Ross Edgley Is A Human Poseidon: Lessons From The World’s Longest Non-Stop Swim

24:34Another one, which is one that I've used over the years is to just really double down on the zone one and the zone two. So you're in that aerobic state of exertion and your body, you know, the more hours that you spend training that way, the more fat adapted you become because your body is becoming more efficient at that lower exertion level, right? But that's something you're doing all the time. I mean, when you're doing these swims, you're in zone one, zone two. Your heart rate can't be that elevated. No, no, it's exactly that. But for some reason, you're burning glycogen as fuel. It's exactly that.

25:09James was saying it's very interesting, Ross, even at low, low intensities, you're carb adapted. You have to go so low to actually tap into that fat adaptation. So it was really interesting that for me, I was always training harder. That was my thing. And actually sometimes even during my zone two sessions, if I'm being honest, looking back, I was kind of redlining a little bit because for me, I was like, oh, just suffer. So it wasn't zone two, it was zone three. So it was glycolytic. It was slightly anaerobic. And that's been one of the biggest things. Slow it down. Exactly. Slow it down and slim it down, dude.

25:37This is my thing. And I say this with love. You know, you have an extraordinary physique. I suspect there's some level of attachment that you have to this physique. And certainly it creates a lot of intrigue and interest because it's world-class, dude. But as somebody who comes from a swimming background, and I'm sure Chris Morgan has told you this as well, like, dude, somebody who is their own best guinea pig who, you know, you're studying sharks. Well, let's look at the best ultra distance swimmers in the world. Let's look at their physiques. Let's look at how they train. These people are incredibly lean.

26:13All of that added muscle on your shoulders and your arms and your lats creates a lot of power. You can generate a lot of power with that. But ultimately, when you're looking at doing multiple day swims, these things become liabilities, right? Do you know, and actually, interestingly on that, this was fascinating as well. That again, the MRI revealed actually that my slow twitch fibers have a slight tendency to hypertrophy at the same time. So that was what was really interesting. They said that Ross, although it looks like you're big, strong and powerful, it's actually an element of your slow twitch fibers actually hypertrophy.

26:45You sort of see it in cyclists, you know, cyclists who are kind of got big legs, but they're endurance athletes. And it's that hypertrophy of slow twitch fibers. You see it again, German volume training, you know, so with a lot of the sort of bodybuilders of old, they have that muscle density and maturity. And it's because of the sheer volume that they've done, there is a slight hypertrophy of their slow twitch fibers. it's rare it's not very common but it does happen and looking at my MRI they said that's kind of what it is you look like it's maybe fast twitch fibers which are kind of bigger in diameter but it's not it's a hypertrophy of slow twitch fibers but the real propellant is the level of mitochondrial density that comes with building a gigantic aerobic machine right so have you looked at like what that looks like for you I need to this is this is the next level and this is what I mean.

27:34At 38, it's so interesting because there's still layers. Yeah, that's hopefully next swim. So you have these two lake attempts to, you know, break the world record for longest lake swim. Neither of them go to your liking. You find yourself more recently in Mallorca getting ready for this Yukon swim and you announce that you're going to go for the longest pool swim attempt, right you make a big show of it on social media we're going to circle back to that but uh the goal here is to swim 360 kilometers 223 miles yeah and you're in this pool in this beautiful part of the world i don't know what the water temp is in that pool but you know it's not as warm as the lake in italy but it's not as cold as lake as loch ness either but probably a little too warm for you to be able to be at your peak yeah yeah we discovered the hard way Yeah, yeah, it was exactly that.

28:30I think what was so interesting about the Mallorca swim, and genuinely, I'll probably do it again, is just like you wouldn't do it. So we ended up doing 140 kilometers. Right, which is like, I mean, you swam 140 kilometers in a pool. Yeah, yeah. It's like, come on. And the first day, this was staged, like you were going to sleep at night, right? But the first day you did 50 kilometers. Yeah, yeah. Which is insane. And speaking to Chris about this, it was so interesting because how do you train for something like the Yukon? How do you train for a non-stop swim? It's so interesting that in terms of periodization, there's not much scientific literature on it.

29:04So you have to push the boundaries. You're really playing with adaptation, that sort of stress adaptation. It's such a fine line. And I think we could have pushed on after the 140 kilometers. We could have probably gone for the record. I definitely wouldn't have been in a state to do the Yukon afterwards. So that's why genuinely I say, I sit here before you four years later, Rich, mature with my kombucha. Well, there was a bigger goal at play, right? You're not going to capsize or jeopardize the Yukon goal by pushing too hard in the pool in Mallorca. But what made it interesting for me was the fact that, okay, this is literally the third thing in a row that you've made a big to-do about where you fell a little bit short.

29:47And I'm wondering kind of what that did to your mental state going into the Yukon? Because what made the Yukon swim different is that there was no announcement really. There was no live streaming. There was no sharing of lots of Instagram stories about what was going on. It was this thing that just kind of happened. And then when it was done, then you kind of showed up again and said, this is what we did. So you had a different relationship to how you were kind of sharing this journey. And if I had to guess, I would imagine like, Like, hey, listen, I was talking a lot before. Now I need to get to work, right?

30:24There was definitely an element of that. I think, interestingly, we couldn't in the Yukon because there was just literally no signal. So we couldn't have said we're going to do live updates because we just couldn't. There was no signal. But with that said, even if there was signal, I think it was exactly what you're saying. If I'm being completely honest, I think when there's a camera, especially if it's for a charity, or even not even if it's just social media, for me, for whatever reason, I feel an obligation, whatever, to talk, to address the camera, to do something. Well, you're good at it and you like it.

30:54You're a showman. You're a showman at heart. Oh, I think there was an element of that. And I love that you said that because I think you hit the nail on the head better than I've been trying to articulate in my own head, that it was like, this needs to be done for different reasons. It needs to be very intrinsic. You know, you just need to be alone with your own thoughts, with your team, no expectations, no ideas from the outside world. And as a result, if I'm being completely honest, it was a different kind of swim. It was amazing. It was so, I was just so present and there was never a camera on me.

31:25The whole thing was filmed, but I never addressed the camera, not once. And I think going forward, it's really interesting that that approach now, although like you said, I am a little bit of a showman. Oh, I think I probably will probably do the Yukon approach a little bit more. and a couple interesting factoids about this Yukon swim. The water temp was nine degrees Celsius, 48 Fahrenheit. I mean, that is cold water, man. Chris told me it climbed up to 12.9, which is 55. Still really cold. You were 83 miles from the Arctic Circle. So there's no night, right? No. I mean, it gets dark a little bit, but you don't really get that blanket of darkness.

32:10No. Which was strange. I think it really played with your senses in your circadian rhythm as well. At two o 'clock in the morning, it is just bright. Again, Chris, absolute hero. He kayaked hundreds of miles with me by my side. There was a point on the second morning where the sun just was not coming up over the mountains. Hypothermia was setting in. You don't shake in your hands. You're shaking from your core. I could feel it in my stomach. And I knew if I didn't do something then, it was basically just going to physiologically implode. The swim wasn't going to happen. So we'd done all of that, but the Yukon was still asking more of us.

32:46So I ended up punching like 600 milligrams of caffeine. And just from two o 'clock till seven o 'clock when the sun eventually came over the mountain, I can't wait to show you footage. My technique was ugly. I was just windmilling and it wasn't necessarily for propulsion. It was just trying to keep myself warm. And then on top of that, I remember once that caffeine had sort of died down, Chris turns to me and he's kayaking and he hadn't slept as well. And he just turns to me and he said, Ross, can I be completely honest with you? And I'm eating a banana on my break. I tell him, I said, yeah, yeah, Chris, what's up?

33:17And he goes, oh, I'm tripping out. I went, oh, good, me too. What are you seeing? And he goes, oh, the seven dwarves are over there just chopping wood. And I went, oh, cool. I mean, they're friendly? He goes, yeah, yeah, they seem friendly. I was, oh, cool. Goggles back on, we just carried on. So it was knowing that you're in the trenches, but despite it playing with your senses, circadian rhythm, you had someone there with you.

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39:04By Chris, we mean Chris Morgan. We'll talk a little bit more about him in a minute, but this is a guy I've known for 30 years. He's the former Olympic coach for the Swiss Olympic swimming team. Coached at Harvard, like amazing guy, but he's in your boat the entire time. So he's having his own sleep deprivation thing, right? Yeah. So it's not like he's trading off with someone else and people are taking shifts. Yeah. No, yeah, he is in the trenches. But what he did in terms of kayaking would be considered a huge expedition alone. You know, it's just the fact that he did it in complete support of some strange Englishman swimming.

39:41But it was what he did was incredible. And yeah. By the rules of open water swimming, in case we didn't already make it clear or people don't truly appreciate or understand what we're talking about here, you're not allowed to touch land, touch another human being, touch the boat. So you're not sleeping. It's not like you're crawling onto the shore and taking a nap and getting back in. Like you are swimming the entire time without touching anything except the water. You're fed by people throwing food at you or dangling it, you know, with a pole or something like that. You're completely on your own in freezing cold water.

40:20Your wetsuit, it feels like you finally, you had some wetsuit issues, but you finally really figured out the wetsuit thing. Oh, we did and we didn't. So again, full transparency. It was amazing. The wetsuit was incredible. No chafing. Seven mil? Yeah, seven mil with greater mobility around the shoulders. And to this day, I don't know if my bum is in the wrong position or the toilet flap was in the wrong position. But basically just, I think we were like five hours in and I went to the toilet, unzipped the flap. I was going to ask how that works. Yeah, not successfully is essentially the answer.

