One of the first "outrageous" claims I saw as Jason Arday's media hounding unfolded was that he ran 30 marathons in 35 days! Wow! What a thing to claim! And the newspapers all suggested there was no evidence he actually did it. Well, they clearly didn't look very hard 🙄 🧵 1/26
Let's take a look at all the information that was publicly available at the time these journalists were claiming "no evidence" First up, we have his GoFundMe page set up before the event, detailing the dates he was running and showing the £6,285 he raised through online donations 2/
14th July 2010 Press release from a compression clothing retailer that was supporting Jason with compression gear to wear during the marathons 3/
July 20th 2010 Richmond and Twickenham Times Reports he completed his first marathon in 4 hours and 14 minutes and was supported by Shooting Star Trust staff at the halfway point. 4/
13th August 2010 Times Educational Supplement publishes a short piece on the event 5/
Also 13th August 2010 Your Local Guardian interviewed the director of fundraising and marketing at Shooting Star, who cycled his 24th marathon with him. 3 colleagues were also reported running with him for part of that marathon 6/
25th August 2010 Richmond and Twickenham Times report on the completion. They also reported on the hairline fracture. 7/
July 2012 Jason is an Olympic torch bearer. England Athletics writes about Arday in their "celebrating our volunteers" piece. Jason talks about his fundraising in collective terms - "I've been involved in", "our fundraising projects"
6th November 2012 Guardian reports on Jason meeting Andy Murray after his then-girlfriend nominated him for the TV show "Suprise Suprise" Murray says it was "pretty cool" to meet Arday. He mentions the seizure and hairline fracture on day 20... 9/
30th November 2012 Your Local Guardian reports on Jason's meeting with Andy Murray 10/
Jason's 30 marathons in 35 days was a life-defining achievement. And everything I have referenced so far was available for journalists to find. But they chose to claim there was "no evidence" of it happening. Imagine what that must have felt like for him 😢 11/ A week ago, this interview with a friend of his, who had known him since 2008, was published The day before he resigned, she tried to tell him he'd be OK He replied, saying that everything he had achieved was ruined and that he was broken 12/ socialistworker.co.uk
She knew about his learning and developmental difficulties at the time She talked about him having an epileptic fit in her office She remembered him as a popular guy (elected SU athletics president), an inspirational speaker, charming, kind and gentle And she ran with him in the final marathon...
Last week, Byline Times published a piece providing some of the evidence showing the marathons happened. The mainstream media didn't pick up on either of these pieces. 12/ bylinetimes.com
bylinetimes.com
In a piece about Cofnas' resignation the BBC continue to push the line that 30 marathons in 35 days was still just a "claim" "Questions were also asked about Arday's claims that he ran 30 marathons in 35 days" 15/ But there is one more piece of evidence, that was slightly harder to find, because it required a Web Archive. But journalists are just as capable of using that as I was! And that was his 30in35 blog, which he updated every day: - Run time - Running song of the day - who joined him each day
The formatting across the pages is rubbish in the archive, so I have pulled it together into a Word based PDF, if anyone in the media wants to cover it👍🏻 It is heartbreaking to read. He was so excited, so humble, so thankful to his supporters, he even wished individuals happy birthday... 17/ Here was an entry on the day he hit his £5,000 fundraising goal! 18/
People who might grudgingly concede that he might have run the marathons, still say the hairline fracture claim isn't true, despite it being covered in the news coverage of the day, and in the Andy Murray piece. So what does the blog show around day 20? 19/ Day 19 "A tough run today, but a million thanks to Diane, Dan, Julie and Steve for running with me – you were a massive help! Ice bath now, then rest."
Day 20 "20 down, 10 to go – feels amazing to have got to 20! Eased up on the pace today after the tough run yesterday, and I think that’s a good move for the time being. The countdown to the finish starts here! Mike, Megan and Hannah were fantastic support and thanks so much for running with me!"
That certainly sounds like something happened during race 19, which required him to ease up during race 20. Is that conclusive proof he had an seizure, fell and caused a hairline fracture? No. Does it align with him saying that happened? I'd say so, yes 22/ Here are photos taken from his blog. Crossing the finish line of the final race With his family, friends, colleagues and supporters at the end
And finally a blog post about being interviewed on ITV News 24/
You can choose to believe what you like about Jason Arday. But he ran those marathons And he deserves people knowing that. He was failed by the British press. 25/ These marathons were one of his defining achievements. And the British media pretended there was no evidence they happened. That it was just something he 'claimed' to have done... Now try and tell me their hounding was about "getting to the truth" RIP Jason 😢 26/26
I will be covering this, with all links and several other debunks of the media narrative about Jason in my Substack👇 monkdebunks.substack.com It's free 👍🏻 However, paid subscriptions and coffee (or tea in my case!) donations (buymeacoffee.com) really help 😜