Jaime Laing undertook the whopping 150-mile, five-day Ultra Marathon from London to Salford this week and raised a whopping £2,053,835 for Comic Relief.
Crossing the finish line the Radio 1 DJ, 36, choked back tears as he declared: ‘Thank you so much. That is unbelievable! You’re changing lives. Thank you so much!’.
Jamie’s impressive run comes just seven months after his pal and former Made In Chelsea co-star Spencer Matthews undertook a similar challenge.
The 36-year-old ran an astonishing 30 marathons in 30 days in the scorching heat of the Jordanian desert.
As well as raising £511,870.46 for Global’s Make Some Noise appeal he entered the Guinness World Record books for most marathon distances run on sand.
Here MailOnline looks inside the battling buddies duelling journeys…..
Jaime Laing (L) has finished an Ultra Marathon for Comic Relief, just just seven months after his pal and former MIC co-star Spencer Matthews (R) undertook a similar challenge
Here MailOnline looks inside the battling buddies duelling journeys (pictured together in 2019)
Training regime
Jamie shared insight into his training before taking on the challenge and speaking on Comic Relief’s YouTube channel admitted ‘never having run’ a marathon before.
He said: ‘Towards the actual marathon I need to be running four hours a day, I’m also cycling and eating a lot of protein’.
‘It’s like a job before a job, so I am up at 6am for training every single day now, it’s exhausting, that’s probably why I look so tired’.
He went on to reveal wife Sophie Habboo, 30, ‘hated running’ and had not helped him training saying all she has done was rub magnesium cream into his calves.
But Spencer appeared to undergo a much more vigorous and intense training regime as he prepared to run the equivalent of the entire length of the UK on sand in searing heat.
As well as running an impressive 30 kilometers a day, the TV star also endured working out in a heat chamber with temperatures of up to 50 degrees Celsius so that he could acclimatised to the marathon conditions.
The heat chamber, which he visited at the London South Bank University, stimulated the exact conditions of the desert challenge, with Spencer training in high temperatures with 20% humidity.
Jamie shared insight into his training before taking on the challenge and speaking on Comic Relief’s YouTube channel admitted ‘never having run’ a marathon before
He said: ‘Towards the actual marathon I need to be running four hours a day, I’m also cycling and eating a lot of protein’
But Spencer appeared to undergo a much more vigorous and intense training regime as he prepared to run the equivalent of the entire length of the UK on sand in searing heat
The TV star endured working out in a heat chamber with temperatures of up to 50 degrees Celsius so that he could acclimatised to the marathon conditions
The father-of-three documented his time in the chamber on Instagram, with the star noting he had 10 sessions at an hour each
His transformation into an ultramarathon runner is made even more impressive given he was one of London’s most notorious party boys during his Made In Chelsea days
Spencer’s epic desert challenge saw him run over 42.2km or 26.2 miles, every single day
The father-of-three documented his time in the chamber on Instagram, with the star noting he had 10 sessions at an hour each.
An expert accessing him at the time, said of the method: ‘One of the benefits of heat acclimation is that you’ll have a lower starting core temperature, which means you’ve got a greater heat storage capacity before you start reaching those high core temperatures.’
However, it proved very difficult for Spencer, who said in an interview that he was left feeling ‘humiliated’ and ‘very faint’ after his first attempt.
He told T3.com in July ahead of the challenge: The first time I tried it was almost humiliating. I ran really slowly for 20 minutes, lost all sense of time, and became incredibly faint. Then I was hammering nuts and dates just to try and stay in the room, but I had to come out after 40 minutes as I was in quite serious pain.
‘I went back in for the second hour and that was alright. I lose about 4.8 kilos every time I do it, but I’ve now got myself to a position where I can cruise pretty comfortably for two hours.’
The star added that he faced another challenge during training after tearing his IT band at the beginning of his journey.
He said: ‘That really threw a spanner in the works and I had to take six weeks off. Thankfully, I’ve come out fine and I’m not injured at all, but this is the kind of thing that can really scramble your mind. If you allow it to get in your head negatively then you’ve already lost the battle before you’ve even got there.’
Inspiration
Jamie revealed his inspiration to undertake the ultra Marathon Challenge was to help raise money for mental health charities, after his own battle with anxiety.
After discovering just how much he’d raised he said: ‘It was a long way but it was an incredible journey. One of my big things was about mental health, that money is going to save lives and help people and I am beyond proud.’
Jamie previously opened up about his battle with anxiety and panic attacks during an recent appearance on Good Morning Britain.
Said: ‘[With panic attacks] You feel like you’re going to die. I thought I was having a heart attack, I hid anxiety for many years, I had the typical thing at panic attack at 20 years old, didn’t know what it was and took myself to hospital and then just hid it for many years’.
Jamie revealed his inspiration to undertake the ultra Marathon Challenge was to help raise money for mental health charities, after his own battle with anxiety
After discovering just how much he’d raised he said: ‘It was a long way but it was an incredible journey. One of my big things was about mental health, that money is going to save lives’
Jamie previously opened up about his battle with anxiety and panic attacks during an recent appearance on Good Morning Britain
‘It’s a heightened sense, you feel like you’re going to die. I thought I was having a heart attack. It feels like your body is taking over you and the adrenaline is going thorough the roof because you’re hyperventilating. Chest gets tight, you feel dizzy, you feel like you’re fainting.
‘I took myself to hospital and they said You’re having a panic attack don’t worry go home – and that was the day my life changed. I had anxiety that I didn’t know what it was, didn’t understand it, never spoke out about it.’
Asked why he took so long to speak out about his anxiety, Jamie said: ‘Truthfully at the time I was ashamed of it. I didn’t know what it was and I just wanted it to go.’
‘It was there for many years until I spoke to a really great friend of mine, who was best man at my wedding, a guy called Toby, and I finally phoned him up,’ Jamie continued.
‘I got very emotional on the phone and I said “Toby something’s wrong with me” and I was scared what he was going to say and he said “Don’t worry Jamie we’ll go through it together” – and it was this echo back that was incredible.
‘I suddenly realised that all these years I had been holding it in and why hadn’t I spoken out about it?’
While Spencer said his late brother’s Michael’s memory was motivation to complete the 786-mile challenge and said the challenge helped him to feel closer to his sibling
Michael (pictured) never returned after scaling Mount Everest aged 22 in 1999 and Spencer has since filmed a Disney+ documentary about his mission to find and retrieve his body
Spencer was just 10 years old when his older sibling went missing but says he ‘feels close’ to Michael when he completes adventurous challenges
Jamie urged people to speak to their loved ones on World Mental Health Day and ‘keep knocking on the door’ to see if they are okay.
While Spencer said his late brother’s Michael’s memory was motivation to complete the 786-mile challenge and said the challenge helped him to feel closer to his sibling.
Michael never returned after scaling Mount Everest aged 22 in 1999 and Spencer has since filmed a Disney+ documentary about his mission to find and retrieve his body.
Taking on such an epic challenge gives Spencer a connection to his brother he wouldn’t otherwise feel, as he tells how Michael remains his biggest inspiration.
He said: ‘Michael serves as an inspiration for me, especially when I do something like this.
‘I think about him a lot and feel close to him when I do these kinds of things.
He also old The Mirror: ‘Every single morning I’ve said a prayer to Mike.’
Spencer, who is a recovering alcoholic, also explained how the challenge had helped him deal with the shame of addiction, which he has carried with him since getting sober in 2018.
‘I’ve come from a place that I was quite ashamed of and I think it’s fair to say I’ve never been more proud of myself than achieving this.