40:55Went to the toilet, five hours in, and I was like, that's just not evacuated what it needed to at all. so for basically 56 hours i was just in the suit baking in the sun and then afterwards that must have created a terrible rash it was but i've healed i've got good bone marrow but then honestly afterwards like the medics were amazing dr tom one of the medics was just incredible the entire team chris as well and they're cutting up the wetsuits trying to get it off me because the chafing is a little bit bad and my skin's a little bit raw. And as I'm just like, guys, full transparency, I'm so sorry for whatever you find in this wetsuit.

41:35And then what was so bad as well, we had like the team out there, these Canadians were just amazing, like big manly, like Canadian, and even some of them had to excuse themselves. They're like, that smell is just, I'm so sorry. And I was like, oh God. Chris said when it was done, they took you to the hospital in Dawson city, you know, which is just a small little town, right? So it's not like some giant hospital or anything like that. And Chris literally had to cut the wetsuit off of you with like medical scissors, revealing, you know, God knows what was inside there. Yeah, we are bonded now. He has seen some things.

42:12But that's the reality. I think it's so good to talk about that as well, because I think sometimes people see the GB swim, the Yukon, and like, oh, oh my God, that was incredible. It's like, no, no, no. Like the reality of setting a record like that is swimming in your own excrement for 56 hours. Who had the record that you eclipsed? What was that record? This was interesting actually. So I believe it was in the Danube, but it gets a little bit strange because obviously there's dams and things there. So it wasn't necessarily sort of nonstop because you'd had to got out. So - You had to climb over the locks.

42:44Yeah, yeah, to get out. Because that's what it is. Whereas with the Yukon, it was truly unbroken. There was no dams, there was nothing, no bridges. We just, it was truly in the water. But if you have like an exceptional current, then you're getting the benefit of that. Oh, for sure. Yeah, for sure. And I think that goes back to what we were talking about as well before, that it's so nice to have this blueprint in many ways. Because now, as I said before at the start, the goal is different bodies of water. So the river one's nice to tick off, but... You've been very clear that this quest isn't to break the record for the world's longest swim.

43:19It swims with an S, right? So I don't know if you're ready to talk about that yet, but we saw the pool attempt. We saw two lake attempts. We now have the river attempt. I assume you'll try to go back and best those pool and lake attempts. But what we're still waiting for is the ocean attempt. Yeah, absolutely. I think what's really interesting is it's all weather windows. So with the Yukon, we had to go now because that's when the river was basically at its fastest and things were melting and stuff. So there's a few different locations and we are just literally waiting and watching. And if Mother Nature, Poseidon, whatever it is, sort of goes, here you go, Ross.

43:59I'll go, thank you. But you're ready to jump when that moment arrives. I really am. I think the Yukon was amazing, but like, and I'm not sort of downplaying it, but it was a training swim in many ways. So we've got a few. Yeah, but you're not going to tell us what that is yet. Oh, no, because there's literally, there's so many options. I'm not even being secretive, there's so many. So if I was to say like one, but it might be superseded because we might get like a anti-cyclone from the Sahara Desert again, and we'll jump in. So yeah, you'll be the first to know though. Yeah, I hope so. I hope so.

44:28Hallucinations, you suffered that like lesion on the back of your knee, but nothing like what happened to the back of your neck from the Great British Swim. So Chris told me it was a combination of an improved wetsuit, but also like lanolin and desitin, right? Which is like what babies use for their bums. Like a zinc oxide, right? That kept you from not chafing, chafing up too much. Which was fantastic. How's that neck look on the back there? It's not too bad. You still have a scar? Yeah, oh, you can see that was Loch Ness though. That was the cellulitis. So that was what was weird because the chafing, I would say the chafing was worse on the GB swim, but it was cellulitis in Loch Ness, which is just a bacterial infection.

45:09but if it gets in your lymph nodes or your bloodstream, it can be fatal. So that was basically what stopped Loch Ness. We still felt relatively fine, but they were like, oh, that's cellulitis, you don't play with that. So I'm becoming a bit of an expert in all these weird... These weird diseases, yeah. Yeah, exactly. Well, it's a good thing you weren't doing this in the Amazon or something like that. You pick up some parasite or some crazy, you know, bug. How long do you think that you were hypothermic during this swim? Oh, I don't... We were just playing with the boundaries. you know I don't know because obviously no one can touch me and this was what was so interesting with our medics on board that they were like wow like usually we can diagnose we can test we put a thermometer in your mouth and it was just purely kind of communication and even on that note though as well and he was amazing Dr.

45:55Tom but he's a friend and also an amazing medic but he was sort of going between the two because there was times when he wanted to to chat but I was like but no one can get me out of this mess other than me so if I stop and just start describing my symptoms, cold's just going to start getting in. So there was sometimes where I was just like, I just have to get myself out of this. Exactly. But were you shivering? Like what was your experience of the cold? Yeah. I mean, hypothermically, essentially you're not generating enough heat. You know, your body's losing more heat than it can generate. And I think shivering in your hands and your arms, that's fine.

46:29It's when it's in your core, like your body actually is shivering. So at that point, again, the support team was just going to go, but so often I say, like, it's such a team sport. And I think people sometimes think I'm sort of self-deprecating and stuff. It absolutely isn't. At those particular points, it could not have been done without the team we had there. And when I was shouting out, we then changed feeding strategies to every 15 minutes and more regularly. And we went from energels and various things like that to just like, I'm talking scalding hot porridge oats. Like, this is a dilemma and a situation I hope nobody listening finds themselves in.

47:03But when you're so cold, when you're so sleep deprived after 50 hours, they were saying, how hot do you want the porridge? And I was like, oh, I mean, as hot as possible. And they were handing me it. It was literally scalding. You could see it just piping. But I was just faced with the dilemma. It's like, do you scold your taste buds in your throat, but it will warm you up from the inside. And when you've made peace with the fact you're like, I'm not stopping. So they're your two options. Pick one. Then we obviously chose the scalding throat. Yeah. How did the tongue do this time? I mean, it's not salt water.

47:38Good. So it's not like, you know, falling apart into your vegetable soup like it was. Do you know what on this one, the tongue was fine. The tongue didn't disintegrate. Exactly. So talk to me about the mindset. Like Like when you're on hour 50, this is a 62 hour swim, no sleep. So the mere kind of just drudgery of putting one arm in front of the other, I assume there wasn't a lot of visibility in the river either, right? When you're looking down and you're swimming, there's not a lot of stimulus there. So how are you occupying your mind? Like what's going through the noggin? It's so strange because it's almost like a TV channel, you know, like a streaming channel where you just literally flick in the channel and anything from minute to minute to hour to hour, that you can tell yourself to get through.

48:23You do. I mean, I think it was interesting, like there was about five kilometers where this huge eagle was just tracking me. And I turned to the guys on the boat and I was like, what is going on? And it was just hopping from tree to tree. And they said, look, I think it knows you're too small to be a bear. You're too big to be a salmon. But what happens with the salmon is they kind of wait for them to just stop flapping around because they're exhausted. And then it will come down and it will just start eating. I was like, oh, okay. So I'm just swimming and this eagle. I cannot stop. Eagle is going to swoop down and yeah, wow.

48:57And I was speaking to the Canadian media, they were amazing, so supportive. They were like, oh, we heard you had some motivation in a visitor. I was like, oh, it was motivation. But certainly having this massive, and they are huge. I'd never seen one before in real life. It's a pterodactyl. It's massive. And just having this thing look at you like your breakfast. I was like, oh, this isn't good, is it? And then the same as well, chafing wounds. And then all of a sudden, it was really weird how it completely coincided with, you know, the chafing of wounds and stuff with the increase in seeing, you know, a lot of black bears, no grizzlies, but a lot of black bears and people.

49:32And a couple moose, right? Chris told me that maybe it was on the third dawn where two moose crossed right in front of you. It was amazing. Yeah, the wildlife. And then it was the same. Chris went to the toilet at one point, took a book into the woods and then all of a sudden just saw these giant wolf prints as well and heard noises. So he said it was the quickest time he's ever gone to the toilet. When you're out there, I get our research so much about the Yukon, being there in person, it is different. It is the wild west out there. You've talked a lot about how we're also much more capable than we allow ourselves to believe the 40 % rule of the special forces.

50:13And you're certainly, you know, out there pioneering the outer edges of human capability and going to battle with that inner resistance. But you must have those moments where you think I can't go any further, like I've gone as far as I can. So what is it specifically that you tell yourself or that you do to get you over that hump and keep moving? This was actually a slight issue, actually, because we spoke to experts at Loughborough University and Liverpool John Moores University back in the UK, because talking about central governor theory, this idea that, or psychobiological model of fatigue as well, this idea that your brain is a hypochondriac and it's going to pull that physiological handbrake.

50:56So when you are 40 hours in, all of a sudden the brain's picking up on all these cues, you're carb depleted, you're sleep deprived, neurotransmitters are completely like fried, adrenal fatigue everything so it's getting you to quit pull that physiological handbrake and it's so interesting speaking to other athletes how that voice in your head knows like you're all of your weaknesses so we go on a hundred miler right now and that voice will be going oh ross you know remember the chafing in your back of your legs that's pretty bad could be cellulitis again remember what happened in loch ness and he's asking things the same which oh, Rich, how's that ankle?

