How West End Star Travis Kerry completed the longest non-stop bear crawl ultramarathon in history
On 1 December 2025 at 7:17pm, West End performer and fitness obsessive Travis Kerry completed something no human had ever done: a 50.2km ultramarathon bear crawl, non-stop, across London. Over 30 hours and 31 minutes, Travis covered 102,028 steps, burned 12,163 calories, shed 4kg in bodyweight, threw up seven times, cried nine times, and endured more mental breaks than he can remember.
His mission was to raise money for Movember and the Mental Health Foundation, and to show men what’s possible when physical training meets radical mental resilience. Travis – who trained up to 21 hours a week for nearly 18 months – crawled the London Landmarks Half Marathon route twice, through wind, rain, freezing conditions and the kind of pain most of us will never experience. He has now submitted for two Guinness World Records: longest bear crawl and fastest bear-crawl marathon. Men’s Fitness spoke to him just days after the attempt – still swollen, numb in his fingers, and running on fumes – about what it really takes to push past human limits.
Men’s Fitness: First things first – how do you feel physically right now?
Travis Kerry: Honest answer? The question is what can I feel. I’ve lost sensation in three fingers, my wrists are swollen like balloons, my shoulders and triceps feel cooked, and my neck… mate, my neck was the worst. Just hanging down for that long absolutely fried it. The crazy bit is my hands are actually okay considering everything – they look raw, but they survived.
MF: And you chose Britain’s driest, warmest month – November…
TK: (Laughs) I know. The idea was cooler temps so I wouldn’t overheat. Then I found out four weeks beforehand that it might snow. So suddenly I’m thinking: I haven’t trained for sub-zero crawling.
We had to adapt quickly – cold training for my hands, different gloves, waterproofing. From about 1am on the second day until the finish, conditions were brutal. Rain soaking into the gloves, hands pruning like trench foot, the pavements slippery. Every few hundred metres my team were literally squeezing water out of my gloves like they were udders.
MF: Most readers know the bear crawl as a warm-up drill. How do you train for 30 hours of it?
TK: You build volume. Endless volume. I spent 18 months training 2-3 hours a day, up to 21 hours a week. Long blocks on the treadmill, crawling outside, wrist isometrics, shoulder isometrics, grip strength, hip-flexor work… everything designed around surviving that position.
Some sessions were insane. My trainer made me put my hands in bags of ice to fry the nerves, feet up on a rowing machine seat, crunch my knees in, jump straight into a kilometre of crawling, repeat five or six times. Another day I ripped my hands crawling without gloves – so I switched to my knuckles just to get the three-hour volume in. There was no stopping.
Coming from dance and calisthenics helped – lots of hanging, core work, joint strength. But this was like reverse-engineering human evolution. Going back to the four-limb position for hours at a time.
MF: This is essentially an endurance event. How did you fuel it?
TK: With things I never want to see again! I needed 1600mg sodium every hour, 160g carbs, and a teaspoon of coconut oil every hour. The hardest bit was figuring out what I could eat without throwing up. Turns out the sweet spot was three dates every 20 minutes. My mates who run ultras told me I needed to become fat-adapted. They saved me. At the start I was taking gels and wondering why I felt dead. Once I switched, everything clicked. Even then… I still threw up seven times.
MF: What were the highest and lowest moments?
TK: The high was early on. My videographer whispered, “Remember your why.” That hit me. This challenge was always about men’s mental health – showing men that speaking out is strength, and that you can keep moving forward even when life crushes you. I cried immediately. That moment carried me for the next 20 hours.
The lowest? Tower Bridge around 2am. Pouring rain. My headphones died. I stood up, swore, threw them on the floor, ran backwards, lay on the ground – I completely lost my mind. My coach stood over me and said, “Trav, get up and scream over the bridge.” So I did. As loud as possible. Then I got back down and kept going. Between 2am and 6am was hell – cold, slippery pavements, no music, just me counting to ten over and over to stay sane.
MF: Did you realise how many people turned out to support you?
TK: Not really. I was in such a tunnel vision. But I kept hearing crowds around me. Afterward my team told me that when I passed through Hyde Park, the Winter Wonderland security guards actually left their posts to escort me and the people walking with me. I didn’t see any of it. Blinkers were on.
Also I was listening to music where possible, my brother was feeding tunes to me and I was listening to everything from Kanye and The Beatles, to the Hamilton soundtrack and podcasts that helped to distract the mind.
MF: What’s next? Another record? A rest?
TK: A rest first! But I’ve always been a bit crazy with challenges, so something will come. I’m playing Hercules right now, and this is my last show before going full-time on my company, Swypes. I want to pour all my energy into it. But challenge-wise? I guarantee something will come up that makes people question my sanity again.
• to support Travis visit page https://givestar.io/gs/world-record-bear-crawl-ultramarathon–crawl-to-heal
