Squash marathon world record attempt

Three Cardiff men are hoping become world record holders and raise £2,500 for charity in an intense fitness and endurance challenge.

The three squash players are hoping to hold two records between them by playing for nearly 30 hours on court, and raise money for children's cancer charity, LATCH.

Matt Lloyd-Lewis, 34 from Roath is teaming up with Paul Duffy, 29 from Cardiff Bay to attempt to break the current singles world record of 26 hours of continual squash games and beat it by two hours.

Ian Charles, 49, a local businessman from Whitchurch who organised the event is taking on his own world record attempt by matching the pair and playing as many opponents as possible in the time.

Mr Charles has done previous charity work including a cycle ride from London to Paris in 2007, and was eager to do something similar again.

He said: "I donate to charity and I have a lot of business connections, so I thought what can I do and who can I do it for? And squash is my sport, so I applied to Guinness World Records and here we are today."

The trio have so far managed to raise nearly half of their £2,500 target, with donations flooding in through their website and a hefty £1,000 donated by Cardiff Round Table.

The training has already begun for the challenge, set to take place over May 7 and 8. Mr Charles is attending a spin cycling class three times a week, swimming two or three times a week and using machines such as the cross-trainer in the gym to build up fitness.

"I'm doing anything low impact to not risk injury, as squash is quite harsh on your knees," he said.

"We also play three or four hours of squash continually on Sundays to get accustomed to playing for longer periods and build up our endurance."

The squash marathon will take place at Cardiff's David Lloyd leisure centre where the three men are members. Their four squash courts will be reserved for the 28-hour challenge and a big after party is then planned for a well-deserved drink for the hopeful world record holders.

Mr Charles said he couldn't wait for the challenge: "I am really excited - I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about it.

"I get such a buzz out of it, and we're all fit guys so it should be fun."