51:33Oh, God, you know, how do you know about the ankle? So it's so weird, but I, for whatever reason, and I don't say this proudly, but the experts were saying, you have an ability to turn that off, but not in a good way, because with Loch Ness and Tres Amino, you knew you were never going to do it. So you just switched it off. Every time it was going, stop, Ross, stop, pull that physiological handbrake. I went, no, no, no, let's keep going, let's keep going. And they were like, in most people, we would say, no you are more powerful than your own mind allows you to believe but when you end up with heat stroke rhabdo hypothermia the same Ross actually pay attention to those voices a little bit more which is something that I think I'm a lot better at genuinely because even in the Yukon we got to that that 510 we turned to the team and we just sort of said that feels good do you want more?

52:24Yeah, we could maybe, yeah, we could, could we push more? That for me, it was the perfect swim. I didn't serve three days in hospital. As a team, we enjoyed ourselves. It was perfect. Why, why want more? It was, it was done. Other than the conditions and the preparation that you put into it, was there something else different about this that allowed you to finally eclipse a record? oh i think the team yeah as a team we have been through so much my girlfriend my brother signing chris jer kennedy one of the world's greatest ice swimmers yeah he was expedition leader on this as well he'd been moved in tresemino i love jer he's amazing and the amount of time sometimes in tresemino when i was swimming with heat stroke i look back at videos i was like that's not swimming i'm just flapping my arms but jer just knows exactly what to say when he's there just go, oh Ross, you're doing great.

53:18Split time's looking brilliant. I was like, no, it wasn't. No matter what. But he knows when to push and pull. So I think it was the perfect coming together of, and I don't want to sound too deep, but like even the Yukon, if things had gone wrong, if the sun hadn't risen on that second morning, it wouldn't have been done. It's quite simple. If it was overcast, it wouldn't have been done. The way that the sun, I spoke to Chris about this, but Maslow's hierarchy of needs and at the base of that pyramid of human needs, just food, warmth, and sleep. And I was there. It was so primitive. You could have offered me a fancy car, a million pounds.

53:54I was like, I just want the sun. That's all I want. That was what was so interesting that, that to answer your question, it was just the, it was the kind of coming together. We would have done Loch Ness and we would have done Tres Amino had the conditions been right. But you know, that's, that's the nature of adventure. Yeah, it came together. At hour 60 though, So wasn't there a forest fire out of the blue all of a sudden? Oh, yeah. Like right at the very end. We thought we'd seen everything. Yeah, the Yukon had thrown everything at us. And then all of a sudden, yeah, right at the very end, fire, which we managed literally just to get back to Whitehorse and then roads and everything closed.

54:26It was that bad. It was getting that big. And again, it was just maybe a signal, the Yukon going, Ross, you are done. Take the win. Chris told me that had the water been a little bit warmer or, you know, had you been not as cold as you were, he thinks that you could have swum all the way to Alaska. He was like, I really, he's like, this guy is a freak of nature. Like, I seriously believe that he could have very easily kept going. That's nice of him. Yeah. Do you know what? It's interesting. The conditions are so variable in the Yukon. I said, it's almost like a Rubik's cube in a minefield set inside a maze.

55:07It just changes. And the team that we had out there, they were incredible. They do the River Quest every year, which is the kayak race. And so the way that they read the river, they're able to go, Ross, we need you left. We need you right. No, not down that one. That's a log jam. We need you right. Just navigating me through. And it was so interesting that immediately, as I got out of hospital, I caught up with the team. We were all at a bar. And the first thing that Liam, one of the captains, one of the drivers said, I said, Liam, I gave him a big hug. I said, thank you so much. He looked me dead in the eye and he went, oh, we can go further.

55:36And I went, oh, I know. My girlfriend's like, no, no. Poor Hester, the secret sauce in all of this. This poor woman. She's had to live through all, like you're never home. Like you guys must have quite an amazing relationship. I mean, she was on the team. She was there through this whole thing. Oh, Rich. I mean, yeah, she's incredible. Yeah, I think what's interesting is you have to outsource common sense. So you can't trust your own thoughts. When you're completely sleep deprived, you need to look at someone on the boat and know that they're making decisions for you and they're the right decisions, even though you're thinking logically you're not.

56:10And then on top of that as well, she's just almost like a compass of common sense. I sort of look at and she knows and if I'm not acting right, she will pick up on it. And I think the other thing about that as well is for anyone listening, if you're doing something similar, it's knowing the right people that you can be vulnerable around as well. Like there was so many times where I was just in pieces, like tongues coming off, like next morning off, like GB swim, Loch Ness. And there's those people around who you can just be vulnerable with. And that's okay. You know, that they are completely there for you and supporting.

56:44And yeah, I've been with Hester, oh, I should get this right. I think 12 years. And yeah, she's amazing. The other thing Chris told me was that if if all three team members, Hester, Chris, and Dr. Tom agreed that you needed to stop, that they were going to pull you out. Yeah. Yeah. At the end, it was getting like that. Yeah. All three of them, I can still see their faces now if I shut my eyes and they were very closely looking at me and monitoring me. And I think there's an element, you'll know that when you are in the hurt locker, but beyond that, you're trying to convince yourself, but those who really know you are looking at you going, he's not got much more.

57:23We're playing with the boundaries of common sense and hypothermia here. What does it mean to you? What does all this mean? Do you know what's interesting is trying to get a bit philosophical with it, because I ask myself the same question. It's like, why do I continue to do these things? And I think when you look at the myth of Sisyphus, you're aware of Greek mythology, and Sisyphus was one of the most intelligent men to ever live. And he kind of outsmarted the gods, and the gods were really annoyed about this. So what they did is they said, okay, Sisyphus, what we're going to do is we're going to doom you to basically roll a boulder up a hill for eternity.

57:54And as soon as the boulder gets up to the top of the hill, it just rolls back down. So for eternity, you're just doomed to just struggle. But it was Albert Camus, the French philosopher, who said, but this is interesting, because if you imagine Sisyphus was able to outsmart the gods one more time, and he was able to do this, if you imagine him smiling. So as he's rolling the boulder up a hill and back down, he's enjoying it. He's taking control over it, this eternal struggle. And what I love here, Albert Camus said, the struggle alone is enough to fill a man's heart. And that really struck a chord with me.

58:24And I think kind of that thread goes through philosophy and psychology. Jordan Peterson, you know, the meaning of life is to pick up the heaviest load you can and carry it. Viktor Frankl, the meaning of life is to give life meaning. And so when you start looking at that, for me, the pursuit of a nonstop swim, it might be impossible. It might be never ending. But in many ways, it's my boulder. It's the struggle alone is enough to fill a man's heart. And the carrying of it gives you meaning. And if you had to define that meaning, what would that look like? How do you put words to what that meaning is?

58:57I think it's just the relentless pursuit of sports science. So even though you're rolling the balder, you're just collecting data the whole time. So I think it's that, that when all is said and done, we're probably going to end up with the most comprehensive study of ultra endurance in swimming than anywhere else. And I think that would be a pretty cool legacy to leave behind. Yeah. You mentioned Sisyphus with a smile on his face, which brings us to your third superpower, which is your ability to smile, you know, throughout these experiences. Like you're somebody, you know, at least as far as I can tell, who's pretty good at equanimity.

59:34Like in the midst of these incredibly challenging situations, you're always kind. You always have a smile on your face. You're always present with the fact that you're the one who volunteered for this and recruited all these people to join you. And you treat them with respect and with grace. And that's not an easy thing to do when you're as depleted and as exhausted and in as much pain as you are. And I think that's a real credit to your character. And I think it's also something that keeps you afloat when you're ready to quit, right? To be able to smile in those situations is an indicator of gratitude, I think, on some level, and also not taking yourself or what you're doing all that seriously.

1:00:20Is that fair? I appreciate you saying that because I think so often athletes will talk about manning up and gritting your teeth. And I think that's fine. It definitely works for some people. I found that it's not quite sustainable for three days. You can grit your teeth for maybe 12 hours, certainly a marathon. But when it starts going over three hours, I found it doesn't quite work. You have to just swim with gratitude, you know, because even not only sort of psychologically spirituality and stuff, I think it's just in terms of like your biochemistry as well. To grit your teeth for three days during sleep deprivation, when you're swimming through bacteria and all sorts, it's just your biochemistry.

1:01:01It's just not going to work. So I think there's kind of how I was raised, but also there's probably some sports science in it that I've tried in the past to go, oh yeah, that'd be cool, just grit your teeth. And then I'm like, oh, it doesn't work. Yeah, it's not really your disposition either. It's not. I know that training for something like this goes through phases and it's periodized, but if you can kind of describe or characterize like what a typical day of training looks like for you for getting ready for something like this or a cycle maybe. Yeah, it got really boring. Towards the end, we were swimming for 10 to 16 hours a day.

1:01:43I was just literally turning up at a pool with a picnic on the side. I mean, 10 to 16 hours of swimming a day, that's gotta be like 30 kilometers, right? 30 ,000 meters. Yeah, yeah. Just literally just up and down. And sometimes at Loughborough University, it was always so funny. like good friend of mine and here like Adam Peaty going for his next Olympics and yeah I was that guy's a beast he's unbelievable you look at him and I joke so often does he train at Loughborough? yeah he does yeah it's so funny because world record holder on the 100 breaststroke yeah and just like the greatest breaststroke the world's ever seen he's just amazing and Melly's coach as well but she was amazing swimmer as well just an incredible coach but you look at Adam you know and he is a mako shark he is lean he's just tall he's broad, you know, and then I'm just in the lane next to him eating sandwiches and croissants.

