Royal Navy’s Doc on NHS Nightingale Cycling Mission
Armed Forces Day, June 26th, is a chance to show support for the men and women who make up the Armed Forces community.
Lieutenant Commander Doc Cox, UK Armed Forces Director of Rugby, sets out on Armed Forces Day on an epic 840km cycle from Glasgow to London taking just ten days to raise money for SSAFA, the Armed Forces charity and NHS Charities.
Doc has been involved with the Royal Navy and rugby for more than 38 years. When on deployment overseas, he helped coach the inaugural Afghanistan team in 2008, then coached in Tanzania, Ukraine and, more recently, in Nigeria helping to develop local sides and players.
Having joined the Royal Navy aged 16 in 1984, Doc is a decorated serving officer for whom service is what it’s all about.
He and his support team, led by Nathan ‘Pony’ Moore, will travel from Glasgow SEC, NHS Louisa Jordan Hospital, which has carried out many thousands of healthcare appointments and vaccinations. Taking in five Nightingale sites en route, they will finish at London’s ExCeL centre, which having opened in April 2020 and then reopened in January to treat non-coronavirus patients.
A personal thank you
The challenge is both a tribute to the NHS and service personnel who both helped build the hospitals and carry out testing and vaccination. It is also Doc’s personal thank you to the NHS. Last year, during the pandemic, his step-mother Lesley died from cancer.
“It was horrendous given the situation hospitals were in but I will never forget the care and compassion showed to her and the family by NHS staff and the way they allowed family to be with her for her last hours,” he says.
Doc himself has reasons to be grateful to the NHS. “A couple of weeks before the end of a tour two years ago, I found a lump in my man tackle which was scanned and I was told was benign but to keep an eye on it. Within 12 months it had doubled in size and I had it removed last March and was very grateful to the NHS.
"I also have a very good mate with terminal cancer right now and I wanted to do something different to thank both the NHS and all the servicemen and women who have helped during the pandemic. People see the military but seldom look past the uniform at the fact that we are human beings like everyone else.”
Carrying a Nightingale lantern on the journey, Doc has been in training some eight weeks, losing a stone and a half in weight.
“I was a sturdy middle aged man in lycra but now none of my clothes fit me,” he laughs. “I’m a firm believer in challenging yourself and I’m in the lucky position of having a very supportive wife, friends and family who always back me when I do something stupid.
"This challenge seems to have beaten everything else I’ve done so far. Pony (Moore) is the one who will be keeping my morale up, making sure I’m taking on fluids and eating my figs. Without him I wouldn’t be able to do it.”
Among Doc’s previous little outings was, together with two soldiers, carrying the balls to be used at the Army v Navy match on a trek around the Turkish peninsula, in The Gallipoli Gallop.
One hundred and two years after the guns fell silent in Gallipoli, Doc and his comrades from NATO Land Command in Turkey honoured the dead of the Dardanelles, raised money for the Royal British Legion and reminded us all of the sacrifices sportsmen made in the Great War: 17 Commonwealth international rugby players died in Gallipoli alone and 106 during the entire conflict, including seven of England’s 1914 Grand Slam-winning side.
Having coached around the world while on operational duty, Doc says: “Rugby gives an esprit de corps, brings people together and creates a common bond and friendship that you just can’t beat. In Afghanistan they were playing in deep snow, almost barefoot, but seeing the smiles on their faces was worth its weight in gold.
"It was the same coaching in Africa, that’s what it’s all about, putting your hand on a shoulder, saying well done and seeing that smile.”
Support during unprecedented time
As the Armed Forces Day flag is raised on buildings and famous landmarks around the country the day provides a much valued morale boost for the troops and their families.
Says Doc: “I want to say thank you very much to the NHS for all that they’ve done during Covid-19 over the last 12 to 16 months, and also to SSAFA for the support that they’ve given families during this incredible unprecedented time.”
“I suppose you can tie that also into the fact that servicemen and women last year were paramount in building the Nightingale centres. It’s a way of saying thank you to them. It will be incredibly tough as I cycle challenge, but it will be worth it when I reach NHS Nightingale in London on Sunday 6th July.”
If you would like to support Doc and his team as they raise money for SSAFA and NHS Charities Together, please visit: https://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/DoRNightingaleChallenge.
To find out more about the work of SSAFA, please visit: ssafa.org.uk.
