By Philip Bradfield
The 30-year-old Co Down man is part of a four-person crew rowing 3,200 miles from the Canary Islands to Antigua completely unsupported for the Make a Wish Foundation. Matthew believes the seeds for his adventure and 鈥済raft鈥 were sown by his parents John, who ran a kitchen business, and his mum Joy, a nurse. 鈥淲hen we were kids, Dad was always taking us hiking and we hated it. It was so painful 鈥 but now I am outdoors all the time,鈥 he said. When he was 18 and 19 he travelled to America for summer jobs where the travel bug bit hard. After studying food science at university he travelled to Thailand where he was stranded for three years during Covid. There he decided to set up in e-commerce, failing in nine different attempts. Now he manufactures fitness equipment in China and sells it in America, employing 10 staff. 鈥淚t took two years of doing nothing else but working on the business to get it working,鈥 he said. He gained his vision and business expertise from blogs and YouTube and drew inspiration from his father, who was 鈥渧ery ambitious and hard working鈥. With his own business now self-sustaining, Matthew is free to travel, so long as he has business email. His first adventure was four months cycling the Trans Am route of America. Since that, he has cycled Thailand and Korea, lived with native tribes in Borneo and hiked the 150-mile Annapurna route in the Himalayas. While browsing situations vacant on www.explorersconnect.com he found his latest adventure. 鈥淚 had absolutely no experience but they thought I would have the character to do it,鈥 he said. The other three members of 鈥楾eam Do The Thing’ are all from England; skipper Stu King, 43, Paul Clarke, 53, and the lady of the team, Nicky Allan, 44. He is now based back in Dromore while undertaking specialist training around the UK and Europe. He trains with heavy weights three days a week and a rowing machine on five. 鈥淗owever there is no real way to prepare, beyond strengthening ligaments and tendons from many angles to avoid injury. 鈥淲e face sleep deprivation and hallucinations, severe weight loss, salt sores, thirty foot waves and massive storms. All sorts of crazy things.鈥 It is not possible to take proper sleep breaks because stopping would see them drift off course. Their vessel is only 7.7m long and 1.7m wide. He only eats meat, fruit and starchy vegetables 鈥渂ecause I want to be able to do this for the rest of my life鈥, but he is putting on fat reserves for the journey. 鈥淥verall it is the most challenging thing I have done in my life. 鈥淭he inspiration we want to spread is this 鈥 do the thing you want to do 鈥 go after that job, set up that project, talk to that person, just put yourself out there. 鈥淏ut our overall aim is to raise 拢200k for the Make A Wish Foundation. That will grant the wishes for 100 terminally ill children.鈥 They team launches on January 23. Follow ‘Team Do The Thing’ progress on Facebook, make a donation at justgiving.com and see their official website at: https://teamdothething.com