Cook traverses the desert on his African adventure. Image: Guus Van Veen
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Russ Cook made history in 2024. The 27-year-old from Worthing, West Sussex, widely known as Hardest Geezer – an old in-joke with pals which became his social media moniker – accomplished something no other human has ever done.
Cook ran the full length of Africa – from its southernmost tip in Cape Agulhas, South Africa to its far northern port of Ras Angela in Tunisia. By the time he had completed his run of more than 10,000 miles in 352 days, half a million people were watching him live on YouTube.
Better still, he’d managed to use his growing social media following to raise £1,000,000 to split between The Running Charity – which works with young people experiencing homelessness across the UK – and Sandblast, a charity dedicated to building awareness and solidarity for displaced Indigenous Sahrawis in north-west Africa.
It was an eventful run, featuring geopolitical unrest, robbery at gunpoint, a terrifying kidnapping ordeal, and a heavy toll taken on his body. “I was pissing blood for six days,” Cook recalls, when we meet in East London. “But the Congo situation was the scariest thing ever. I thought I was going to die when I was kidnapped.”
Cook was picked up while running alone through the jungle by two men on a motorbike, driven hundreds of miles and held to ransom until his support team arrived.
“It was so traumatic I still find it hard to think about,” he says now. “It’s almost like it happened to someone else. When I did the audiobook, I sat there in tears reading it. Then, after we got out, I had to go back to the point where I was kidnapped to continue the run – I was quite zombied out, but it was terrifying.”
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But Cook persisted, navigating political turbulence and knackered knees until, finally, he could see the sea.
“When I saw the Med, I thought of my 17-year-old self, wondering what his life was amounting to,” says Cook.
“It was very emotional; it felt like my life’s work had gone into that moment.”
‘I can make things happen’
Russ Cook has come a long way. A few years earlier he was living in poverty, working jobs that made him unhappy, and drinking and gambling too much as he struggled to find a place for himself in the world. “Being a young man is really difficult. I left home young. I’d had difficult times with my parents like a lot of teenagers do,” Cook says. “I was living by myself, gambling what little money I had, working jobs I didn’t like and any spare time I’d be binge drinking to try to make myself happy.
“It’s a confusing age. I speak from my own experience. You don’t have access to good jobs because you’ve just finished school. So you always see guys doing way better than you. And who wants to date a loser 18-year-old who has nothing going for them? So navigating this adult world is hard.”
But then Cook found running. The long and winding road to Cook’s African adventure began, as so many wild and wonderful things do, in a nightclub, under the arches at Brighton beach.
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“I looked around, thinking, what am I doing here? And I decided to run home,” he says. “That was the spark. Since then, running has helped in all areas of my life.”
Cook ran. And he ran. All the way home and then on and on. He kept on running until running became a part of him. What started as a path to recovery and empowerment evolved to become part of his identity.
“One thing I’ve learned from running is that I can make things happen,” says Cook. “I didn’t think I could run a marathon. Then, after eight weeks of training, I ran one.”
Cook ran further still, saved up his money from cleaning jobs in Brighton, and went to the small town of Iten, at the top of the Rift Valley in Kenya, where some of the world’s greatest long-distance runners – including double Olympic marathon champion Eliud Kipchoge – took their first steps.
“I don’t really like cleaning,” he grins. “So I thought, let’s go to Kenya, see what’s going on. I got a flight to Nairobi then a 10-hour bus into this rural village and spent a few weeks running.
“I met this Italian guy who had been cycling around the world for six years. I thought, this is so gangster. He’s got everything he owns on the back of his bike and just cruises around. That’s when I first conceptualised running from Asia to the UK.”
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Hardest Geeze, man on a mission
Hardest Geezer Ross Cook with his book that documents his remarkable run
By 2019, Cook was ready for that first ultra-long distance challenge, running from Istanbul to Worthing.
“It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. And it opened my eyes – I was by myself for the whole time,” he says. “Loneliness on the road is a real thing. But it did give me a sense of purpose and confidence.”
The self-styled Hardest Geezer picked up a following on social media as he charted his long solo runs on videos. He also began working with and fundraising for The Running Charity.
“When I first found The Running Charity we immediately clicked,” he says. “It reflected the journey I’ve been on myself and how running taught me so much about life. It is so much more than a run club. It helps young people into housing, and onto a better life. If you keep showing up for someone and love them no matter what they do, you can build trust – and if you do that, you can help guide them.”
The Africa trip had a huge impact on his chosen UK charity. “With the growing need for our services and a really challenging fundraising landscape, it has enabled us to secure existing services, build new partnerships and reach even more young people,” says CEO Alex Eagle.
“In 2024 we delivered more than 11,000 hours of support and reduced the number of people with the lowest forms of mental health by 83%.
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“In 2025, we are reaching new communities in the most need – including a drive to help manage young people’s transition out of prison to avoid rough sleeping and homelessness.”
Running the equivalent of 376 marathons in less than a year, often alone, enduring all the physical and psychological impacts, also changed Cook’s outlook on life. “I went on a spiritual journey,” he says. “Towards the end I had this big sense that I was given the strength to do that by something that wasn’t me. You know, by the universe.”
The buzz in the crowds as he ran in the London Marathon, two weeks after completing his Africa run, confirmed that the running community has taken the Hardest Geezer to their heart. But he’s also a man on a mission to use his profile and passion for running for good.
“I have to think about what the purpose of it all is,” he says. “Maybe I can find something a bit more meaningful.
“I thought about it a lot in Africa, finding ways to take people on adventures and have experiences they would never otherwise be able to have.”
In January, he is taking a group of young people to Kilimanjaro. The following month he returns to the Sahara. With further endurance challenges and charity collaborations in store, Cook takes a rare pause from running to reflect on the path he has taken. “Running has given me stability. I’m in a much better place with my relationships,” he says. “I also have more desire for life, you know? I am happier, more in control of my own life. It is such an empowering feeling.”
