KING OF THE SEA

Ross’s amazing solo round Britain swim

SUPERMAN Ross Edgley has become the first person to swim around Britain’s entire 1,780mile coastline.

The 33-year-old finished his mammoth feat – equivalent to swimming the Channel every day – yesterday.

It took 157 days to complete the incredible challenge.

The swimmer battled through freezing temperatures, jellyfish and even parts of his tongue falling off due to the salt water.

For five months, Ross was either in the water or on a boat.

He set off from Margate, Kent, and swam clockwise through The Channel, up the Irish Sea, over Scotland to the North Sea and back down to Margate. Speaking at the finishing line he said: “It’s so lonely in some ways, that solitary confinement, but coming in and seeing everybody was amazing. “It’s weird, so many emotions. Relief I didn’t face plant the floor, grateful I can see my family again.” Ross, who got a congratulatory kiss from girlfriend Hester Sabery, inset, was joined for the last kilometre by 300 other swimmers.

Despite so long at sea and burning roughly half a million calories, the world record holder said he cannot wait to get back in the water.

Ross, from Grantham, Lincs, said: “It probably won’t be long before I’m putting on a pair of goggles again.

“Honestly, I’d do it tomorrow, just because it’s going to be nice to swim without having to scrape the ice off a cold wetsuit before you have to get in, or to swim without getting stung in the face by a jellyfish.”

It’s not the first record Ross has claimed, having completed a rope climb equal to the height of Mount Everest in 19 hours in 2016, two months after taking on a marathon while pulling a car.