ScotRail staff march three million steps for mental health awareness

Last updated: Wednesday, 21 April 2021

At a time when many of us have been neglecting our fitness, 10 plucky members of ScotRail staff have taken on a test to raise awareness of mental health issues and collect a few thousand pounds along the way.

Each one accepted the challenge thrown down by Samaritans to take 10,000 steps a day over the 31 days of March.

The results are in and, the train operator can reveal they all completed the task, marching an awesome total of 3,100,000 steps between them.

They used official fitness apps to monitor their progress and kept a record on a step tracking poster supplied by the charity.

Regular daily updates were posted on social media sharing their successes with family and friends and that helped them all raise just under £6,000 for Samaritans, including £250 match funding per person from ScotRail.

Sisters Chloe and Megan Moore, who both work for the train company, were encouraged to take on the challenge by other members of their team in the Communications department.

Internal Communications Officer, Chloe, said:

“When we first thought about doing it, we reckoned 10,000 steps a day would be easy.

“And, it was, until we realised that we were going to have to do it every single day throughout March.

“But, it’s for a great charity and we’re just chuffed we managed to stick with it and hopefully we’ve done a bit to raise awareness of mental health issues and get some donations into Samaritans.”

Social Media Officer, Megan, said:

“It was great doing the challenge with my sister and the rest of the ScotRail team.

“It really kept me focussed and when I was starting to feel the pace a bit, they all rallied round and helped me to keep going.

“I can’t believe we all did it and walked more than three million steps. It feels incredible to have taken part in something so worthwhile as helping people learn more about mental health issues lots of people seem so scared to talk about.

”And, raising money for Samaritans is an added bonus.”

The ScotRail 10 were all at different levels of fitness. Some used a treadmill to help them reach their target while others walked the dog a bit more than usual.

Martine Gravil, ScotRail Fatigue Manager, said:

“We knew it was a very uncertain time with the coronavirus lockdown continuing in Scotland.

“But, we all thought that doing this challenge would be good for our own mental wellbeing and if it helped get people talking about mental health then that was a win-win for everyone.

“It was a personal test, but it was also a great way of keeping in touch with the other people who were doing it along with you.

“Getting exercise is really important for your mental health so this was the perfect challenge to help us all do that.”