Modern Wisdom - #001 - Stu Morton - Rowing The Atlantic Solo

Episode Date: February 12, 2018

Stu Morton is an ex-Marine and endurance athlete who is planning to row solo from Mainland Europe to Mainland South America, solo across the Atlantic Ocean.  Find out how far 1.5 million oar strokes gets you, why gaining 30kgs is sometimes ok and why he's going to be mostly naked. Check out everything I recommend from books to products and help support the podcast at no extra cost to you by shopping through this link - https://www.amazon.co.uk/shop/modernwisdom - Get in touch. Join the discussion with me and other like minded listeners in the episode comments on the MW YouTube Channel or message me... Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ModernWisdomPodcast Email: https://www.chriswillx.com/contact Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What are you wearing to rowing? So generally, I think 80% of the time people will row naked. Completely naked, yeah. Completely naked, yeah. That was a good one. Again, Hollywood style. So, Mr. Stuart Moan, welcome. You're right, how you doing? Very good, thank you.

Are you? Good. Fantastic. So, we've known each other for nearly a year now, through Reebok time side, and a few of the bits and pieces as well. And since I met you, you've had an idea that I think is probably one of the maddest things I've ever heard. It's a sort of story that you hear about in the news, but you never actually know anyone who's going to go ahead and do it. So I guess in short,

what what's your next three months going to look like, what are you doing? I'm going to row, wouldn't row and vote from Portugal to Venezuela, which has actually never been done before by anybody so there's been done by a team of five guys before but never done by someone on the road. So it'll be like a world first. So you're rowing across the Atlantic Ocean. Yeah, on your own. Yeah, from mainland Europe, mainland South America, which is important because there's a race that exists where people go from the Canary Islands to the Caribbean, so it takes in sort of 80% of the Atlantic Ocean and it's long story short, it's

20 grand to enter and there's more kudos attached to going from mainland Europe to the mainland South America. Right, it's about a thousand miles long there, then the race. So that's the reason for choosing that. And then also the fact that no one's ever done it before. So there's not many things left that no one's ever done before. There's not many of them. Especially in exploration and stuff and adventures. So it was one of those last things to grab

and it just sort of built, as it evolved it sort of built into what it is now. The initial intention was to just rode the Atlantic and it is that in any way possible. So again, in any way possible, whatever bit to whatever bits of it. And being kind of naive to it, I was just like, well, I want to rode the Atlantic, what's the most common form of doing that? And then I'll try that. And then looking into it and feeling madly layers, you sort of figure out what's on offer.

And then through a bit of sort of bucking against the rules and sort of not wanting to conform, I ended up getting my own route. So basically there's this company called Atlantic campaigns who run the Talasco-Wesky Atlantic Challenge. And it's the standard bearer, if you like, in Ocean Rowan. And it's 20,000 pounds to end in that race. Is that solar as well?

Oh yeah, they take on solar entries, pairs, threes, falls. I think the mic have done a five, but I think four is actually the highest they do. And basically, I looked at what you get for the 20 grand. Now I'm not putting it down, I thought it's a fantastic organisation, it does great things, but for someone that doesn't come from a particular background, 20 grand is like quite a bit of cash just to find to enter a race, especially when you spend upwards of 70 grand to buy the boat and the kit and all the stuff that you need. So I basically about seven years ago, I set the scene, so about seven years

ago. I was living in London working in private security and basically got invited to a dinner party And one of the girls at the dinner party was a film director, right? So I'd asked if she'd worked on anything recently And she'd just finished a film on a guy called Charlie picture, right? He would write the Atlantic on his own independently So I watched that film and sort of transfixed by it everyone else else at the dinner party didn't really want to think about doing that. I think it was the only cloud. I don't think there's anyone that really thinks of doing that right? Yeah.

Let's say to sort of think the heat of the people talk about, but I don't know, it just doesn't. For me that's exactly how it was, but it, you know, like most things, the curiosity you've got the better of me and I sort of, I email Charlie to find out the ins and outs of Ocean Rowan and how someone goes about that and planning that sort of thing. So he sent the older links to the taluscorase and through that I figured out how much it was going to cost and all that sort of stuff. So I had set aside a bit of time to say for it. And then like I said in researching more about ocean rowing I came across other people that have done independent rows.

