Singing and cheesecake: the secret to surviving a gruelling 157-day swim
After 1,792 miles and half a million calories, Ross Edgley walks on dry land for the first time since June
THE first man to swim around the entire coast of Britain yesterday put his success down to a simple rule – if he could still sing, he could still swim.
Ross Edgley finally staggered on to dry land after spending 157 days at sea. Around 400 swimmers from the Outdoor Swimming Society joined him for the final approach.
His 1,792-mile trip back into Margate in Kent, his starting point on June 1, ended with him finally setting foot on the shore shortly before 9am yesterday.
It was an impressive journey. During his 23 weeks, he swam the equivalent of 15 times around the M25 or the distance from London to Moscow.
Burning an estimated 500,000 calories, the 33-year-old adventurer ate more than 600 bananas and had to contend with jellyfish stings and a frozen wetsuit off the shores of Aberdeen. At times, he swam alongside dolphins and basking sharks.
However, at the bleakest moments, it was one song – and thoughts of his mum’s cheesecake – that he would turn to. “I can’t sing, I’m an awful singer, but under the water, I sound amazing,” he told The Daily Telegraph.
That song that was on repeat in his mind was Escape (The Piña Colada Song) by Rupert Holmes, which has found fame again after being featured in Guardians of the Galaxy in 2014.
“If you’re singing that when you’re swimming across the Moray Firth, it’s hard to swim in a bad mood,” he said.
He added that peace of mind was crucial – and he had read the Stoics and “lots of Shackleton”.
“People would often say: ‘Oh wow, you must be reading Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations or stoic philosophy, and I was reading a lot of those books, but sometimes I would just think ‘what’s for dinner tonight?’ or ‘should I have BBQ sauce or tomato sauce?’
“Another question I got a lot was ‘Did you have any grand epiphanies?’ Really, the answer was: ‘No, you just keep yourself entertained and do what you can to avoid thinking of jellyfish stings, sea ulcers or chafing’.
“It really could be as trivial as ‘Mum’s homemade cheesecake – that’s going to be brilliant’, rather than Socrates.”
Mr Edgley spent up to 10 hours at a time in the water, depending on tide patterns, and often had to swim at night to keep up to schedule. He was accompanied by a support boat on which he would sleep and eat – starting the day with a breakfast of two pizzas and consuming up 15,000 calories a day.
He entered the Guinness Book of World Records on August 14 – 74 days in – for the longest staged sea swim, according to the World Open Water Swimming Association.
A fitness expert and water polo player for Great Britain, Mr Edgley has previously attempted to swim 24 miles from Martinique to St Lucia dragging a 100lb log, and in 2016 completed a marathon while pulling a car.
He is unsure what his next challenge will be, but he has said he will probably embark on another aquatic adventure.
However, he does have a more pressing concern. Having grown his beard to protect against jellyfish stings, his facial hair has become a bone of contention between him and his girlfriend.
“I want to keep it, but the girlfriend is threatening to shave it when I sleep.”