Minister for Sport Leo Varadkar tonight joined a 10km run in aid of the trust of Northern Irish blind adventure athlete Mark Pollock.
Held simultaneously in Belfast, Dublin, Cork and Galway, the Run for Mark in the Dark, also completed by Fine Gael TD for Dublin South Eoghan Murphy was organised to raise funds for the ongoing costs associated with a spinal injury Mr Pollock sustained last year.
Losing his sight aged 22 while in his final year at Trinity College, Mr Pollock has gone on to complete major endurance challenges such as running six marathons in seven days in China’s Gobi desert, running a marathon at the North Pole and trekking to the South Pole. He has also won silver and bronze medals rowing for Northern Ireland in the Commonwealth Games.
In an accident in July 2010 however, Mr Pollock fell from a second story window fracturing his skull, some ribs and breaking his back in a number of places leaving him paralysed from the waist down. Mark has since embarked on a spinal injury activity- based recovery programme to rehabilitate his paralysed legs.
Speaking about the programme, Mr Pollock has said, “...Nobody can honestly predict what will happen, but I’m pretty sure that if I spend the rest of my life sitting in a wheelchair there will be little to no chance of me springing up one day and walking. I’ve got to get on my feet…. and start trying to use the paralysed muscles that have been wasting away for so many months now.”
Mr Varadkar and Mr Murphy were joined by members of the Mark Pollock Trust and other athletes for the Dublin run which was oversubscribed and set off from Front Square in Trinity College last night in wet conditions.
The Mark Pollock Trust was set up by friends of Mr Pollock to assist with the cost of rehabilitation specialists and visits to specialised spinal injury activity-based recovery centres.