1:02:31And it's just such a contrast. But Adam, yeah, he is amazing. But being at Loughborough, it is so interesting to train there with some incredible swimmers all going to the Olympics. Whereas I am, yeah, I am a basking shark, a whale shark at best compared to them. And what do you learn from that? What does Petey tell you? One of the biggest things I've done, I think, in the last, I want to say like two years, is really just fell in love with swimming because with swimming how I do it, it's more akin to like an expedition. It's like climbing Everest versus running a marathon. So when people sort of say, oh, you're a swimmer, I'm like, oh, I am.

1:03:08But I just mean I move in water, but I'm doing it through rivers and oceans. You can't compare me to a port swimmer. They're incredible. But trying to learn from them, I think it's made me so much more efficient. It's almost like comparing Kipchoge to Edmund Hillary. You know, they're so different. Yeah, they're both on feet, but they're so different. And I think, but learning and falling in love with swimming as a sport, as a huge fan as well. I love Brett Hawke, you know, his podcast. I love that. We've just been talking about, I'm obsessed with the 53 style as well. Can't wait to see like Ben Proud, Manadou, Cam McEvoy.

1:03:43I can't wait to see what happens there. So I've really fallen in love with sport of swimming in a pool. And it's kind of made me better as a result, even though swimming, it's not the determining factor. It's like we said, resilience, mental, feeding strategies, but trying to become a better swimmer. You made a video a while back where you got in a flume and kind of teed up against a great European sprinter. He's amazing. He's just broke the... Oh, don't quote me on this. I think he just broke three master's records at the Nationals, I think. Oh, wow. He's incredible.

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1:06:04All of which brings us to sharks, because the greatest swimmers are the most efficient swimmers, and there's no swimmer more efficient than the shark. Maybe the dolphin, but sharks are pretty good, right? Oh, yeah. So walk me through how you got involved in this whole Shark Week thing. Oh, this is amazing. So yeah, Shark Fest, National Geographic. Basically, some of the chiefs there, Janet and Tracy, just amazing. We were chatting about the GB swim when I swam around Great Britain, and there was a period where we were going around the top of Scotland and I was just kept company by a basking shark.

1:06:37This basking shark was looking at me kind of going, oh, you're not a shark. You're not a seal. Not quite sure what you are, but nothing really swims around the top of Scotland. So it ended up keeping me company for essentially two days. Then the basking shark ended up going, I assumed to Iceland and I went around the top of Scotland and back down the other side. And it was just this encounter that when I was swimming with a basking shark, it looked at me and was like what are you doing like you're taking 20 strokes to my one tail flip you know I was so clumsy as a result and it was just this idea of if you could follow in the footsteps of shark try and biomimic them learn from them what could we uncover so speaking to Janet and Tracy at National Geographic and we basically just said wouldn't it be amazing to try and pitch you against sharks you're almost doomed to fail you know it's not going to work but the spectacle alone will serve as a Trojan horse to bring shark science to a completely new audience.

1:07:34I said look I'm in get my goggles I'm in so we tried to swim as fast as a Mako shark world's fastest shark Polaris out the water like a white shark the ones of South Africa that just jump out the water propel seals try to eat as much as a tiger shark and then finally a hammerhead shark because of its unique shape of its head is able to just turn on a dime and just withstand so many G-forces. So they put me up in an RAF fighter pilot plane to see if I could withstand as many G-forces as a hammerhead shark. And it's all in this documentary that comes out on Disney Plus for Shark Fest. It's amazing.

1:08:07And what did you learn? Like, I don't want to spoil it for anybody, but what did you take away from this experience? Like, what did you, did you figure out the shark's secret and can that secret be incorporated into your life and performance, Ross? Genuinely, yeah, no, genuinely. Are you becoming a shark? It genuinely can. So Alison Towner, one of the world-leading experts in White Shark, she's amazing. And the Polaris, for instance, which I wanted to chat to you about. Yeah, we're going to talk about it. I got a lot of input on this, but go ahead. So you have experience with monothins. Now, this was completely new to me.

1:08:39I'd never used a monothin before in my life. And I remember my first ever session, I put it on, and it was completely different. The locomotion, understanding hydrodynamics, how to move, it was completely different. And I Polaris out the water, and I managed to kind of get out to my trunks. and I turned to Alison and I said, how was that? And she's studied white sharks off South Africa. And this always stuck with me. She goes, that's not bad for a naked shaven ape. And I said, what do you mean? And she goes, you've got this clumsy skeletal system and you are like 40, 45 % muscle at best. Whereas she said, white sharks, they're 65, upwards of 65 % muscle.

1:09:13They have this flexible cartilage and these propulsive forces that all go through the tail. So they are just launching themselves out. So it was trying to understand that and take this clumsy skeletal system, this naked shaven ape, and try to jam my feet into a monothin and become a shark. It didn't obviously go as well as a white shark, but it sort of changed my understanding. I've sort of said since sharks taught me how to swim, but they really did. And I mean, same question, monothin, it's so different, isn't it? Which you sort of pioneered with Chris, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the monofin for people that don't know is a gigantic flipper.

1:09:52You insert both of your feet into it. They're locked in. And these fins come in a variety of stiffnesses and materials, et cetera. And it's fascinating when you put one on and you swim because you can generate so much torque and propulsion underwater. And it allows you to swim at speeds like you just can't even imagine. But it's also very tiring. Like it uses your entire body. It's something that will quickly exhaust you. And you would think like, oh, well, somebody who has really strong legs is going to be really good at this. But all the force is generated from the core and the back, right? So it's about like pressing your chest down as much as it is about bringing your feet up or pushing them down.

1:10:34when you're trying to go as fast as possible, it almost creates like an invisible line through the water where the undulation is so subtle because the torque down and up is quite rapid. So the range of motion becomes very narrow. And when you look at a shark or a dolphin, I mean, a shark, the fin goes side to side, the dolphin, it goes up and down, but they're varieties of the same thing, right? You watch them swim through the water, they're unbelievably efficient and you can't understand how they're going so fast because it doesn't look like very many things are moving, right? And what you learn from that is that it's efficiency of motion and making the water work for you in the most hydrodynamic way possible that's gonna create the most amount of acceleration and speed.

1:11:21And the monofin is a great way to test that because anything that is out of whack, well, you'll quickly know right away, like this is not working for me. like it brings everything into focus. Like you can't get away with anything when you're wearing one. It's so true. But on that note as well, I love that you touched upon there that you're reducing drag forces as well. So when you look at a shark, especially a Mako, they are so streamlined. So not only have they got these propulsive forces at the same time, they've just reduced drag so much. And it was at Loughborough University where they did a 3D model scan of my body and compared it to that of a Mako.

1:11:56I knew I was bad, but it was horrendous. And when they even, not only that, they said, look, if you were traveling at the speed of a Mako, this would be your energy expenditure as well. Because I just had, like, when you look at it, there was just red lines all around my head, my shoulders, even my bum as well. It was just like, it was terrible. Where you're just losing energy or energy is being expended that's not moving you forward. Exactly, exactly. And to go back to your point actually previously, which was like, yeah, there's probably certain an element in my youth where it's like, oh, I kind of like, you know, benching, bicep curling, big weights.

1:12:29Whereas looking at that, I was like, oh, God, that is terrible. And certainly that's one thing for the Yukon that I really tried to focus on. It was just like the Yukon and long swims do not care if you've got big biceps and chiseled abs. You know, you need to be fat, Ross, and hydrodynamic. So this Polaris chump, basically you get, you shared it on Instagram, like you're underwater with this monofin on and you propel yourself upward and see how much you can breach your body above the surface of the water, right? Yep. You're pretty good. Oh, you're kind. You're pretty good. I have seen fin swimmers completely breach, like get their entire body out of the water, including the fin.

1:13:08Like that's what's possible. I think people can get up to like three meters out of the water. Yeah, I want to say, I think the world record, I think he's an Egyptian guy and it's incredible. But again, watching, it's not human. The fin swimmers, they completely change their biomechanics. It's just - It's a whole different thing. Completely. And it's a sport, which I did not know. I guess like a short history lesson working my way up to like how I got introduced to this. I came up as a swimmer in the late 80s, arrived at Stanford at the very early days of when swimmers for the very first time were pioneering and experimenting the underwater dolphin kick.

1:13:50And swimmers were beginning to realize that they could actually go much faster underwater in a streamlined position on their back doing a dolphin kick. They could swim much faster this way than they could on the surface swimming freestyle or any other discipline. And there were a handful of athletes who realized they were quite good at this and really doubled down on it. The most famous example being this guy, Dave Berkhoff at Harvard. It's still called the Berkhoff Blast because nobody was better underwater than this guy with his underwater dolphin kick. He was a hundred backstroke specialist.

1:14:24and at the time, there were no rules around what you could or couldn't do with this underwater dolphin kick. So, he went to the Olympics in Seoul and swam the entire 100 backstroke underwater. You know, he came up to take a breath and flip turn at the 50 meters and swam all the way back underwater. Not only him, basically the entire heat of the finals of the 100-meter backstroke. I'm sure you can find it on YouTube, the Seoul, you know, Seoul Olympics, like 100 And world records were broken. It was crazy. So they ended up having to change the rule. Like, well, we can't have this. We can't just have swimmers seeing how long they can stay underwater.