Right. And it's a whole community, right? Yeah, it's huge once you've sort of scratched the layers away. Absolutely. The last year just seeing stuff that you like on Instagram, there's the guys rowing all over the place. Yeah. And it's almost like, it's like when people get into training, like we've never been exposed to like gym life before. And then as soon as it starts, it's just like it's like when people get into training like we've never been exposed to like gym life before and then as soon as

It's all so cute. Yeah, and to pick up all the the lingo and all that sort of stuff So it's a definitely like a subculture that people pick up on an ocean road is that way as well but more people have climbed Everest than a road to Atlantic And then again if you look at the Pacific or the Indian Ocean the numbers are even smaller again So that's about that's a thousand and a one and a half thousand, is it maybe a thousand? At the moment, I think the figure stands at about 500. Yeah. But the talusca race, it's grown in popularity.

So this year, the race has actually happened as we speak. And I think there's 75 people in the race. So it's getting exponentially. Yeah, so maybe 50 people will complete it. There's already been some dropouts and stuff Yeah, a couple of rescues and that's that and the other thing and that's quite humbling to see from my position Like I'm setting off in three weeks and seeing people giving up but as well as that There's a guy called Damian Brown who's a former rugby player and he's basically setting an example of of how to tackle an ocean road like

He's got the former. Yeah and he thinks like kind of the way I like to think about things. So if you take an event or something that happens to you and you're like if you can react to it one of two ways but that doesn't change the fact that that event has occurred so you can lose your temper or you can laugh it off but the event's still there to deal with. So it doesn't really matter how you react to something, you're there and you've got to get on with it. But there's a few, you know, and at times gone by, there are people that have sort of

for whatever reason withdrawn from the race. And I'm starting to change my, like, initial reaction to that. Like my initial reaction on here and that sort of news would be that I couldn't hack it and it wasn't for them and all this sort of stuff. But a few of them have raised safety concerns that they perhaps didn't think about and they lead up to the rope

and there's so much that goes into the planning that I totally understand that from their position they might have got to a point where they hadn't really considered what they were getting themselves into. Yeah. I know that sounds dark, because it's rowing in open.

But I think it's easy to get caught up in the hype and sort of find yourself in a position you don't really want to be prepared for. Yeah. So it tells you like your background, what's your background? So basically I grew up in a really like sort of transient lifestyle. So my father was in there on forces. I was born in Germany and then ended up living all over the place. And then when I was 18 I joined the Marines on a dare.

The death from back. Yeah so basically there was a TV program on Mara at school and everyone was talking about this TV program and sort of with Dave Fancy doing it and all that sort of stuff. And again another situation where I think I was the only person I wanted to. Yeah. And then later that day, I was stood in the queue for some food at school. And I overheard two lads talking about the fact I wanted to give it a go. Right. One whole cold. How old do you? I was like 17 or anything. Right. So it's like A levels. Yeah. And then I overheard someone saying they didn't think I could do it and not being sort of academically minded and not knowing what I wanted to do if I got to university and all that sort of stuff. I just decided to run it by a normal man first, saying when

you drop out of school and you're in the reins, what do you think? And he was like, yeah, go for it. I guess with his background that would have been good. Yeah, so did that, left the reins, got into private security, did that for a few years. And yeah, just I think you can tell from that background, I've always been a fan of like challenges and figuring out who I am and how I act to like stressful environments and sort of extreme situations. And I just feel like it's been a few years since that's happened.

So the road sort of come in a good time now. So this has been a concept in your mind for about seven years. Yeah, I think six or seven years. See the 2010 or 11, I watched that video at the dinner party. Yeah, since then it's just sort of evolved. But obviously with the amount of money involved, and obviously with the age it was like buying houses and getting a car and all that. 70 grand is hard to come by when you're doing all that stuff.

70,000 pounds is the cost. I probably spent so far about 70,000. I say so far because it's still more stuff to get for sure. Yeah. So it's just, it's little things like there's probably a kit list with two or three hundred items on that you need to do the row. Wow. And most of the items cost a couple hundred quid so you can, you know,

gather from that how much stuff. And in amongst that is a bolt. In amongst that is a metal is it a bolt? Either all like it's a row and bolt or a vessel because there are things I think because of the stuff attached to it it gets called a vessel because it's like a radio and a GPS and I don't know. It's basically a wooden row and bolt with a cabin sleeping. So it's pretty good. So you've got you've gone through the Marines you've gone through the Marines, you've gone through your private security, you've come out the other side now. Yeah.

