In 1970 Martin Whitfield, who’s based in Bournemouth, contracted meningococcal disease when he was only 16 weeks old.
His mother, Beryl, remembers Martin screaming in a high-pitched wail. She took him straight to the local nurse who, having seen the baby, closed her clinic and rushed both Martin and Beryl to hospital.
At the hospital Martin was given penicillin. While waiting for the results of Martin’s lumbar puncture Martin’s father, David, remembers the doctors suggesting Martin should be christened that day in case of the worst happening.
Fortunately, Martin made a full recovery and although he had multiple hearing tests during childhood, he experienced no after-effects of having meningitis and septicaemia. If Beryl had delayed for one more day, the doctors suggested Martin wouldn’t have survived.
Marathon des Sables 2021
Fast forward fifty years and Martin signed up to take on one of the world’s most extreme endurance challenges, the Marathon de Sables. A six-day race running over 250 kms (156 miles) through sand dunes, salt plains and rocky jebels, with Martin carrying everything he needed to stay alive in his rucksack, including an anti-venom pump in case of any snake bites!
Because of his experience of meningitis as a child, which his mum Beryl still talks about to this day, Martin wanted to take part in this challenge to raise essential funds for Meningitis Now.
Having waited months for the race to be reorganised after the Covid pandemic, Martin set off for Morocco in October 2021. Although the race was postponed from its usual April that year, the temperatures reached dizzying heights of around 56 degrees in the full sun of the Sahara desert.
Martin, along with the other participants, made the long journey into the desert to reach the start line. He was given a bib number, a tracker and two bottles of water to last until the first checkpoint. By his own admission, Martin's training for the race hadn’t been sufficient to manage the extreme challenge.
Like nearly half of the participants that year, Martin was unable to finish the race due to severe heat stroke and dehydration experienced in the Merzouga dunes. Fellow runners have since told Martin that his behaviour became erratic and he collapsed.
Marathon des Sables 2025
Martin is determined to complete the marathon and is once again attempting the Marathon des Sables 2025 on 4 April.
His training has been going well, and to prepare he has been running long distances including a 46km (8 hours 39 minute) yomp across the Dorset Purbecks. He has much more training planned as April approaches and has been testing his kit and trying out different food, nutrition and electrolytes during training to reach his best performance.
Acclimatise
Martin has also booked in sessions in Chichester University’s heat chamber, which Marathon de Sables runners regularly use to acclimatise to the scorching Moroccan heat.
If you’d like to support Martin as he crosses the desert to raise funds for Meningitis Now you can donate to his GoFundMe here.
