K is set to be just one of many (many) walks in the park over the next couple of months.

A site engineer with global construction company Multiplex, Grey will be running 60 marathons in 60 days in support of Perth-based mental health charity 20Talk.

This enormous feat will see him running over 2,500 kilometres, the approximate distance between Perth and our Adelaide!

It’s a deeply personal project for Grey, who originally began running in an effort to manage his own mental health struggles.

“A few years ago, I was struggling a lot with anxiety, stress, and depression and running helped get me to the other side of it,” he says. “Now that I’m in a good place, I wanted to use my running to take on a challenge big enough to raise a significant amount of money and awareness around mental health.”

Inspired by the likes of online sensation Nedd Brockman, Grey will also be running the marathons while balancing work life – one of the main sticking points for us average joes on a day-to-day basis – to help show people it can be done.

“Over the years I have seen so many people lose friends or family to suicide and it breaks my heart thinking that they could have been saved if they had the right means of support,” Grey says. “Mental health is also such a prevalent issue in the construction industry and I’d love for this to help start the conversation about mental health on sites across Australia.”

20Talk is a local youth mental health charity helping young adults integrate mental health tools and skills into their daily lives, and founder Leighton Bradfield says the money raised will help the organisation support many more young people around WA.

“20Talk began after my co-founder and I lost two close friends to suicide in 2018. We came together at my parents’ house to understand why we were losing our mates. Soon after we realised it was because the support networks were clunky, out of touch and not relatable to the common young person,” says Broadfield.

“The additional funding is going to help 20Talk expand our free one-day Mental Health Maintenance scholarship program into more universities and TAFES in WA. This specific program gives young adults the proactive tools to take charge of their mental health and tackle life’s challenges.”

Grey initially set out to raise $100,000 via GoFundMe, and has incredibly already smashed that goal before he even started, with the 60-day challenge set to kick off today, Wednesday 10 April.

As a result, Grey now hopes to raise $250,000, something he hopes to achieve with plenty of community involvement over the journey, tackling a bunch of iconic locations like the Swan River and Optus Stadium, along with a few novelty maps.

Across the journey Multiplex will be providing support through flexible work arrangements, along with “regular health and fatigue check-ins”, said Multiplex Regional Managing Director, Chris Palandri.

You can donate via the GoFundMe Page, check in on his progress via Instagram, and join in the fun by following him on Strava.