I've seen you just over the last year, I've seen you run coast to coast of Hadrian's Wall. Yeah, that was, um, so that, that wasn't really a big thing for us. I know that, that's, that's something a big headed. And it's not meant to sound that way to us. It's equivalent of somewhere in the region of three marathon's back to back in 20 years. Exactly. Well, it's actually three 28 mile runs back to back. So I'll set the scene again. Josh Rose and I did a run in November just off the cuff

to see how like fit we thought we were. And it was a trail run in Wooler, which was 28 miles. And then we literally finished it in 10 minutes after we were talking about people that do ultra marathons and stuff like that. Which just 100, 100 know. I think ultra is anything over a marathon to be honest, yeah. So people do a 50k and call it an ultra, okay, or they'll do a 100k and call it an ultra, whatever. So Josh and I would basically say and do you reckon you could do that back to back? And I was like, I don't know. And then just off sort of googling and flying around Facebook and stuff, I found two guys that had ran headrians wall and it was 84 miles and it just jumped into the head that that's pretty much

They're back again and they're again of the wrong way just did yeah, which was the biggest distance either of us have ever done. I think up to that point. And only 10 minutes after it, you were already looking for the success. Yeah, so I just jokingly said to him what are you reckon about doing this? And he was like, yeah, that sounds pretty good. And then I know I've always been a fan of if you tell people about it, then it's happening. Yeah. So I think we posted that on Instagram that day, and then to sort of train towards it that external ability coming in a little bit. Yeah, and it's just sort of like, I think it's good to test yourself now and again on stuff that you don't know you might be able to do. Otherwise, it isn't a challenge. Do you have many people these days? Do you like a marathon, which no offense to anyone that's proud of what they've done, but it's not hard to run 26 miles in a matter of

what you're back running. But even if the training, I suppose with the training for a marathon, I've seen some of the training protocols and people are working up towards 20 miles, like 10 and 20 miles before hand, unless something goes wrong, the race is already running. Which is actually the point of the training, right? The point of the training is that you should be able to complete the run comfortably. Yeah, but I think there's a difference

in trying to complete an event which you've prepared for and trying to test yourself in a way that you can only prepare up to as well as you can do for. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, and I think also if you apply a time frame to the marathon then it becomes a challenge. But for most people they just want to do it and it's more possible than people think it is. And I think there's loads of stuff in life that's like that. It's way more possible than you think. You just never, you haven't tried it before. And the headroom's wall run was definitely that, like

infebruary we failed it. Why failed it? Because I got a shinsuit, what do you call it? Stress fracture, am I shin? Right. So that stopped us at about 65 mile point. Which is still, which is a long way. It's not just exactly double, two more rhythms.

And so that was that. But then because of the kind of people Josh and I are, we were like, well, we've got to go back and finish it I think that day the Instagram calls that you bought I think yeah, yeah, upon announcing that it hadn't happened. Yeah, there's certain pretty much Like we're gonna back for you so to speak and the day was good because it was the rerun was in August just gone And it basically for me was more of a test of like where it was physically and mentally because it it was a tough test in that like you had to apply a

bit of mental fortune to get through it because it's a long way to run most people aren't happy driving that distance but to run it we sat off at like four in the morning and finished it 10 at night and let's like coast to coast to the country so it was quite a deal. But also for me it was good because on the road I'm probably going to be working out for up to 18 hours a day and the run took around about the same time. So the thought of getting up the next day and doing that all over again, it was more preparation than I could do. I could turn around and go well it's possible that it's going to be bloody hard. And to string 100 days like that together,

it's really going to be the test. So going back to the role, you've got your prep, you've started to get towards it. So I mean, what's the next step in terms of, you've started to think about the idea where do you go from there? You need to find a route, you need to find someone with specialist information.

Yeah, exactly that. It's like most ideas that you don't think you're going to be able to achieve. Just as soon as you start on the road, it just starts to evolve. I've never really been someone that plans everything to an absolute T and then goes and executes it. I train myself up to a point where I think I've got all the skills I need to be able to take on the challenge, which involves the whole planning phase as well. And then I'll just react to the situations as they come, and as I'm going down that road. So basically, I, like

I said, I emailed the guy at Charlie picture, found out about costs and, you know, required courses and, like, the navigation that you need to, like to pick up and all that sort of stuff. And then just slowly start going about doing it. But the real sort of, the impetus was like injected into the project back in 2016. Right. Because a team of five guys had completed that route that was on about three of them were friends of mine from the Marines. Right. No way.

Yeah. So I called one of them up and just said, look what's the score with it? So how did you go about planning it? He said, we just picked the route and did it. So I basically the same sketch as the run. I told everyone I was doing it and it kind of like forces you into making it happen then. And also picking a date was important. Because it's something to work toward and it's something that like you're then accountable for because people know your like that's January, Stuart andon's going to be going off and his row is quite...

