Sean Conway

Sean Conway is an extreme adventurer known as The Endurance Guy. He is the first person in history to achieve the Endurance Grand Slam: a world’s first, longest, fastest, and most of…

He was the first to swim the length of Britain;

He competed in the world’s longest triathlon;

He was the fastest to cycle across Europe; and

He did the most full iron triathlons in a row.

He is now an in-demand inspirational and motivational keynote speaker and mentor.

Contact Great British Speakers today to enquire on availability and fees for ‘The Endurance Guy’, extreme athlete, speaker Sean Conway, for your next event.

Type Of Speaker

Exploration & Military High Performance Mental Health Motivational Personal Development Resilience Speaker Sport

More About Sean Conway

Born in Zimbabwe, Sean Conway now pushes himself far beyond what he thought possible, both physically and mentally. Along with the highest highs, there has also been the lowest lows, but Sean has picked himself up and kept going – earning him the nickname, The Endurance Guy.

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Sean Conway | Challenges

Sean created The 496 Challenge – a challenge that is so tough, only 10% of people who start end up completing it.

The 496 Run: Run the day of the month in kilometres, so on the first of the month you would run 1km, and then 2km on the second day and so on, finishing the month with 31km, totalling 496km.

The 496 Cycle: The same as the 496 Run, you cycle 1km on day one, 2km on the second, and so on.

The 496 Swim: The swimming challenge is similar in that you increase the distance per day, but it is in metres; so the first day is 100m, then 200m on the second etc until the final day where you swim 3.1 km.

Sean Conway’s other successful challenges include:

105 Full Iron Distance Triathlons (2023): Covering 14,763 miles in 15 days, Sean swam 2.4 miles, cycled 112 miles, and ran 26.2 miles every day for 105 days in a row.

Swimming the Length of Britain (2013): Swimming 900 miles in 135 days, growing a beard to help protect him against jellyfish stings.

Cycling Around the World (2012): For 155 days, Sean cycle 16,000 miles ‘around the world’.

Across Europe Cycling World Record (2018): After a failed first attempt, Sean cycled 3,890 miles from Portugal to Russia in just 24 days.

4,200 Mile Continuous Triathlon (2016): In April 2016, Sean set off on a 4,200 mile triathlon around the coast of Great Britain, completing the challenge in 85 days.

Running the Length of Britain (2015): Sean ran 1,011 miles from John O’Groats in just 44 days, running upwards of 40 miles a day.

Cycling the Length of Britain (2008): Sean spent 25 days cycling the length of Britain, totalling 1,300 miles.

Lap of Wales Triathlon (2022): After suffering an injury, Sean wanted something to aim for, which is where this triathlon came in. He completed the triathlon in just 13 days, covering 716 miles.

He has also taken part in what he refers to as ‘smaller’ challenges, including cycling 300 miles in 5 days; took part in a 24 hour mountain bike endurance race; trekked across the deserts of Jordan; competed in a ‘double brutal’ triathlon; ran across Iceland in nine days; ran a marathon in each of the 15 national parks in the UK; cycled the 360 mile route around North Wales; ran 280 miles from Conway in North Wales to Conway in Ireland; completed the London Marathon in costume in 4.5 hours; sailing the length of Britain in 83 hours; kayaked the Thames for 149 miles; and cycled from London to Paris in just 24 hours, among many others.

Sean Conway | Facing Adversity

But not every challenge has gone to plan, but “It’s in our failures where we become stronger”. Sean Conway’s failed attempts include:

– Injured his ankle during his first attempt of ‘most consecutive iron distance triathlons’

– All challenges were interrupted in 2020 due to the pandemic

– Injured his leg on day four of his attempt to cycle across Europe

– Due to injury, he had to pull out of his ‘route 66 bike ride’

– Signed up to compete in the ‘round Australia cycle record’ but hadn’t given himself enough time for training and was unable to attend

– Injured his knee when trying to run the length of Britain

– He was run over when trying to cycle around the world, spending a month recovering

Sean Conway hire mentor speaker book at official agent Great British Speakers

Sean Conway | Media Work

Sean has featured in a number of documentaries and short films for Amazon Prime and YouTube, including:

– Sean Conway Running Britain

– Sean Conway on the Edge

– Sean Conway Europe or Bust

– The 496 Challenge

– National Park Marathons

– Running Across Iceland

SEAN CONWAY | BOOKS

Sean has published a number of inspirational books, including:

– Land’s End to John O’Groats: The Ride That Started It All (2012)

– Cycling the Earth: A Life-Changing Race Around the World (2016)

– Hell and High Water: My Epic 900-Mile Swim From Land’s End to John O’Groats (2017)

– Running Britain: The Final Leg of the World’s First Length of Britain Triathlon (2018)

– Big Mile Cycling: Ten Years, 60,000 Miles, One Dream (2019)

– Tempura’s Treasure (2020)

