He may have only announced his retirement yesterday, but Michael Gordon will continue to push his body to the limits even after the season has finished, today confirming he will join the Mark Hughes Foundation trek up Mount Kilimanjaro in October.
The 35-year-old will join a list of rugby league royalty as they raise much-needed funds for brain cancer research.
“The Mark Hughes Foundation is fantastic, and everything they do for rugby league and everything rugby league does for the Foundation is great,” Gordon said.
“They’re doing the trek in Africa, so I decided, funnily enough, to throw my hand up.
“I’m going to launch a page tomorrow for fundraising for the charity.”
While the Tweed Coast junior has thrown his body around on the football field for the past 14 years, the trek will no doubt be a different type of pain – but this time all in the name of charity.
“It’s going to be a tough trek,” Gordon conceded. “I think it’s a seven or eight-day trip from top to bottom.
“It’s going to be hard, but it’s all for a great cause.
“I threw a remark out to one of them that I’d love to be involved, and got a phone call back within a couple of days saying ‘we want you on board’, so I was stoked about that.
“I’m just going to throw myself into it, get some hiking shoes and start walking.
“It’s a different sort of fitness. I think the stats are that 50 per cent don’t complete it, just because of the altitude.
“We’re going to take it a little slower, just so we all get used to the change in altitude along the way.
“I’ll have to do some practice and come in to the (altitude) facility here and do some walking in the chamber.”