Absolutely, yeah. Parkinson's law, the work, expands to fill the time that it's given for it. And if you just, at some point in the future, it would be five years, 10 years, and before you know, you can't do it anymore. Exactly, so no, that's, I mean, so moving on to the actual row itself,

am I right in thinking that it's 1.5 million orstrokes. Around that. Yeah, I mean, it all depends on like the distance it takes me, but as a rule, it's going to be about one and a half million orstrokes, yeah. Which just sounds like the sort of thing that would take it space or, do you know, I mean, millions of anything. Millions of repetitions of anything just sounds absolutely insane. Yeah. That's nice. It's one of those weird things, like the closer you get to it, and the more people I know that have actually done the row, the more you realise that it's it's everything you think it's going to be, it's like incredibly monotonous and boring, and testing and all this, and you can have music and sort of films to keep your company and everything,

but at the end of the day there's no getaway from the fact that you've just got got to get on the Oro's and pull and Also, it's so much more different to anything I've done before where on the run that Josh and I did Yeah, if we failed that there was like our friend Ben was driving a car next to us Yeah, so we could jump in or we could like get our iPhones out and call someone and they're coming pick us up but this is not like so what's the support structure that you've got? There's no support, it's completely unsupported. In absolute emergency I can set off one of the many beacons that I've got on board and through the different coastal agencies around the world they'll sort of try and affect the rescue. The majority of the time these rescues are from passing ships because there's quite a few shipping lanes on my route.

Okay. So there is the opportunity to be rescued, but that's if you're in an emergency situation. Yeah. It wouldn't be looked upon very well if you self- you, you can just because you're a bit tired of all that stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So if you're on a you're a bit tired. I travel a lot of stuff like that. Yeah, yeah, it's like, we feel a bit sorry for yourself.

And then failing that, there's a life raft, a grab bag of emergency kit, and then the current, to take me to the Caribbean. Bloody hell. Which I'll take probably about 150 days maybe. Okay. But someone, that's definitely last result. Yeah, it's last result, but it is a result.

Yeah, for sure. So I guess you've got to have planning for every eventuality, like you say, there's a lot of things that could occur that you wouldn't know. Yeah, so when do you set off what time of day and what date? Well, it's all worth that. So you set like a general date that you're aiming at, which for me is the 18th of January. For no other reason, I've just plucked it out with the air.

Yep. And then through the weather even guy, my friend Foxy, we're just going to look at the weather around that week and see if it's a viable option. But generally, January's a good time, right? Yeah, because of something going on with currents. Yeah, the talus gray sets off in December, and I'm going to settle for January, basically for the same reason that the trade winds come from Africa towards South America. Right.

They're at the strongest point at that time of the year. And also the hurricane season stops in around November, December time. So if you set off, obviously after the hurricane season, it's going to be too not like a few other agencies in the year. So you're going to get an assist with the wind, right? Yeah. At least a little bit. Yeah, so there's not to get too much into it, but there's two classes of boats. There's the pure class and the concept class.

The concept class is basically like the newest design, which is an incredible design. And not to sound like I'm sort of like hating on it. It is a phenomenally designed bit of kit and the people that make them rannock, definitely the best boatbuilders out there. But it's widely known that they get huge wind assistance because they're designed for that. So the entrance to the cabin is at the front of the boat for the main cabin, whereas mine's at the back of the boat. So, as the wind comes over the back of the boat, it doesn't hit anything on mine.

It just drifts off into the ocean, whereas it's a flat surface. Yeah, so it acts like a sail. Because of that, Rannock has set these blistering fast paces across the ocean, any of the world record that held are currently held by Rannock boats. So, is there now two classes of world record?

Yeah, so Guinness will like, well, it's not fair, now we have to have two classes. So, I, so Guinness will like, well, it's not fair now, we have two classes. So I looked at who holds the record for my row. It's an old fashioned pure class boat. Right. So I only thought it's fair if I'm going to try and beat like the record that already stands. Yeah. Then I've got to do it.

So the route you've been, so the route that you're doing has never been done before. No. And that would, so irrelevant of which side it was in, which boat you were in, you're going to be. Well, specifically for country to country, I'll be the first person. Yeah. But for continent to continent, someone's done it before. Okay. And the guys called Seenhaar from Norwegian that set it in 96 days. Right. And so if I beat 96 days, I get the record as well as being the first person to go from Portugal to Venezuela.

And the first bridge person and all those other stuff. All the sub-mountain. So that's pretty good. I mean, it's just boggles the mind really to sort of think about these sorts of stuff. Like, I can't imagine what the experience is going to be like to go across. So what's the estimated time? You're hopefully setting off January 18th. Is it morning?