– Iron 105: 105 Full Ion Distance Triathlons in a Row (2024)

SEAN CONWAY | CLIENTS

AA, BlackRock, Bremont, British Cycling, British Swimming, the Building Forum, Cheltenham Literature Festival, Dell, Discovery Channel, Duke of Edinburgh Award, Ecco, Edelman, Enterprise Week, Eton College, Google, Grassington Festival, Howdens, HSBC, Inter Sport, ITV, Kendal Mountain Festival, Keswick Mountain Festival, Lake District Foundation, Liquidnet, M&S, Microsoft, Mizuho, the National Running Show, NCS Survey, Ordnance Survey, Origin Housing, Park Resorts, Royal Geographiccal Society, Scouts, Speedo, Sky, South West Outdoor Festival, Snow + Rock, St. Columba’s Hospice, Staffordshire Police, Steppes Travel, Sustrans, Switzerland Get Natural, Tales of Adventure, TEDx, Twisted, uSwitch, Venari, West Yorkshire Police, Wilderness.

Call +44 1753 439 289 or email Great British Speakers now to book Sean Conway for your next corporate event.

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Testimonials

We have had some great feedback and I am delighted to say the term ‘non-negotiable’ is seeping into our language. We have our heads of department meeting tomorrow so we will be discussing what our non-negotiables are around quality, as our value in focus this year.
P&A Group

We had a great talk the staff here were really enthused by Sean Conway. we’ve had loads of positive feedback. He was funny, engaging and of course really inspiring and it all tied back in really well with our values campaign.
Mizuho International Bank

Sean was a fantastic speaker at our company-wide annual off-site. His enthusiasm and energy are infectious and people can’t help but be motivated by his achievements. Sean also effectively links in key themes that the business is working on – so that his talk is both inspirational and relevant. Thoroughly recommended.
L3 Pilot Academy

I wanted to do something special to lift my team’s spirits on Blue Monday, which can be a tough day for many. I was lucky to find Sean Conway, whose amazing stories and positive mindset really inspired and motivated everyone. His talk was exactly what we needed to feel energised and ready to take on the week.
Brightlocal

We thoroughly enjoyed the time that Sean spent with us at Taunton Prep. Both on the evening before Parents’ Day and on the day itself. Sean’s talk was very well received – he pitched it perfectly – in terms of the age of his audience, the length of his speech and combining an inspirational message with humility and humour. We received a huge number of compliments following the day. I know that the Head has written to Sean personally but we would like to pass on our thanks again.
Taunton Prep

We’ve had some really positive feedback from the team about Sean’s talk. It was very inspiring to hear about his adventures and I think a lot of us are now considering how we can start to live life to the full a bit more!
M&S

Sean Conway was a fantastic motivational speaker. He had the audience hooked on his every word. More importantly he was on the money covering all the important leadership messages we wanted covering/wrapped up in some incredibly engaging memoirs. Brilliant.
West Yorkshire Police

A true inspiration to us aspiring cyclists. From an academic view point, the talk was well constructed with no flaws and great detail was made to show the most exciting and jaw dropping tales from a young man’s youth.
Bradford University

Sean’s talk to our TEDx Manchester conference astonished the student audience. His inspirational story and powerful message that nothing is impossible will stay long in the memory.
TEDx Manchester Youth

Sean’s talk about his John O’Groats swim kept an audience of 500 young people and parents enthralled from start to finish. His down to earth manner and can do attitude were truly inspiring and he left many in the audience thinking about how to challenge themselves and achieve something that they didn’t think they were capable of.
Youth Philanthropy Initiative

Just come back from listening to Sean Conways’s extraordinarily inspirational talk. The sixth form loved him and there was a queue of Year 13 lads trying to get ‘selfies’ with him. One of Year 10, curious about all the fuss, asked me if Sean was a rock star-I told him he was better than that, that he was a professional adventurer!
Cheam School

I think it is always a challenge when a speaker is new to an organisation to find all the links and connects to our purpose with their story. It was good that Sean was without us throughout the event so that he could tune in to that. On our pre briefing call with Sean I think we offered him an approach to enable interaction with the audience through a couple of ‘push pauses’. It was good that he did this… That ties back to finding links and connects.
Carmarthenshire DofE Programme

He was great, took us all on the journey with him, and was engaging and very inspirational. ‘we want a bigger beard for next time’.
Origin Housing

I just wanted to say a massive thank you to Sean for being part of this year’s Peebles Outdoor Film Festival. His presentation on Friday night was a perfect start to the festival, and was commented on by many people throughout the weekend.
Peebles Festival

He was totally inspirational yesterday and really got under the skin of the girls. So many have passed me in the corridors this morning saying that they’re now going to do something amazing like him!
Tudor Hall

Sean was great. We genuinely thought he was one of the best speakers we’ve ever had. The students were so receptive he received 3 rounds of applause and I was worried he might have started a riot. Perfect pitch and length and content.
Bedales