1:15:01So they changed it so that you have to surface at 15 meters. But to this day, it's set in motion, you know, a new way of swimming, which prioritized the dolphin kick. So now it's all about power off the walls. How quickly can you generate force with that dolphin kick and, you know, get up to speed before you have to break the surface? and there are athletes that are extraordinary at this. And the ones that are the best tend to be, you know, the ones that find themselves atop the podium. So this is something that was kind of happening when I was still competing. And then after I was done competing, done with college, you know, in law school, graduated law school, I'm in California, I'm in Northern California, I'm studying for the bar exam.

1:15:47And I'm doing it also with Pablo Morales, who I'd swam with, multiple world record holder, NCAA champion, you know, like one of the most decorated swimmers of all time, right? And Pablo was friends with this guy called John Mix. John Mix was a former, I think he was a water polo player. And he had recently spent time in Europe and he was traveling all around Europe. And he discovered this thing that he had no idea existed, which was called competitive fin swimming. So apparently, especially in Eastern European countries, in China and in Russia, at a very early age, when a young athlete shows prowess in the water, they make a determination.

1:16:29Is this person gonna be a competitive swimmer or a water polo player? Or are they gonna go into this thing called fin swimming, which is competition in a swimming pool wearing a monofin at all distances you would see in a typical swim meet from 50 meters all the way up to the 1500 meters. And there's all kinds of varieties here. There's the apnea, like the 50 meters where you're just underwater the whole way. There's plenty of them where you have a center mount snorkel so you can breathe while you're under, you're just beneath the surface. And then there's ones where they actually have a small oxygen tube where they swim the 1500 meters entirely underwater holding an oxygen tube in front of themselves.

1:17:07So like his mind's blown, right? And he realizes like nobody in America has ever heard of this thing. and he comes back and he creates a prototype for a monofin. And this becomes the very first product at a swim apparel company called Finise. You know Finise, right? So this is how Finise started. John Mix started Finise and it started with a monofin. And he started giving out these monofins to competitive swimmers for them to train with because as you know, nothing will develop your core like swimming with a fin. Like it's unbelievable. It's so stiff, right? And John decides that he wants to put together for the very first time a team to travel to Hungary to compete in the world championships of fin swimming.

1:17:56And, you know, Pablo, he was an equity partner in finis from the very beginning. So he goes to Pablo. It comes to me and we kind of cobble together a small group like a ragtag Bad News Bears team to go to this world championships and compete with this monofin, right? And I hadn't swum in years, but in addition to Pablo, we had Jenny Thompson, who was like this unbelievably, she was the most decorated female Olympian of all time, like multiple world records, et cetera. Misty Hyman, who won gold in the 200 meter butterfly in Sydney, she was on the team. It was like 12 of us or whatever. And Chris Morgan, this guy that we've been talking about was one of those guys, right?

1:18:40So this is how I met Chris. And for a brief period of time, I think we only had like a month to get ready for this thing. And none of us had ever worn one of these fins. So we're training, we're trying to figure out how all of this works. And we show up with no idea like how to do this, except like these people have Olympic gold medals. You know, it's crazy. And we just got our asses completely kicked. But it was amazing to go to this meet and see like the 50 meters, the 50 meter apnea, these guys dive in. I mean, I don't know what the world record is offhand, but it's some crazy number. And they dive in and it creates this wave that goes down the pool.

1:19:17And all the timers who are standing at the other end of the pool just get drenched when that, it's like a tsunami that slowly moves down the pool and then just hits the wall on the other side and creates this big splash. Like it is wild. And these people have like a level of expertise with this thing that, you know, was really quite stunning. Yeah, as a spectacle, it's incredible, isn't it? that yeah it's exactly that it was the first time again because of the shark documentary actually tuning in and and looking at them it's insane like again we humans as naked apes can can do that it was incredible is it you or chris who has the american record still oh it's definitely not me i don't even know chris would know if chris had an american record he'd be aware of that i guess i don't know and what was funny is i mean we had a great time there's crazy stories from that experience, but it's not like we came back and then that created a foothold upon which something meaningful could build.

1:20:13I mean, Finise then became this huge, you know, corporation that to this day is one of the biggest swimwear, you know, companies in the world for competitive swimmers, but it didn't instigate like an interest in fin swimming, you know? I don't know what it's like in the UK, but still I think a lot of swimmers train with these things, you know, versions of these things. But we went and like, there would be these handmade fins made out of fiberglass that were tapered just right. And each event has a different type of thin with a different level of stiffness. Like it gets really intricate and complicated and complex, like in a really fascinating way.

1:20:46It really does. Cause it was exactly that, that when I started sort of exploring this idea of polarizing out the water, I just sort of rung up a few companies and just went, I need a monothin. And they said, ah, okay, brilliant. Okay. So what sort of stiffness, what sort of texture, what sort of materials? I was like, just a monothin? So it was exactly that. And I actually went for one of the stiffest ones just straight off the bat because I was like, I just need the most powerful. And oh my God, that's almost like going into the gym for the first time and saying, I want to squat. And then just saying, okay, cool.

1:21:15Put 250 on the bar and see how you do. My God, the next day just ached in places that I never have before. I think that's what's so interesting as well. I mean, I spoke about him before, but I love Brett Hawke and what he's doing for sprinting, specifically in swimming. I think we're still uncovering things right now. It's like just the strength and conditioning of swimming. And that, again, this is what the shark documentary sort of taught me that Mother Nature did a pretty good job. So if you're going to try to improve yourself in any sort of way in the water, just go and learn from the apex predator.

1:21:46There's probably clues. So they pit you with a mako. Yeah. The mako swims something like 80 miles an hour, right? You're not going to win this race. So how does that work? This is it. So I was at Loughborough University immediately. I don't care what monofin you're wearing. You're not going as fast as the Mako. No, no. And that was it. So immediately upon hearing this, this was so interesting because I just thought like an athlete, like a sports scientist. So the very first port of call was I'm going to Loughborough University. I turned up at Loughborough University. I start speaking to all the experts from British swimming.

1:22:17And I'm like, look, I need to swim as fast as a Mako shark. And it was so interesting that they treated me like a human swimmer. Obviously, that's as they should. So I'm drilling months and months and I'm trying to go from long distance swimming to being a sprinter. You know, everything, even in the gym, there's a strong correlation between your pull-up strength and your swim speed as well. So I'm like, I think I worked up to 75 to 80 kilos, one rep max pull-up. And I'm working, working up. And this is months and months and months. And I am shaving off like tenths of a second until I actually just sat there.

1:22:45And there was almost this epiphany that it was like, what am I doing? Like, I'm so far from this. I need to think like a shark, not just swim. I need to think like a shark. And the way that sharks on long migrations will look at tides, currents, water columns, their physiology will pick up oceanic cues, like changes in temperature, salinity. I was like, that's what I need to do. So there was this amazing tide just off Wales and the United Kingdom. And you get this crazy compression of the tide. So from six hours a day, it comes through six hours goes back. So if you could time it perfectly at peak tide on a spring tide, you could essentially have 10 knots going with you.

1:23:22I was like, that's what I need to do. So I took all of that training from the British English Institute of Sport. And then I went to Wales, like I said, and we timed it perfectly. And Rich, you'll understand this as an amazing pool swimmer yourself. You understand when you're swimming the tiles and the lane ropes going past and you're like, oh, that's quick. But when you're swimming in 10 knots on a spring tide, you feel like Poseidon. Every stroke I was pulling, I was overtaking like five houses. I was like, I am amazing. I'm invisible. But then obviously the tide changes and you're going backwards.

1:23:54So it's so humbling. but there was this idea of not just swimming like a shark, but thinking like a shark at the same time as well. So I think in the end, we got a quarter mako, but that was with every single technological advancement and help from the ocean I could. Still woefully bad. The meta message really is making the water work for you. As a very muscled guy, it's easy to follow the illusion that the way to get better is to get stronger and to just force your way through the water, which is a cross purposes with the speed that's otherwise accessible. The people who really know how to feel it and where they're fine, because when you're entering your arm, you're looking for the still water.

1:24:38If you pull shallow, that water's already moving. Like it's not gonna propel you forward. It's like, but there's an other worldliness to like trying to find that eddy that you can grab onto that's gonna move you forward the best. And it's not about how strong you are. It's like, how much can you extend your shoulder? And how much can you like rotate your hips and like, you know, corkscrew it so that you're creating your own eddy that's pushing the water behind you. And these are things that have nothing to do with how many pull-ups you can do. Yeah, yeah, it's so true. And I think, especially in swimming, because it's so kinesthetic, it's proprioception, that feel of the water.

1:25:14If I'm out for a week, I get back in and I'm like, it's like, I've forgotten how to swim. You know, but it's true of any sport. I think when people say running, It's like we've been able to run since we were infants, right? It's like, no, but it's a skill. Like it's energy efficiency, like just drilling that. So it's amazing the amount of times where people don't actually drill the skill of what they're doing. Because I run. I've been doing it since I was an infant. It's like, well, you might be overstriding, forefoot striking, heel striking. There's so many variables. And with swimming, that's been one of the biggest things.

1:25:41Again, like I said, I'm such a fan of swimming now. I'm such a sort of student of it. And like Cam McAvoy, some of his underwaters, for those listening, Australian 50 meter, amazing. The way he's sort of changed his career around. But his catch phase, he just catches like an impossible angle. Or Ben Proud as well. James Gibson, his coach, who was an amazing swimmer himself. But Ben Proud, some of his clips just go crazy viral because his attention to detail, I think with Cam McAvoy as well, he'll do, I hope I'm not, I'm getting this right. So I apologize if I'm not, but he might do like three kilometers in an entire week.