A morning thing, is it the sort of thing where you're going to be able to have anyone to see you off other than a support crew? Yeah, so Foxy, the weather-written guy, he's going to come out to Portugal with me. And then my friend Pierre is going to help me drive the boat down. And then those two, basically, I want as little time as possible in the marine and in Portugal.

Right, why is that? Just like there's a mental thing, I think it's way better for like say your buys to everyone at home, yeah, drive down, put the boat, water, jump in. In general, it's as big as it is as you start in the car. Exactly, yeah. Yeah, and also, you know, like I said,

because we're guessing the weather and all that sort of stuff, you don't want to miss your weather window. So if I dilly dally when I get down there, a two-day delay might end up being a four-week delay, which I can't really afford. So for me, I just want to get the boat in the water and set off. Plus, it isn't like a challenge that I've ended up doing that I don't want to do. Like I've been, it's like a dream of mine for six or seven years, so I'm like tampering it a bit to get out there and test myself and all that sort of good stuff.

Yeah. And I think like the solitude, something I'm going to enjoy, like the adventure side of it, that you know, putting yourself at the mercy of something you can't control isn't something people do very much these days. Absolutely. And I think that's where the test comes from.

Is that I'm not in control of my environment and I can only react to it. So it's much the same as like when we're operations and the reasons, like it's a good test of who you are and what you're about, especially in this world where people are so bothered about sort of money and status and celebrity and all that sort of stuff. Like that stuff doesn't really impress me. Like any idols I have, you know, they've got the work done and then they get the floor to the floor to the floor and run and tell them people what they're going to do and expect in some

sort of... For sure. I mean, you know, a lot of people I think would be primarily chasing the titles and they want to do it the quickest they want to do, the fastest the best and get the most renowned out of it. For me, their bonus is the true test is the test itself. Yeah. And if it takes me 120 days, I'm not really bothered. The records like a nice to have for the sponsors and stuff like that,

you're something that they can sing about and say that they were involved with. But for me, I don't really care about that. It's nice to know that you've earned something and you've achieved it because you outworked the other guy and all that sort of stuff. But for me the big test is, can I deal with what's thrown at me? The conditions will probably be different to the other guys as well. And the distance is so vast that you can't do the exact same route anyway. Right. So the parameters of, well he did it in this time and he did it in that time. They're hard to sort of, you know,

the direct comparison. Yeah, and you can't create like that level playing field where it's like a football match where there's two goals and 90 minutes and off you go for sure. So yeah, it's just, it's a weird one because the records mean a lot in the buildup, you know, getting funding and sponsorship and all that, but when it comes down to it,

like getting from A to B safely is number one. I think that's what, that's what grabs attention, isn't it? Yeah, it's that this is potentially going to be a world record. But as you say, that for you is sort of below secondary. Yeah. It will be cool. I mean, like the whole ego side of things, it'd be nice to be the first person to have ever done anything,

because you'll never lose that record. Absolutely. Whereas if you're obviously the fastest, you're the fastest until someone beats you. Yeah, and the best fastest. Yeah. And with the way the boats are going as well, it'll come to a point where the pure class boats are no longer built or the two-old to be recycled. So it's only concept class boats.

So then it would be nice to be the last person to have done something and all that sort of issue. But definitely I'm open to the thought of after the first one's done, maybe doing it again in a concept boat or, you know, but obviously gotta do it first and see if I like it. Let's get the first one and then get a little bit of it. So you're gonna set off January 18th and then I'm writing saying that you don't actually steer. Is that right? It's GPS that does the majority of the steering in terms of directions of the weather. So you can have what's called an auto helm. And it basically attaches to the rudder and it's a digital steering device. So you type in your bearing to the GPS and then you can get it done automatically

or you can sync it yourself as well. You'll put the bearing into the auto helm and then it basically steers for you. So you just get on and you just pull. Yeah and you just pull. But if that breaks you then go to foot steering or hand steering, which is as bad as it's at. Yeah, whilst also trying to pull your horse. Yeah and you're constantly like, really adjusting it and sort of making sure you're on the right bearing. So, have you set your course now? Do you know the results? Yeah, so I went through it with Foxy, we sort of sat down the other week, spent about eight hours picking the course.

So you've only done it recently? Yeah, I mean, you've had a lot of good idea for a long time, but everyone knows that I'm going from Portugal to Venezuela, so it's pretty obvious. Yeah. I just head west. Yeah. But the intricacies of sort of getting out of Portugal and like breaking away from the land, so you can afford to get your head down without like drifting into anything. Yeah.

