Trio finish 300km run for Ubuko
Real-life challenge inspires Selborne pupils, teacher and support staff to push their limits
Two Selborne College pupils and their teacher spent days of their holiday walking and running 300km to raise funds for a very special fellow pupil. Talk of the Town met the trio on Sunday, when they and their support team stopped in Port Alfred.
The Ubuko300 was a week-long journey that started on July 1 from the gates of Grey High School in Gqeberha. Walking an average of 50km a day, teacher Jono Kruger and pupils Sebastian Taylor and Bradley de Kock finished at Selborne College in East London on Wednesday, July 6.
Their mission was to raise R300,000 which will contribute towards the R500,000 needed for a prosthetic robotic hand for Selborne grade 8 pupil Ubuko Mpotulo.
Ubuko was diagnosed with meningococcalsepticemia when he was two years old. This led to gangrene and he lost both his legs and several fingers. On top of the challenges that come with adapting to everyday school life on his blades, the positive youngster also only has his thumbs and an index finger to work with. But he tackles each day with a smile and it is this positive attitude that makes the Selborne community want to do more for the youngster.
The campaign, as Kruger explained, stems from an initiative the school started a few years back, Trials for Lives, where the school challenged a group of rugby players to do something bigger than just playing for success.
“We wanted to open the players’ minds to more than just winning and so we connected to the children’s home and that year we played for the home,” he said.
The team raised enough funds to feed 10 abandoned babies at Kings Children’s Home. Kruger said that initiative had now expanded to different sporting codes for the school, including the Sports for Lives campaign they are doing for Ubuko.
The school has been running different campaigns to raise funds for Ubuko’s hand which started with the Trials for Lives initiative where the Selborne first rugby team dedicated their 150th rugby season to Ubuko.
Other initiatives were Goals for Ubuko, where the school’s soccer team also raised funds in support of Ubuko and Baviaans for Ubuko where two dads at the school went mountain biking through the Trans Baviaans to also raise funds for the Selborne pupil.
The young runners said it was a serious challenge, especially because they had never completed 50km in a day. But they were determined to complete the walk for a worthy cause.
“I just had no expectation really and I had no idea what it would be like, and halfway through it I was absolutely finished. But I looked at the bigger picture and that got me through to the end,” said a resolute Bradley.
Taylor said the first 50km had set them back mentally, but they got their strategy going on the second day which kept them going to the end.
The team were on the go for just under nine hours, from 4am to 1pm, every day and have managed to raise over R100,000 through their campaign.
“The recovery after the run is not the easiest. You need to recover well, but once you’ve completed a whole day of running, you just want to go to bed and sleep,” said Bradley.
“One of the reasons we’ve come this far is because of our crew. Jude Boateng and Goitsimang Bahula are helping us with the water, drinks and just the vibes that they bring and also running with us along the way which makes the journey a bit easier,” Sebastian said. They walked more than 76,000 steps a day.
The team had numerous sponsors for the campaign, including Rugged Rocks in Port Alfred who sponsored their accommodation for Sunday night. Other sponsors included Kempston hire, which sponsored the drivers, Spar Mdantsane who sponsored food for the journey, Thirsti which sponsored water, Fenn which sponsored ski pants and Banana skins who sponsored compression socks.
Kruger described how Ubuko’s spirit had touched the whole Selborne community. “I heard the story of Ubuko through the primary school of how he has adapted with everyday life. He climbs the stairs to his classrooms like the rest of the boys. So we knew about Ubuko’s spirit before he arrived at the college. We got to meet Ubuko this year and immediately the Selborne community wanted to do something to help this young man.”
The school has embarked on various initiatives that help pupils in need, like the cricketers who took on a Boundaries & Wickets for Lives campaign to help a children’s home close to the school, and the Goals for Lives campaign.
Selborne College has implemented the Sport for Lives model in their curriculum. For term 3, Kruger explains, all the grade 11s will be undertaking their Life Orientation project for the first time using a Sports for Lives module as their project and will get marks for doing initiatives in aid of Ubuko. “They’ll be going in groups of five, finding their own sport code and do a three-hour challenge which is also contributing towards the Ubuko initiative,” he said.