1:26:16That's it. Which for swimmers, you're like, that's crazy. That's such low mileage. It's like, no, but you don't understand. Of those three kilometers, it's so crazy purposeful at speed, race pace. And I think that's what's so exciting at the minute for swimming where we're at. Yeah, it's pretty cool. Are you going to be in Paris to watch some swimming? I would love to. You know, like I think UConn was the main thing. Now I'm recovered, not in hospital. I would love to go. For the 53 style men's and women's, oh my God, I'd love to be there. It'd be amazing. The Shark Week thing isn't your first outing with National Geographic.

1:26:47You were a member of the Limitless crew that went on some crazy adventures, which brings up like your relationship with Chris Hemsworth and his brother Liam and the training that you guys did together. But before we get into that, like how did the Limitless thing come together? Was that just Chris saying like, you got to be part of this? Yeah. Chris, essentially, I think when you're doing athletic adventures that are a little bit out there, whether it's ice swimming, climbing a rope, dangling from the blue mountains, that there's probably not many people whose name comes up who could probably help.

1:27:20So me and Chris were just sort of chatting. He sort of reached out. And it was just, I think, what's amazing about the Hemsworth gene pool is from Luke, Liam and Chris. And then even actually when you look at Chris's kids, Luke's kids, it's obscene that the gene pool needs to be studied. It's just ridiculous. And with Chris, I think, especially with the rope climb, because he was Thor size, because he was getting big for Thor. so his training made absolutely no sense because on the one hand you had marvel and everyone saying right you need to look like the god of thunder and he's like cool got it but then for limitless it's like right we need you to dangle you a hundred foot from the blue mountains and we need you to climb a 50 foot rope it's like those two don't work together like that's not gonna work so what he did specifically on the rope climb was just incredible and then not only that again you body fat being insulating, you need body fat.

1:28:14Some of the greatest ice swimmers have an abundance of it. It's amazing. Chris had none because he was the god of thunder. So we took him from the heat of the Australian summer and just went, here you go, here's the Arctic Circle. This is ice swimming. And I think it was just, it was a testament to his physiology, his psychology, but that was one of the best things I've ever been part of because I'm so often just involved in myself and an event and to be there for somebody else, but also to see Chris just apply it. It was really quite special. We all speak as a team, like what happened in Norway for the ice swim?

1:28:47It just hasn't been done before. You don't take someone from Australia and throw them in the Arctic. So you just don't do it. And to get to do it with Darren Aronofsky at the helm, one of our most brilliant living directors. Do you know what? The thing is about Darren, he's a beast as well. So people don't understand. His ice swimming as well, he'd done a little bit before Norway, but we were on a lunch break in Norway, and it was Aaron, one of our friends. It was his birthday, and I was like, guys, we've got to go swimming. And everyone's like, I've not got any swim stuff. I'm like, we just stripped down to our underwear, we go run in, and we just go and smash some waves.

1:29:20And Darren was literally the first to volunteer. He was like, I'm in. Darren's a beast as well. Yeah, I trained with him in New York as well. Oh, you did? He's a specimen, yeah. Because you don't think of him as being an athlete. oh yeah just this huge brain with like this unreal facility for creativity is exactly it and it's so weird i mean you're so right i've never felt so dumb as when i speak to darren because he just speaks on a level with like fear and philosophy i just sit there i'm like oh my god i just float for a living whereas when we train he is a specimen you know there's this there's no quitting him some of the drop sets we did blood restriction training as well some of the drop sets he just won't give up.

1:30:00He's a beast. Yeah. The blood restriction training, are you talking about Katsu? That takes us back to Chris Morgan again. This is his whole thing, you know, which is a very interesting, I mean, he is like an evangelist of this. And I know that you've played around with it. What is it? So I started using it first for my rehab after my shoulder surgery, because essentially you're not lifting any heavy weights. There's no mechanical tension. So after shoulder surgery, I had to completely rest and wait for the cartilage to repair and regrow. So as a result, I needed a new training stimulus, something that wasn't mechanical tension.

1:30:33I couldn't be lifting weight or even metabolic stress. So lots of high volume, I couldn't do that either. So that kind of led me down the route of looking at different rehab tools. And one of the things was blood restriction training, which is just this idea of, it's got many applications, but what I used it for is say you are attaching it to your bicep and we start doing bicep curls. You do 20 reps, 10 seconds rest in between for five sets. What's interesting is the body sort of goes, hang on, if you're restricting the blood, there's no blood coming to the biceps. So if there's no blood coming to the biceps, there's no oxygen.

1:31:04If there's no oxygen, we're going to have to turn off the slow twitch fibers and only target the fast twitch fibers. So as a result, you just get this crazy burning sensation in the fast twitch fibers, which also increases your body's ability to just accumulate and tolerate lactic acid, which also spikes hormones at the same time, growth hormones specifically. So it's weird how it kind of targets muscle fibers, but at the same time, it's almost altering your biochemistry in a way. And it's a completely different training adaptation to just shifting heavy weight. Yeah, you're essentially putting these straps around different appendages, right?

1:31:37That's right. Tightening them up. And this is a tradition that's not new. It's rooted in Japan, right? There was a pioneer of this who believed in it and evangelized it. And Katsu is the sort of brand that I guess Chris and Steve Munitonas now are at the helm of, right? Yeah. Yeah, that was exactly it. So it's funny, it's a tool. I know people say, do you use it all day, every day? I'm like, no, no, no, it's just to have in your back pocket. It's the same way that slow, low intensity training, high intensity training, German volume training, these are all tools. You know, you just need to know when to use them.

1:32:13Yeah. How did you first get connected with the Hemsworth brothers? I think it was just because, like I said, with Limitless, there's not many people who you approach who have experienced ice swimming and climbing a rope the height of Everest. So it was kind of Chris just reached out. We ended up speaking. I was a massive fan for ages. He just reached out. He's like, what are you doing? I need to understand. Kind of. Kind of. Yeah. And then I was out in Byron for so long. And yeah, we just have these just training camps sort of out there. Like Luke Zocchi, his actual strength and conditioning coach and one of his best friends is amazing.

1:32:51And then, and then, like I said, it's so strange. And like I said, they genuinely, that gene pool needs to be studied because Luke, you know, the oldest Hemsworth and Liam, they, what's interesting about them, I think it's their work capacity is one of the biggest things that we will catch up and train and I'll go, hey guys, oh, have you trained today? Or do you feel okay? And they'll go, no, no, no, we've not trained today. I'll go, okay, cool. Okay. So we'll do like an hour, two hour session. They're like, yeah. And then as we're training, I'll find out that we've just been surfing for six hours, but they don't class that as training.

1:33:21I'm like, oh my God. So it's just, yeah, they are just, I think Craig and Leon, so their parents, I think they've got, I hope I'm writing this, but Danish, Netherlands, you know, they've got some Viking DNA somewhere because they all just. Well, something's going on because all three of those guys are absolute animals. And I know Luke a little bit. I've spent a ton of time in that area in Byron. So I know all those characters. right yeah i know ben at the genny you know like we have a lot of friend overlap from my time spent there i keep waiting for our visits to overlap it's i think you're due for a return i did and i just missed you last time i love when were you when were you there uh last year for uh luke and chris's 40th oh chris's 40th luke's 39th yeah um yeah i had the pleasure of going over to luke's and having him put me through a workout, which was a whole experience.

1:34:17So Luke is Chris's official trainer or maybe he trains all three of them, I don't know. But then when you get introduced, how did that work between you and Luke? And was your input like on an official level or were you just a friend, like they're training with those guys or what was the nature of that relationship? Because there's been a lot written about like, Ross Edgley helped Chris get ready for Thor. and we saw what Chris's physique looked like in the lead up to playing that role. Yeah, well, I think that's very much Luke Zocchi and also just Hemsworth genetics. It's literally like, I mean, I actually arrived because I had shoulder surgery as well.

1:34:57So I actually arrived quite late onto the set of Thor. So when I arrived... But in Byron in the lead up to Thor though, also, you were there for a long time and you guys were training together like daily. We were, yeah, but specifically rope climbs. And I think that's what's so amazing. like as a team, like there's just no egos. So if it's like, okay, today is rope specific stuff, then everybody goes, cool, listen to Ross, you know, but equally, if they say, okay, today is body weight conditioning, that's something Zocchi is so good at just general physical preparedness, like he's an absolute beast.

1:35:27So I'm like, okay, cool, you take the session. And I think that's what's so interesting. And then if we go surfing, I'm like, right, I know nothing. So it's amazing that and you'll know this because of the nature of people in Byron, there's just no egos. And so So whoever is taking that session, someone will have a speciality. And then equally, if we're on a tennis court out there with Pat Rafter, everybody shuts up and we do as we told and Pat Rafter just rains down aces on us. You know, so it's interesting how if it's ice swimming, swimming or rope climbing. You're the guy. Yeah, if it's anything out of that or burgers or cheesecake, anything out of that, no, no, no, that's not my domain.