So the first sort of day will be, the first week's going to be hell. Why? You're justing to everything. It's the first week where you're like, because you're dressing to everything. It's the first week where you're like aware of what the routine is gonna be like. The first week where your body's getting used to that workload, all your hand, the blisters and stuff in your hands are gonna form and all that sort of thing.

You can train them to a certain extent and the nice comfort come finds in a gym and what have you. But when you actually get on it, you can't really train for an ocean road unless you're on the ocean. Yeah for sure so you've touched on it there so I'm going to segue off. Yeah just take a three training, take a three what the training is consisted of. I think that's always a hard question to answer because there's a you know chunk of society that trains all the time and they have goals outside of these big projects. So I train most days and have done since I was 16 or 17. But the road specific stuff, I knew I had

to get fat and you had to get strong and I knew I had to have a pretty good engine. Luckily, I've had a good engine for a while, so that kind of took care of itself. Yeah. And that run was like confirmation of that. Yeah. And then just getting fat. Getting fat's been really weird. Really weird. It's gone really well. But it's been really strange.

Obviously most people that train a train into the team of gold, whether it be looking good or the nice one, you're looking good when you're naked and all that sort of stuff. And I've had to do the opposite of that. Yeah, I've had to eat for a purpose, which goes against everything, like I and people I stay with, like, stand for. So that's been really weird. But it's, it's doing, I'm getting better at it now because I know that it's going to

like suit, it's going to be a better big fat. Yeah, but I'm getting better at putting the food in. I'm not being that bothered by it because I know it's going to like serve me well when the time comes, but yeah. No, it's really weird. And how about strength? So this will probably, I'm going to guess that this would be the heaviest you've ever been.

Yeah, 112 kilos at the moment from 85 in August. Oh my god. So that's quite a quite a game. Very sharp. And it's not like, you know, obviously you can judge for yourself, but a lot of people have said that I'm carrying it pretty well, like I don't look like it's already far to the end. But I think that comes from the strength training that I've been doing. So I've had a bulk as well as fat. Definitely with my top off and stuff, I'd look flabby and they've got curves where I go, want them and all that sort of stuff.

Definitely with my top off and stuff, I'd look flabby and they've got curves where I go, want them and all that sort of stuff. But working with Tim Briggs, who does we don't need nutrition, we will like, well, the first part of getting fat is just eating more than you need to, but I'm not sure what to say. I can't believe that you have like,

how to get fat.dark. Yeah, there's been emailed over at some point. So we just overloaded on carbs and like, eight, eight a diet where my body got all the nutrition that needed. Yeah. So a lot of the stuff that Lauren cooks, I'll do the same with that.

And then on top of that, it's being like pizzas, nice cream and chocolate. Okay. Whatever you want to do to get calories up. Mm-hmm. And then recently, maybe three or four weeks ago, we switched to like a keto diet. Okay. So the idea is that my body now is going to be better at burning fat.

And the transition happens now, rather than on the road. Okay. So I've already experienced headaches and... Would you say you've dropped into ketosis now then? I'd probably say so, yeah. Not the cost of it now. I feel better on it now. I did get quite few headaches and was feeling like dreary and a bit hung over in the mornings and stuff. And then also,

yeah, I was just, you know, it's been nicer on the fact based diet rather than like the carbie sugary stuff because it makes it feel awful. Yeah, and now I'm coming out with the transition as well. It feels a lot more energetic and sort of healthier if that makes sense. I mean, for a lot of people who have had to suffer the pain of a fat and protein diet, that's for most people really uncomfortable. They don't like the fact that they don't have that starch, that kind of bulky satiated feeling that you get that comes along with having carbs. So that's the diet side. So, in terms of training, what have you been doing to prepare a lot of time on a concept 2, I'm going to guess?

Yeah, there is that. I mean, it doesn't really cross over that much to Ocean Rowan. So really? Yeah, so, and a 2 hour set on a concept 2, I can pull 30 kilometres, which is a good pace. But then, when I first got my boat, I rode it from the time bridge to the Royal Keys, which is eight miles, and it took me two hours. Oh wow. So the weight of the boat, how slow is she goes in the water and all that sort of stuff? Like it makes it so much different to the concept too. But you're not going to do any damage being on a concept too, so it's a nearer issue, you can get to it without getting on the boat. So a lot of two hours

sets, one hour sets, row through the night one time did like 70k in one sitting. That was it at the gym across the timeside. And then most of the time it's just sort of general perpair fitness with Lauren. So training most days together in the mornings and we're just doing like cross-fit, you sort of stuff. So a lot of functional movements and sort of... I thought I'd be like... I honestly thought there'd be a lot more role-specific stuff. I genuinely thought it would just be, yeah, I'd just spend the last six months sat on a concept too.

