Meet Boardfree OZ’s David Cornthwaite
By admin | April 22, 2010 at 9:18 am
A young, auburn-haired man lies flat on his stomach while a slender needle is slipped into the heel of his foot. A nurse technician asks him if he can feel the hypodermic, or any sensation, while she finishes the injection. He grits his teeth only slightly. A glimpse of an infected wound on the foot is clear. A video cameraman catching the procedure cuts away, but the action is accented by the young man’s own warning, “Never skateboard the length of Scotland!” Soon, he is back on the street, a skateboard beneath him, pushing off down the lane.
If wasn’t enough for David Cornthwaite, the “thirtysomething” British graphic designer who set a world record by being the first man to longboard—think skateboard, but with larger proportions—across Britain, he threw a one-two punch by boarding between Perth and Brisbane, Australia, all despite physical limitations, such as severe blistering of his feet and fatigue.
To top it off, he used the attention garnered by his achievements to raise money for three charities: Link Community Development (an organization striving toward greater education quality in Africa), Sailability Australia (one of many branches worldwide dedicated to providing boating opportunities to the severely handicapped) and the Lowe Syndrome Trust (raising awareness and funding to treat a rare disease affecting kidneys, muscles and bones).
Cornthwaite pushed on, writing his first book about these experiences, particularly his trip to Australia, also documented in the film Boardfree OZ, which airs as a miniseries on Halogen TV. He has recently demonstrated a knack for hydrofoil windsurfing, a demanding physical exercise that relies on subtle, abrupt body movements to ride ocean waves (demonstrated here). He currently holds the British record for speed in this activity. He has also paddled his kayak 2470 kilometers across the “Mighty Murray” (the River Murray, Australia’s most impressive watercourse).
Next on the list, a new film—and a new challenge: to stand up paddle surf (an exercise involving a large surf board guided with a single paddle) from London to North Africa, along the Amazon River. In July of 2009, The Daily Mail called his work “an amazing balance of feat and strength”, featuring Cornthwaite in an extensive article. Moreover, he has begun yet another charitable organization, This is Your Freedom, designed to encourage other outstanding athletes to arrange what they describe as “charity challenges”—exhibitions of daring feats designed to raise money for relevant persons and charities. It seems Cornthwaite seeks to inspire a new generation of young people to take risks for their own sake, and that of others.
And beyond these aspirations? Cornthwaite is a sportsman, a modern-day frontiersman, and a humanitarian with a decidedly hands-on approach to acts of goodwill. He wrote recently on his blog—“The Why Not?”—of his push for new heights of charity and physical daring: “For a while I couldn’t quite connect myself to the guy who had pushed a skateboard across Australia. It took seven months to recover physically and more than a year to get the ‘psychologicals’ back in order, but after that it was a case of bashing through the undergrowth of a strange new world. A career in Adventure? Really? Sure, why not?”
