100 Miles In 24 Hours For Paddleboarders On River Wye Challenge

Paul O'Dwyer from Port Talbot is setting off on a 100 mile stand up paddleboard challenge on the River Wye on Friday morning. He'll be doing the fundraiser with his friends Nerys Lloyd who works for South Wales Police and Gemma Cox from Public Health Wales. They will be covering 100 miles in 24 hours. Paul told us: "We're not scared of a challenge myself and my friends. This Friday we are heading to the River Wye where we'll start at Glasbury jump in the water and then paddle for 24 hours or maybe longer 100 miles, finishing by Tintern near the abbey. The goal is 24 hours- however, if it takes 25 then so be it., but we'd love to smash this in 24 hours. It's a massive ask because that's just over four mile an hour. So at night it will be a bit tricky to maintain the same speed as during the day, but we're thinking let's give it a go and see how we do."

You can LISTEN to interview with Paul by clicking the podcast link in the Twitter link below:

'It's all for a good cause'

Paul and his group are fundraising to help cover the cost of bringing a special early detection screening service to his home town for the day. He says "Calon Heart Screening Wales in Cardiff offers screening for men under the age of 45. So over the past year I've lost four friends to heart issues and heart attacks etc. Some years ago my friend, my best mate, he lost his sister who was only 13.

"Calon will come down to Port Talbot and for four and a half thousands pounds will screen in one day 60 men to try and pick up any abnormalities that may exist in the guys. Fingers crossed they don't, but if you know we save one life then that would be amazing and well worth it. We hopefully will help some friends and some families out, going forward.

'Early detection is key'

Paul told us: "The friends I've lost none of them knew they had any issues with their heart. So if they'd been screened, then there's a good chance it could have been picked up. I think we all know somebody who's or know someone who died of a heart attack over the years. Picking that up before you are 45 is apparently crucial, and I think after that point it may be a bit too late. Obviously you can monitor it and treat it so to speak, but you know long term prevention is definitely advised before 45 apparently. I'm approaching that age now, I am 42 now, so I'm thinking it's time to get screened and take friends along with me on that journey to hopefully stop another person dying young. "

Donation details in this link:

'Challenges just keep getting bigger'

Paul's latest fundraiser comes just weeks after he took on another mammoth challenge to take around 130 paddleboarders from Mumbles to Aberavon.

"We thought let's get some people along and we thought you know we'd all in the water having fun and there's two establishments which provides support for that and that'll be the RNLI and the local lifeguards. So we just basically said to people, if they came along it would cost them £15. All that money was collected and donations are still being made and we've got over £2,000 from that event alone."