PA MediaAn ultra-swimmer who is preparing to swim 1,000 miles (1,609km) around Iceland said he was inspired by actor Chris Hemsworth and his role as the Nordic god Thor.
Ross Edgley, 39, from Alderley Edge in Cheshire, joked the three-month challenge will be “the closest thing yet to swimming around Asgard” – the home of Thor.
He said he was introduced to Australian Hemsworth during the production of Thor: Love And Thunder (2022), describing the Hollywood star “just full of questions” and an “encyclopaedia” of Nordic folklore.
Mr Edgley will embark on his journey, deemed the Great Icelandic Swim, on Friday, and expects to face choppy waters, killer whales and temperatures as low as 3C.
EPAThe swimmer’s intended routine will see him swim for six hours and rest for six hours, a pattern which will be repeated every day for about three months.
Mr Edgley is no stranger to difficult challenges, having previously swum more than 1,791 miles (2882km) in 157 days around the coast of Great Britain, as well as earning a Guinness World Record for the longest-distance assisted adventure swim, covering 317 miles (510km) along the Yukon River in Canada.
But he said the Iceland challenge is likely to be “twice as hard” because of the colder temperatures.
“Usually in England, when you get out of a frozen lake, you’re running somewhere where there’s a hot chocolate and you can get around the fire – but out there it’s just Viking country,” he said.
PA MediaThe ultra-swim is also being completed in the name of science, with Mr Edgley planning to take daily water samples, working in collaboration with the University of Iceland and the Marine and Freshwater Research Institute of Iceland.
The samples are designed to help build a picture about the biodiversity around Iceland’s coast, researching the environmental DNA (eDNA) in the water.
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