Gareth Thomas overcame ‘driving rain and 30mph headwinds’ in the dark of the night to complete the Pen y Fan challenge, proving once and for all that HIV is no limit to your physical capabilities.
Scaling up and down the highest peak in South Wales ten times – a feat equivalent to climbing Mount Everest – Thomas completed the challenge in 17 hours and 20 minutes, finishing his 10th descent at 5am on Friday morning. The challenge was completed for Tackle HIV, a public awareness and education initiative founded by the Welsh rugby icon in partnership with ViiV Healthcare and Terrence Higgins Trust that aims to tackle misunderstanding and stigma related to HIV.
Gareth was joined by Welsh rugby star and Wales record try scorer Shane Williams and supporters from his Tackle HIV campaign, some of whom are also living with HIV. The team are determined to show that living with HIV is a not a barrier to achieving anything.
Speaking about the challenge, Gareth Thomas said: ‘For so many people, what today will show is that HIV is a virus that I live with, and it doesn’t restrict me. If it doesn’t restrict me physically, if it doesn’t restrict me mentally in any way, then it doesn’t impact on my life.’
‘Yet so many other people who are stigmatised or have the lack of understanding and the misinformation feel that it would impact me in some way. I constantly have to keep doing things and keep being physical to show that this virus doesn’t restrict what I’m capable of doing.’
‘If you can go up and down Pen y Fan 10 times, then there’s no greater message and there’s no greater example of somebody physically being able to not be restricted by a virus, so why should that stigma and disinformation still exist?’
