‘A run for a mate’: Kevin Sinfield’s seven ultramarathons in seven days | Motor

“This is a sponsored run,” said Kevin Sinfield of what seems to most people an unimaginable, surely superhuman challenge – running seven ultramarathons in seven days. “In my own mind this is a run for a mate, with other mates.”

Sinfield, one of the greatest players in rugby league history, has just completed day two of what will be about 275 miles of running to raise money for motor neurone disease (MND) charities.

It is his third mad challenge in as many years. In 2020 Sinfield ran seven marathons in seven days to raise money and awareness in honour of his friend and former teammate Rob Burrow, who is now in the grip of the disease.

Sinfield sees it as natural, obvious almost, that he would try to help. “Just because you’ve finished playing doesn’t mean you stop being that teammate. You try to help,” he told the Guardian.

“All Rob’s former teammates have played their part and done their own bit. This is an extension of that, I’m just trying to do my little bit too.”

Burrow wore the number seven shirt for Leeds and the initial plan was to raise £777,777. In the first year more than £2.5m was raised. The following year Sinfield ran 101 miles in 24 hours, bringing the total he has raised for the cause to more than £5m.

This year’s challenge is also dedicated to other sportsmen who have succumbed to MND. They are described by Sinfield as a “band of brothers” and include former the Scotland rugby union player Doddie Weir, the ex-Liverpool and Bolton footballer Stephen Darby and the recently diagnosed former Gloucester and Leicester rugby union player Ed Slater.

On Monday Sinfield ran from Melrose in the Scottish Borders to the picturesque Northumberland village of Otterburn.

He was mostly on the A68 and he was often accompanied by music. So in Scotland it was Flower of Scotland “and quite a lot of Proclaimers”. Crossing the border into England, Sinfield’s team played Jerusalem followed by Land of Hope and Glory.

Burrow texted Sinfield 15km before he finished, saying well done for finishing day two. He was of course “taking the mickey”, but that’s the way his sense of humour works, said Sinfield.

The two men first met when Sinfield was 14 and Burrow 12 and they were part of the Leeds academy. They became friends in the Rhinos first team and clearly have an incredible bond.

“There’s things that we’ve done together in training and on a rugby field that … we’ve had to go to some dark places together. I trust him implicitly. I’ve got so much respect for him and he’s a great friend.”

He says the challenge is to raise cash and also awareness. “The funding that the disease could have had and should have had” didn’t happen in years gone by, said Sinfield. That’s changed “but for years and years this tragic and horrible disease has ripped through families.”

As Sinfield talks to the Guardian…