Tomorrow, Nial Breslin will begin an epic 300 km kayak through Ireland for charity - despite not even fitting properly into kayaks. 

The musician is raising money for A Lust For Life - a youth mental health charity that champions early intervention models of care. 

Neither Bressie or his five fellow kayakers have any experience - but all were eager to take part in ‘The Rising’ challenge for charity. 

“I haven’t thought it through in any shape,” Bressie told The Hard Shoulder. 

“I don’t fit in a kayak as well which is a bad starting point - so, I’m kind of squeezing myself into it.”

The group will start in Leitrim and kayak down the River Shannon to King John’s Castle in County Limerick. 

The group have been training on the lakes of Mullingar but the forecast is quite poor; there will be strong winds - something Bressie describes as “not ideal”. 

“We’re going up to Daura, [Leitrim],” he said. 

“That’s kind of the furthest up you can go - you can’t kayak on the rest; it’s too shallow. 

“So, we’re going up as far as we can.” 

Although he used to play rugby for Leinster, Bressie said kayaking was “really hard” and unexpectedly “challenging”. 

“We’re keeping safety right at the top of it,” he said. 

“The six of us don’t have experience; we do have boat support - which is brilliant, that really is helpful. 

“But it is incredibly challenging and I kind of feel responsible for the other guys as well because I kind of dragged them into this thing.” 

The charity hopes to see its model of early intervention rolled out into every school in Ireland and its crowdfunder is still live.

“We’re up to nearly 50 grand already and we want to push towards 100 - that’s the aim,” Bressie said. 

“The impact that will have for us to be able to continue to provide these programmes and infrastructure to the schools - which is absolutely required right now, more than it’s ever been required.” 

The kayakers aim to complete their 300km journey on July 6th.