Alix Popham is going to swim 2.4 miles, bike 112 miles, and then run a marathon. Photo: Nick Treharne
When Alix Popham was a rugby player, earning 33 caps for Wales and playing for Newport, Leeds, Llanelli and the Brive, the last thing he ever thought he would be sailing in the sea on 2.4 miles and then bike 112 miles before it's all over. leave by running a marathon. But that's exactly what the 43-year-old former flanker will be doing on Sunday when he takes part in the Tenby Ironman triathlon on the Pembrokeshire coast.
his home in Newport, he was surrounded by the bustling bustle of four family dogs and his three-year-old daughter. “And when I played, I thought running 3K was too far. Anyone who ran further, I considered completely crazy. I looked at them and thought: what's the point?
However, there is something about Popham that makes his task all the more remarkable. At the end of 2019, he was once riding a bike when he had an unexpected episode that had dramatic consequences.
“For a while, I started to forget things, I had a hard time remembering information, and I became irritable. Mel [his wife] constantly advised me to go to the doctor, but I attributed it to everyday stress,” he says. “Then I went on a bike ride, which I have done hundreds of times from here, and I had a moment of blackout, I did not know where I was. Mel was supposed to save me. The day after we went to see the therapist.”
The doctor sent him to see a specialist. Then Covid hit. So in April 2020, he got a call from a consultant neurologist on Zoom.
“Mel and I were sitting here. And the doctor said it wasn't good news.”
It couldn't have been worse. The diagnosis was dementia praecox, the horrific aftermath of the irreversible damage to his brain from sports.
“I thought I had only been knocked out twice. I once played for Wales against South Africa and once for Leeds when I woke up in the dressing room without two front teeth.
But doctors estimated that the damage was caused by more than 100,000 concussions at his 14- you legs. -year of professional career.
“It was training,” he says. “It was like the Wild West, just chaos. The old rule was that you train harder than you play. And I was ready for it.”
The consequences were catastrophic. His entire rugby career is erased from his memory. He knows something happened because people told him. Although even when he watches the games he participated in on TV, nothing comes back. Not that, despite the consequences, he regretted his career.
Popham against Fiji at the 2007 rugby tournament World Cup Photo: Getty Images/Sean Botterill
“I am proud of what I have achieved. I can't remember it, but I don't regret anything. I would just like to share with us what was known. Then perhaps you would have made a different choice.”
But whatever the severity of his condition, however bleak the prospects for his future, he decided that he would not be beaten.
“When I was diagnosed, I had a choice: turn left and feel sorry for myself, lean my head against the wall, give up and wait for death. Or turn right, stay positive and try to make a difference.”
He turned right. In the weeks following the news, he called about 50 former colleagues and rivals. Telling them about their lives, he recommended that they also get tested.
«This is just the tip of the iceberg»
«More than 300 players have now been diagnosed,» he says. “I think this is just the tip of the iceberg. The neurologist who diagnosed me estimates that over 80 percent of rugby players have some form of brain damage.
“And soon Mel and I realized that there was simply no information on how to cope with this disease in a 40-year-old man and his family. All this is designed for people over 60 years old. Literally no one knew anything about what it was like to live with this thing at my age. That's why we created Head for Change.”
His new venture, a charity that offers help and advice to those affected by the disease, as well as lobbies for education and fundamental changes to the game, needed money to move forward. So Popham decided to make a fundraising effort. He started in isolation: running 24-hour marathons on his Peleton bike, his two teenage daughters doing marathon races on a trampoline. When the restrictions were lifted, he took more adventurous turns: like the Gavin and Stacey trip, the bike ride from Billericay to Barry. Then, encouraged by Mel's brother, he moved on to triathlon.
“It was fun to watch him swim,” his wife says, fiddling around in the family kitchen. “His figure was completely wrong, and his big, heavy butt”
“I prefer to call it my muscular legs,” he says. “But yes, swimming was not my forte. Because I hurt my shoulders so badly playing rugby, the first two triathlons I competed, I had to do breaststroke.”
As he improved, when his shoulders got stronger, when he could swim. freestyle, so the tests became more difficult and longer. To the point that on Sunday he will be part of a 14-member fundraising team for Head for Change in Tenby.
Popham responded to his diagnosis of dementia by organizing philanthropic activities and working to raise awareness and fundraise. Photo: Nick Treharne
«Shane Williams is doing it with us,» he says of the former Welsh international striker. “He did it eight times. He's ridiculously fast. I won't even see him that day.”
“True,” Mel says. «The last time you did a triathlon with him, he finished and had a pint with me when you first started.»
Popham, however, says he's not interested in his time. He just wants to get around. This is what he noticed recently: his innate competitiveness was suppressed.
“I don’t know if this is a symptom of the disease. I still want challenges, but I don't put pressure on myself. I don't want to know the small details. For me it means to be part of a group again, a common goal; achieve it together.”
There are other symptoms: he trains with his son-in-law and others to keep his bearings. Because sometimes he forgets where he is. Which, considering how grueling the task can be, is not bad.
“This is my happy place,” he says of the 18-hour preparation for this event a week. “One of the symptoms of the condition is depression, suicidal thoughts. But the workouts are amazing. It's a beautiful countryside here, usually I'm with a couple of people and chatting nonsense with like-minded people. For anyone, this is a good thing. I'm no different.”
Indeed, none of the doctors who monitored his condition said that this was a bad idea. «Do it» was universal medical advice. So on Sunday he'll line up on the beach at Tenby, ready to start maybe 16 hours of relentless endurance.
Shane told me it all starts with 6,000 spectators lining up on the rocks and screaming . as the sun rises on the other side of the bay, the national anthem of Wales is played,” he says. “I get goosebumps just talking about it. I can't wait for this moment.”
And he's grinning widely. This is Alix Popham: a wonderful person with an outstanding challenge.
If you want to support Alix Popham and Head for Change at Sunday's event, check out his fundraising page.
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