Prince Harry records video for all runners in London’s ‘mental health marathon’
Howard Lake | 11 April 2017 | News
Prince Harry has recorded a video message for all 39,000 runners in the 2017 Virgin Money London Marathon, encouraging them to wear the Heads Together headband they will be given to help make it the ‘mental health marathon’.
He will be joined at the event by The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to support runners taking part for their mental health campaign Heads Together, which is this year’s Charity of the Year for the Marathon.
Prince Harry message to London Marathon runners from InVision Communications on Vimeo.
In the video he says:
“You’ve been training for months and the start line for the 2017 Virgin Money London Marathon is finally within sight. I’m sure it will be one of the most rewarding experiences of your life. William, Catherine and I will be there to cheer you all on.
“We know that many of you will be running for some incredible charities because you have been directly affected by life-changing issues. You’ll recognise the emotional impact these can have, and how talking about it openly can help. We all have mental health, just as we all have physical health. You can all play your part in the biggest ever movement for mental health.
“Whatever cause you are running for, wear your vest with pride, and please wear your Heads Together headband too. Together we’ll get the whole country talking about mental health.
“Good luck and see you at the finish line”.
Mental health marathon
The headbands are being provided to the runners by Virgin Money, which is one of three Founding Partners of the Heads Together campaign.
Even though many runners will be running to raise funds for other causes, the royal family members hope that they will still wear the headband to show their support for the national movement to end the stigma around mental health once and for all.
Runners will receive their Heads Together headband when they pick up their race number. Prince Harry will attend the London Marathon Expo, where runners will collect their headbands, to encourage runners to wear them on race day.
Heads Together headband on social media
Not running the London Marathon? Heads Together has announced that non-runners will be able to support the mental health marathon by wearing their own Heads Together headband on social media.
The charity will unveil several ways for people to wear a headband online. To get started, Heads Together and Twitter have unveiled a custom emoji of a smiley face wearing a Heads Together headband, which appears automatically when you use the hashtags #HeadsTogether #TeamHeadsTogether and #oktosay on the social media platform.
Marathon Heads Together headbands will also start to pop up in a number of surprising places in London and online.
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All 39,000 @LondonMarathon runners will be given a #headstogether headband. Even our #teamheadstogether emoji has one! Try it out!#oktosay pic.twitter.com/76ZkiDfL2K
— Heads Together (@heads_together) April 10, 2017
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.