I've done some accessories work. But it would appear that... Yeah. ...the crossover from doing more functional stuff actually appears to be more beneficial in preparation. Yeah, I think so. Looking at that talus grace, that I keep going back to. People take that pretty seriously.

People train for it, or have trained for it with this thing you've just said there, sat in a concept to most of the time, and then doing a little bit of accessory stuff, and it hasn't really worked as well. Really? There's people that have come recently with an endurance sports background who have done more sort of functional training and then they've done a bit of a little bit of a lot of different type of design. So I think it's more like training for the Marines well, you're like you're sort of ready for anything, like you're a good sprinter, strong, you're gymnastics and all that sort of stuff. And I think

that's definitely worked well. It'd been as robust as you can possibly be. I suppose it must make the training as well, building up to something that is going to be a bit monotonous. The fact that you can go in and one day do rock climbs and one day do columns and one day do concept two and that, do you know what I mean? Yeah. Well, my thought is to save the monotony for the actual the event itself. It sounds like it's going to be a little bit, yeah. Yeah, I'm happy that I could set an a row of like 14 hours or whatever I've done it before. Yeah.

I'm happy I can work out for 18 hours, I've been done it before. And like I said, the row is more mental than it is, physical, like it's gonna be debilitating and hard work and all that sort of stuff. But I think like the overriding rule or mantra in my life is always someone worse off than yourself. Yeah.

And it's I think whatever situation you're in is not that bad if you keep that in mind. So you're sure there's going to be very many people on the planet that are going to be doing as many hours per day as yourself during that period. But again, it's a crazy thought. And you think seven billion people on the planet and you will be easily in

the top 0.1% of people working out for three months. Yeah, it's nice. Well, there's a famous Brad Wiggins explains the Tour de France by saying it's the only sport event on the planet where you need a haircut halfway through. And I don't need like maybe three or four. You're going to have to do all sorts. So, but it's also apart from the working outside of things, like I have to be a carpenter and electrician,

a watermaker specialist, all these different things. Because if anything breaks on the boat, there's no one to fix it, but you said to me that one of the first things that he said about the race was you need to be able to take a part and put back together every single element. Yeah, upside down and in the dark. So, wow.

It's pretty, so talk us through the vessel or the boat, talk us through water. Yeah, so she's 24 feet long. There's a cabin at the front and at the back that are both enclosed in airtight. Right. The one at the back is the one I sleep in.

And so it's about, it's basically coffin dimensions. It's like six foot by two foot. Built for you, pretty much. Built for me, pretty much, yeah. And in the cabin I've got sort of food, a memory phone mattress and a sleep and bag. And then I've got like the GPS, the radio, a thing called AIS, which is like an indication system that tells me and other ships who each other are.

Right. And touch and say, stay away from me, you're about to run for me or whatever. Please. Yeah. Then the forward cabin at the front of the boat is where I'm going to have, it's mainly for storage. You can't really get in there.

And it's just going to store things like the parachute anchor and all that sort of thing. Right. And then the deck itself has got two-row in positions in six-hors. Why? That's it? Why two room positions? Just six or basically so my boat can be rode by one person or two people

and there was an opportunity to like condense the two positions into one just for the sake of I'm a solar row so I don't need to but then we talked about the project manager that when they're as I get halfway through and I've eaten half of the food and obviously half of the Then we talked about the project manager, when they're, as I get halfway through and I've eaten half of the food, and obviously half of the weight of the boat is dissipated, it would be nice to have the opportunity

to either row more forward or more back of the boat. So I can affect the boats to believe in the water, because ballasts are like a big thing with those boats. So that's the reason we kept the two positions, and also just to break up them and up me a little bit. Yeah, I know it sounds weird, they're really like a foot apart from each other, but just spending one day in the front and one day in the back. It might just be a little bit different.

So I remember one of the first questions that I asked you and I'm sure that some of the listeners are thinking this as well. The guys, the bolts that have two or three or four people in them, you would think would be able to get across quicker than a bolt that only has one person in them. There's more people, more horsepower. But you said that that wasn't strictly the case. No, it's been proved in the last two talus graces. So it's all like power to weight ratio. So they can go faster, but they're carrying more weight, and they're doing it in two hours sort of sessions. So, if we were doing it as a pair, for example, like I'd be rowing while you're asleep and

vice versa. But the pace is pretty much the same, because our boat would, it would weigh what it would weigh for two people, whereas my boat's only going to have 100 days worth of food instead of 200 days. Yeah. So, only one person. Yeah, I've got to shift less weight. So effectively I can keep the same sort of speeds over a 24 hour period as we could do in two hour, you know, with segments. Yeah. So in the last two talus grics, last year my friend, Gavin Hennegan, who came to third overall as a solo row, beat teams of two and three and four.

