Nedd Brockmann was awarded Young Australian of the Year in 2026, recognised for his extraordinary efforts in raising over $10.6 million for homelessness in Australia.
When Nedd started his journey, he was a young electrician from Forbes who had only just taken up running, with fewer than 4,500 followers on Instagram. By the time he crossed the finish line at Bondi Beach in front of 10,000+ people, he had sparked a movement. Running close to 100km a day for 46 and a half days, he became the fastest Australian to achieve the feat. More importantly, it helped put homelessness on the radar in a way that people couldn’t ignore.
Why the homeless? Coming from a small country town, when Nedd arrived in Sydney and saw how many people were living without a home, he wanted to do something about it. He chose a challenge big enough to cut through and get people paying attention.
The message was simple: homelessness should not equal hopelessness. After completing the run and raising millions for homelessness support charity We Are Mobilise, Nedd wasn’t interested in calling it “done”. The run wasn’t the finish line, it was the start. He kept showing up, backing the cause, and using the momentum to keep helping and inspiring Australians.
The run across Australia showed what’s possible when you commit to something bigger than yourself. In 2024, Nedd went again - running 1,000 miles around Sydney Olympic Park Athletic Centre - in his most difficult challenge yet.
That effort helped launch Nedd’s Uncomfortable Challenge, where people take on their own hard thing, in their own way. You choose a challenge that genuinely pushes you, rally your mates, schools, workplaces, gyms and community groups, and raise funds to support Australians doing it tough. With the community behind it, Nedd raised a further $4.7 million for We Are Mobilise, supporting people experiencing homelessness across the country. Nedd's Comfortable Challenge went again in 2025 with $1.6 million raised throughout the community.