Jailbreak 2016 has seen a Trinity team come in first place. Michael McGrath and Aoife Curtin were the first of 90 competing teams to reach Kościuszko Mound in Krakow. Just as the winning team was announced, the goal of 50,000 raised for Amnesty International and Society St. Vincent de Paul was reached.
Michael and Aoife were an early stand out in the race, when photographs of them and Westlife’s Nicky Byrne at Dublin Airport appeared in which they completed the #CeadMileHandshake charity challenge.
From Dublin they boarded a plane to Frankfurt and documented their journey on all forms of rail based transportation, as both are “massive fans of the Luas”. Taking a train from Frankfurt to Berlin, the pair then caught the night bus to Warsaw.
This morning they hopped a train to Krakow and dashed towards the final location, the historic Kościuszko Mound.
The team had raised over €1,000 during the course of their adventure.
Jailbreak 2016 is a global race of over 100 teams of two students each, comprised of students from universities and colleges all over Ireland. The teams had two days to get from Collins’ Barracks in Dublin to a mystery location, which was revealed at 9 o’clock on Saturday morning. The teams could not use any money to get there, instead having to “beg, borrow and swindle their way onto planes, boats or even buses to get where they’re going”.
Last year, the winning team arrived at Lake Bled in Slovenia just six minutes after the team in second place.
Speaking to Trinity News director of Jailbreak 2016 Christopher Bowes thanked “all the Jailbreakers for their hard work and fundraising both before and during the event”. He went on to say that “everyone at HQ was amazed to see them beg blag and borrow their way across the continent. We’re thrilled to have reached the €50,000 fundraising target and to have been able to highlight the amazing work of Amnesty International and Society St. Vincent de Paul.”
The competition was organised by TCD LawSoc, Trinity VDP and the Trinity branch of Amnesty International.
Jailbreak 2016 is in aid of Amnesty International and Society St. Vincent de Paul. The organisers had set themselves a target of €50,000 to be raised and distributed between the two causes. Participants in the race highlighted how easily their journeys across Europe for free were, in contrast to long arduous the journeys taken by refugees.
Recap all the Jailbreak action by visiting our two-day liveblog of the event