1:36:02Speaking of cheesecake, what are we doing about your diet, Ross? Come on. I know that there's a certain pride and all the donuts that you eat and all this garbage. I cleaned it up. But I'm telling you, you're on the cusp of 40 and there will be a moment where your metabolism is gonna turn on you a little bit. And I wanna get you ready for that so that you don't have to suffer the downside consequences of that. No, yeah. And maybe you might be a little bit better at fat adaptation if you weren't like, you know, eating such awful stuff all the time. I know, I know, genuinely I am. Because I do think there's definitely an element of, no, no, no, but I also think I am a little bit better.

1:36:41Maybe it's my fault, but, you know, when I'm swimming, I'll post the tray of donuts and things like that. But honestly, since four or five years ago, since you introduced me to kombucha, I do have more vegetables. Genuinely, I do. I'm not, honestly. Benny always, again, mutual friend of mine, but Benny always has me in stitches. When I go over to - Benny, Ben Gordon. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He'll constantly just be there just going, oh, Ross, this is called broccoli. Yeah. Here's a carrot. Ben Gordon, we should say, is an unbelievable drummer for a metal band called Parkway Drive. And they tour the world.

1:37:16They have a huge fan base. But he also happens to be the proprietor of the Byron General Store, which is basically where you got to go if you want to eat healthy food. Like it's just, you know, all the best stuff, right? So it's kind of like the must, like breakfast stop in every single day. and that was grown out of like his own kind of journey into wellbeing from a place where he was like riddled with anxiety, performance anxiety, like going to these huge venues and part of his drumming, I know you know this, right? Like he has this massive drum kit, like imagine Neil Peart from Rush, right?

1:37:54And the stage elevates it and it's in this like, it's in this like structure, like this scaffold, that's the word I'm looking for. And then it elevates up and then it rotates 360 degrees and he's playing his drum solo upside down. And he does this in front of gigantic crowds. And apparently there was a time in which this produced a lot of anxiety for him. And he went on this like kind of journey to figure out how to live his life in a more kind of like stable and balanced way, which led him to meditation and to healthy eating and all these things. And the general story was really his expression, like his offering to everybody else as a reflection of that.

1:38:31Yeah, that's exactly, I never thought about it. like that, but that's exactly what it is. I love hanging out with Benny because he's just got such a calming sort of, he just, he's the best. And then, yeah. And then now he's a dad. He is as well. Yeah. But, oh, and the waffle fries as well. I know I just said, I'm going to eat healthily, but the waffle fries at the general store and the muffins. Oh my God. They're amazing. When you were there, you were also doing a lot of swimming though. You were putting in the time for a swimming adventure that wasn't meant to be right. Like I, I know what it is.

1:39:00I don't know if you're, you want to say what it was, but like that kind of got deferred, right? So I have a sense that maybe we're going to be seeing that. I think we might. So I'll keep it under wraps because it might, yeah, it might come full circle. But yeah, it was just a training camp out in Byron. Again, Chris was just amazing because the amount of times I'll just be like, Chris, I just need a pool to swim in. And he'll be like, mate, just knock yourself out. So I would just be swimming up and down in his pool. And then Elsa as well, his wife, she's amazing. Sometimes if they were having family dinner, you know, they'll have this amazing casserole or pasta dish and they just basically just take a bowl out and leave it on the side of the pool for me as I'm swimming.

1:39:38So as I'd pop my head up every 1K, I'll be like, oh, thanks guys. And I'll just keep swimming as they're having family dinner. Incredible stuff. Incredible. Yeah. What are we supposed to learn from you, Ross? What do we take away from these things that you've done that would be helpful in our own civilian lives. I'm still trying to figure that out myself. But I think, like I said, coming back to the idea of purpose, I think that's the biggest thing. And actually, we were chatting to the team just earlier. And I just think it's this idea of like, everybody's got something that they could do. And when you look at the history of as humans, the anthropology of as humans, we've always been sort of going on these journeys of self-discipline for self-discovery.

1:40:18You know, whether it's the Japanese monks going on in Okugaki, the Yamabushi monks of Japan, and whether it's Aborigines going on walkabout, we've always been doing something. And I think, you know, recently, I'm a huge fan of Ned Brockman. I loved, it wasn't what he did, it's how he did it across Australia. Russ equally across Africa. Russ Cook, the hardest geezer. Oh my God. Again, it wasn't what they did, it's how they did it that I just love. And then Ned's going for the record at the moment for a thousand miles. Yeah, I think he's gonna be the fastest person to run a thousand miles on a track.

1:40:51That was it, yeah. But it's centrally located. So that way, you know, people can come and join him and it can be like a participatory kind of thing. I think it's amazing. And when I hear stories about that and I look at people like that, I'm like, yes, we're essentially doing exactly the same. There's a common theme throughout all of it that, you know, as a tribe, if we were sitting there, there'd always be one in that tribe dating back to caveman times who would just say, what's over the horizon? Like, what is it? That wanderlust gene. There'd be something that that person that would go, do you know what?

1:41:19We're going to stay here. We're going to make a family. but you, you disappear over that mountain. And I think that's it. I think looking at guys like Russ and Ned, I'm just sort of trying to do my own sort of aquatic version. But anybody listening, I just think it could be anything as long as it resonates with you, whether it's rowing, cycling, just pick a route, something. And yeah, that idea of self-discipline for self-discovery. What is the weakness that shows up that you really need to work on in your life? Not in your swimming per se. Cheesecake. Yeah, we have your diet. We talked about that.

1:41:53I'm talking emotionally. I guess where this is coming from is I hear that and I believe you. And I think that's laudable and beautiful and inspirational in all the best ways. But this goes back to your relationship to all of these events and kind of what they mean, right? And I've seen too many people who use events like this to run away from certain things in their life rather than towards some greater level of self-actualization at the tippy top of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, right? So if we're being really honest, like I can admit that I can use like endurance sports to hide from certain things that are uncomfortable and be celebrated for that.

1:42:35When I know when my head hits the pillow that maybe there's some other things in my life that could use a little bit more attention or maybe things are out of balance a little bit. And I'm just curious about like how you think about that equation. I think one of the biggest things, like to be completely honest and transparent about that, I think one of the biggest things was it's become an amazing job, like in reality. And I love the Japanese philosophy, the ikigai. So your ikigai, your reason for being, why you get up in the morning, your purpose, again, coming back to purpose, but that made up of four things, what you love, what you're good at, what the world needs.

1:43:11But the fourth one, what you can be paid for. And I think that's what's so interesting because I know exactly what you're saying that I think sometimes talking about philanthropy and charity and various other things, that's absolutely right. But you also need to be paid for it as well at the same time. So to be completely honest, there is a commercial aspect as well in that everything that I've done, it does work as a business, a very, very strange business granted, but it is a business. And it's something that I really enjoy. So if I was running away from anything, it would probably be an office job.

1:43:41whereas like in terms of business I love the marketing of it I think as well which comes back to what you said that the showmanship as well but it's just putting something out into the world I suppose very similar to the heroic age of Antarctic exploration when Admanson, Shackleton, Robert Falcon Scott everyone was going to the South Pole to uncover something but when they came back home they were publishing their books and contributing to geology and science. There's an element of that as well, which is just this idea of it is a strange business, but it is a business as well. And I think too often people probably don't want to say that because it's commercial, you know, you don't want to say it.

1:44:18But the reality is, it has become my strange job to just float very far. But that's a really beautiful thing to celebrate, that you can marry how you make a living with those prongs of ikigai, like this thing that brings you joy, this thing that has meaning for other people. There is a self-serving aspect to it, but there's a service aspect to it as well. And we live in a capitalist society. We all have to make a living. And it's not something I'm unfamiliar with because I feel so blessed to be able to do this thing and to support my family in doing it. It's an absolute joy that marries like a passion that I have with something that is giving back to other people, but also supports me economically.

1:45:02So I get that completely. But I guess in saying that, it then begs the question of the challenge that scares you most. Like what's lingering out there on the horizon? Maybe it's in the far future. Doesn't necessarily have to be in the near future. That is like, yeah, I'm not ready for that one. Yeah, I don't know. Are we talking professionally or personally? No, I'm talking about, yeah, like in your endurance endeavors, your athletic endeavors. I'm not sure. I'm still yet to find it. I think that's what it is. Yeah. I think I will. But I think one thing that the Loch Ness and Tres Amino has taught me is you're kind of bulletproof if you're okay with the outcome.

1:45:48So even if it doesn't go well, there's nothing to be fearful of because what's the worst that can happen? You've got an amazing team around you. So I think that was one of the biggest things that yeah, we finished. And certainly when I was like 21, it was black and white. If I failed, I'd failed. You couldn't speak to him. I'd have been in a terrible mood. Whereas with this one, we finished and my entire team around me just went, are we getting pizza? I went, yeah, let's get pizza. And it was actually, it was interesting. Friends of mine at the Royal Marines, one of the psychologists there, he was amazing.

1:46:18He was talking about when he'd speak to some of the guys going through Limpston through their 32 weeks training. and some of the young recruits would be like, I have to make it through training. Like I have to make it. If I don't, I'll be a failure. I'll go home. I can't look at my mom and dad in the eyes. The psychologist there said, yeah, in so many ways, it is the most important thing in the world. Like when you're in it, you have to make it through. There's no such thing as failure. You have to make it. It's so important. Don't even think of failure. But when it happens, it's not that bad.

