A CYCLIST climbed to the top of the fearsome Ditchling Beacon 100 times over the weekend.

Kurt Charnock, 41, took on the mammoth challenge to raise awareness of depression after his good friend Fabrice Cesaro passed away.

The keen sportsman told The Argus he was blown away by the comradeship shown by complete strangers who joined him on his climbs.

He eventually finished the challenge at 1am yesterday having taken on the first ascent at midnight on Saturday morning.

Mr Charnock, from Hove, said that while he was feeling very tired and very sore, it was all worth it.

He said: “So many people turned up and were talking about mental illness issues and that was the whole point of it – raising awareness of depression and showing people that you can talk about it.

“I’ve had lots of messages saying Fabrice would have been proud – and that’s really nice to hear.

“It was always in the front of my mind, and his funeral was on Saturday so it made it that little bit stronger the fact that I was doing it while that was going on.”

As well as raising £1,400, the most important thing for him was raising the awareness of depression.

Mr Charnock added: “I am guilty of doing it myself – just thinking of depression and that sort of stuff as ‘pull yourself together and get on with it’. But that’s not good enough.

“So if there is a positive to take out of this, it is that even in our little community, people can now talk about it.”

After getting through between 50 and 60 cups of tea as well as sandwiches, pizzas and fish and chips, he finally finished his hundredth climb of the 248 m (814 ft) hill.

He said: “I cannot tell you the delight I felt driving up that hill on my way home.

“Going up it in a car felt wonderful, but I have to admit it felt a lot shorter in a car than on my bike.”

Mr Charnock conceded he could not have done it by himself and thanked cycle groups Crawley Wheelers, Mid Sussex Triathlon Club and Fat Dads of Ditchling as well as the Hyatt and Harman families who ran up the one mile (1.6km) climb with him several times.

He also thanked Becky Taylor, Jodie East and Eohan McKenna from his cycling club the Brighton Triathlon Race Series. He said a counsellor has already contacted the club and offered their services to any cyclist dealing with depression. For more details visit: brightontriathlonraceseries.co.uk.

Mr Charnock will now embark on a 3,000 mile trans-Australia challenge ride from Cairns to Perth in January.

The worst part:

“On about 60 climbs I was really struggling, I’d done 120 miles by then and at the bottom of the hill every time I’d say ‘here we go again’.
“At that stage I had to have a couple of hours kip because I’d been going 40 hours and I was making mistakes on the way down and didn’t want to fall off.
“After a couple of hours sleep, getting going again was really, really tough.
“That was the worst bit.
“I had my human alarm clock Simon Barry – who later became snooze button Simon – trying to wake me up, but every time I would say ‘15 more minutes’.
“So when I eventually got up it was a huge boost to have him there.”

The best part:

“The best part was that so many people turned up I never did a climb by myself because people had read it in The Argus or picked up on it on social media and came along.
“There were at least three or four people riding with me on every hill, sometimes up to 20 people. It was amazing.
“By the end I knew where every Coke can was in the bushes, where every wing-mirror on the side of the road was. So to have people help me up the hill was huge.
“They were complete strangers riding with me, but by the end of the climb they were talking to me about the difficulties they’ve had with depression.
“The fact they felt comfortable enough to just open up and talk about it was really amazing – people are finally realising it’s OK to talk about it.”