1:46:46And I think that's the thing with Loch Ness and Tres Amino. When we were in it, I was like, nothing else matters. I have to make it to the finish line. We have to raise loads. for ocean conservation, for records, we have to achieve everything. It needs to do in crazy numbers in terms of visually for the charity. That is success. But then when it didn't happen, immediately you just flip a switch and go, ah, it was just a swim. That's a healthy relationship with it. Because it's about the doing, not about the result. It's about detaching from the result, which is of stoic virtue. But it also speaks to this thing that I've heard you talk about before, this idea of eudaimonia.

1:47:22Can you explain what that is? Absolutely, yeah. So again, when I was searching for reasons why I try to do what I do, I came across Aristotle and he coined this phrase, which was eudaimonia. And he said that happiness was kind of a bad word because it sort of gave the impression that you should just be happy. There should be no struggling or suffering. And he said, well, that's kind of wrong because you should have to sacrifice, struggle and suffer in order to actually fulfill something, this sense of accomplishment. He said, in many ways, it's almost like if I gave you a million pounds, you'd be happy.

1:47:52Of course you would. It's a million pounds. Whereas if you wrote a book, started a business, ran an event, won a million pounds, earned it, that's not happiness. That's eudaimonia. It's very different. And I think one thing that the GB swim taught me, and I didn't realize it at the time, but walking onto land for the first time in 157 days, that was eudaimonia. I wasn't happy. It was eudaimonia. It was happiness with fulfillment. And I think ever since the Yukon was similar, I was like, oh, that's not happiness. That is eudaimonia. That is years and years of training that have manifested itself in a particular event.

1:48:28So yeah, for me - Happiness is the activity. Happiness is an activity. It's this way of doing things rather than the product of having done it. Exactly. Yeah. While addressing that idea of sacrifice and struggle, you know, rather than just being happy without any of that. Aristotle was like, no, no, no, you have to struggle. You have to suffer. That's what will produce eudaimonia. It won't produce happiness, it will produce eudaimonia. What are some of the other stoic principles or Greek ideas that swim around in your head when you're in the Yukon? I think there's a fair few, not necessarily even principles, but the story of Marcus Aurelius.

1:49:05I mean, what I love about Marcus Aurelius is what he wrote was never meant to be a best-selling book. It was just his diary. It was just his musings. And he had gone through wars, like assassination attempts. He wasn't, according to his written accounts, a very well man. But he just lived to just an incredible age, outlived so many people, a lot of his enemies. And it was just his outlook on life. And I think that was one of the biggest things that certainly when swimming through the Yukon with your leg bleeding and neck falling off while still nursing your own toilet in your wetsuit. It was just this idea, do you know what?

1:49:41What would Marcus Aurelius do? So it wasn't necessarily principles. It was the story of Marcus Aurelius that I think, yeah, when you know about that, that's really quite impressive. What do you think people don't fully understand when they hear your story or they try to imagine these things that you've done or you read the press that gets written about these adventures that you've been on? Is there anything where you're like, they don't really get it or they're missing this piece or what people don't see is this? Yeah, I think I literally haven't done a podcast in like three years, really. You know, so I think a lot of people, especially after Loch Ness and Tres Amino, because I was in hospital after both of those.

1:50:23So on social media. Not as long as you were supposed to be. No, but there was, I don't want to say speculation, but people were sort of saying, you know, what went wrong? And there was ideas that were going around. Whereas it's nice to actually just speak about it so freely now, which was just like the conditions weren't right, but we tried our very best. And I think - And also it's an example, sorry, I don't mean to step on your words, but it's like, it's a way of modeling that failure is the path to success. You have to be willing to fail. And then it's your relationship with that that dictates how you move forward.

1:50:53And to, you know, look in the rear view mirror and learn from it rather than say, well, you know, oh, I can't do it or to flog yourself. Like I've seen you try these really hard things. They don't work out. And then you just move forward onto the next thing with a smile on your face. and I think that's powerful for people to see. Yeah, I really appreciate that because I think one of the biggest things that those swims taught me as well is no event exists in a vacuum. You have to consider it in its relationship to other events as well. So if I'd have stopped after Loch Ness, if I'd have stopped after Tres Amina or if I'd have stopped after Mallorca, you could have called them a failure.

1:51:30But because of the Yukon, because I kept going, they all became lessons. I think that's what's so interesting. anybody thinking about any particular event in their life. If they think it's a failure, no, it doesn't exist in a vacuum. It depends what you do next that will determine what that actually was. I think you're pretty good in the cold. I think you might have a little issue with heat adaptation though. So whatever you do next, probably stay away from the warm water. That's good advice. But maybe not as cold as the Yukon. Can you just find like, maybe just 60 degrees Fahrenheit, something like that, you know?

1:52:04No, genuinely. Certainly. My girlfriend will be so happy that you said that. I think that's the other thing, though, as well. It's just this idea of just daring to be great, you know, every single time. And this is probably certainly a personality defect, but I can't just do a swim. You know, it's got to be a really long one. It's got to be a hot one. It's got to be a cold one. There's got to be some metrics that make me excited. And maybe as I mature, I might stop doing that. But for me, again, even the shark shows, it's like if you're going to swim against the shark, has to be a white shark.

1:52:33You've got to swim as fast as a mako. You've got to eat as much as a tiger shark. Right. But this will run its course at some point, right? Because you'll reach that place where it's like, you can't continue to always top what you've done before. And if you're using these to fill a God-sized hole in your soul, you're going to face an existential reckoning, my friend. Yeah, no, no, no. I agree. But unfortunately, I do think I'll be sitting here. We'll be doing this podcast at 100 years old and I'll be going rich. Good. You're a very happy-go-lucky guy. It's not like I'm worried about you. I almost feel like just a little bit of a big brotherly kind of like.

1:53:11Yeah, which I appreciate. For those people listening, they won't know. But like after the GB swim, I was just swept away with media and everything like that. And it was amazing. And I don't regret anything. It was brilliant. But genuinely, you were one of the first to, if not the only person who actually, after the whole podcast, I'll never forget this. And I want to say this publicly, but as a big brother, you just took me to one side and we went for kombucha. you took me out for a vegan meal and you said, Ross, oh, I was a bit of a big brother. I feel a little bit protective. And I just want to say a lot of people will ask you what's next and pull you in all directions.

1:53:41Take time for yourself, like deconstruct, write a book. And that was some of the best advice I've ever got. So publicly, I've said it, but publicly, I want to say thank you so much because it was a whirlwind and you were a big brother and a voice of reason at a time that was particularly crazy. So thank you. That's very sweet of you to say. I appreciate that. Thank you. Yeah, I love you, buddy. I think what you're doing is really powerful and inspirational. And in addition to, or maybe more important than what it is that you're doing, I think it's the way that you do it. Like you talked about Ned and Russ and the way that they kind of comport themselves while they do these crazy things.

1:54:17I think that's of equal importance, if not more important than the actual feats themselves. And I think to see you, you know, do it with a smile on your face and treat your team members with, you know, respect and grace and to invite, you know, people like ourselves to join along and to feel welcome, you know, and to provide us a window into, you know, kind of what's happening has been really fun to watch unfold. And so I'm your biggest fan, dude. And if there's anything I can do to put wind in your sails, I'm right there for you. Oh, thank you. Next shark swim, you can come along. Yeah, I would love to do that.

1:54:53but I'd love to strap a monofin back on. Yeah. Done. I had one. It's so funny. I had one that I got that was Russian made. I had it forever. And I used to let my kids play around with it in the pool. I think it got cracked at some point. I don't think I have it anymore, but I'm gonna dig into my photo albums and try to pick out some pictures of Chris and I from back in the day and send them to you. That would be amazing. It's cool. And Chris is, he's like a full-on team member for you now, right? Like he's been instrumental in helping you. What he did in the Yukon was, like I said, people would consider how far he kayaked and everything, an expedition in itself, like an extreme one at that, sleep deprivation, everything.

1:55:36And he just did it selflessly in support of the swim. And so that's why I love platforms like this because, you know, I get to actually shine a light on the team. It's such a team event. So, yeah, time and again, unfortunately, he has adopted Small English. I love the way the universe works, too, that this guy that I've known for so long has now found his way to you and has become this, you know, really important team member and, you know, guy supporting you. It's really cool. Yeah, it is cool. Yeah. We did it, dude. How do you feel? That's really good. Do we do okay? It took four or five years to come out.

1:56:09No, I know. I'd check in with you on. When are we going to do this? When are we going to do this? Are you going to be in Byron? I know. I really want to hook up when we're in Byron. I love that place. I do too. It's a very special place. It's become like my favorite place to go. It's a really unique, cool place. It's weird because I was chatting to Benny about that because, again, not to sound too deep, but like the spirituality of Byron because it was a place where women would go to give birth, isn't it? Because obviously Byron Bay. So people saying there's a powerful Aboriginal energy. It feels like a vortex.

1:56:42Yeah, it really does. Yeah, and it's, yeah, I, honestly, I go and I just leave, like, recharge, just think, it's just, yeah, the people there, it's pretty amazing. All right, well, cheers, we'll share a kombucha and buy rent at some point. Done, next podcast. All right, buddy, love you. Cheers. Love you, brother.

1:57:10That's it for today. Thank you for listening. I truly hope you enjoyed the conversation. To learn more about today's guest, including links and resources related to everything discussed today, visit the episode page at richroll.com where you can find the entire podcast archive, my books, Finding Ultra, Voicing Change in the Plant Power Way, as well as the Plant Power Meal Planner at meals.richroll.com. If you'd like to support the podcast, the easiest and most impactful thing you can do is to subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, and on YouTube, and leave a review and or comment.

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1:59:07No!