Wow. And there's a guy Mark Slats, who's doing it this year, and he's third. There's a solo, and a team, you know, they're raceful of fours and threes. Which is true. Which just seems so counter-experienced, I suppose, but when you've got the amount of food for that many more people, and all the rest of it, I mean, that's just... And they're rowing probably 20 hours a day, those two solo guys that just mentioned. 20 hours a day. They're rowing about 20 hours a day, yeah. So what's the logic behind, because obviously that's going to cause I guess a little bit more burnout, you're going to be

getting hit by the next day. Yeah, I mean Mark at the moment, they've been going to weeks, he doesn't seem to have slowed down any yet, but obviously you can't keep that up forever, so everyone's sort of on the stage and someone is going to stop. Yeah, so for me for example I'm just going to roam and see how I feel and judge everything off of that. There's no point in me making like a schedule now that I'm going to have to change when I get on the road. So I'm just going to sort of roam for an hour or two and see how I feel. If I feel like I should rest a little bit I'll get some food down in the water and stuff and then if I feel. If I feel like I should rest a little bit I will get some food down in the water and stuff and then if I feel like I want to carry on and do a big stint I will.

So for the rowing aficionados out there, have you got an idea of sort of cadence and stroke rate and stuff like that? Yeah, so it's a very basic sort of measure. You'd be doing around 18 to 20 strokes a minute. And to be honest with you, that's all that really counts for the efficient hardos out there. Because the boats, like I said before, if I did two hours on a concept 2 and two hours on my boat, the distance is like halved, basically. So it was, that was a big eye opener, because obviously you spend the whole time looking at your little screen on the concept too, you can write it. If I pull one 30 per 500, that's awesome.

Yeah, do really good. Yeah, and if it's too blah, blah, blah. And you're doing all this maths in your head, and then as soon as you get on the boat, it just all goes out the window. So it's just efficiencies guided by stroke rate, and 18 to 20 is sustainable for a hundred days. And that feels about right for you as well? Yeah, it feels nice. And also, because it's an ocean and not like a river boat, a lot of river roads have talked to me

about sort of how it feels now I'm training and all this sort of stuff. And it's different again for those guys, because they're generally racing on really flat, sort of glass-like rivers or lakes. And they don't have to deal with weather all that much. Whereas I'm constantly moving, there was very rare going the water super clean and come out super clean. So you might put two wards in and one you know you're catching crabs straight away or the

you all get to pull their hands or pull them onto your thighs or whatever. So I think for a lot of people that have seen rowing on water before it'll be Oxford Cambridge boat race, stuff like that, which is like glass, like as flat as flat. Yeah, and get. And guys display in like amazing balance and they're both super rigid and they don't move around at all.

Yeah, and I've seen a video of one of your friends recently, I think, sat on the water at the moment. Yeah. And a sort of video that he'd uploaded from the cabin looking at him. And it just looks like hills. It just looks like a crazy golf course that he's wrong over the top of behind.

Yeah, it's nuts. So, for instance, to describe the conditions, he recently woke up in his cabin with his eyes, sort of all blackened and cuts all over his face. Right. Because while he was asleep, he capsized. And it's like a washing machine inside the cabinet most of the time.

And he said it was sealed, right? So he was just batting around in this sort of coffin. We'll work up with his eye and sort of bad order. Oh my God. But he's the guy I mentioned before Damien. He's just sort of an example of how to tackle it. So he just sort of laughed it off, took it for what it was.

And he was just cracking it up. He's just cracking it down, yeah. Wow. And then later that day, I think he what it was. And he was just cracking it up. He's just cracking it up, you know. Wow. And then later that day, I think he was on the deck and it capsized to get it twice in a day, right? And he said he's sort of, you know, he's prepared for that because he'd heard of it before.

So, but he's like, he's how I'd sort of like to tackle it. And like, you look at him and it really sets you up well for what's coming, because he doesn't like sugarcoat it and make out it's easier than it is and at the same time he's just honest like he just says what it is not so glorified and he's not saying oh it's the hardest thing I've ever done in my life and all this sort of thing you're gonna if you go into it thinking it's not gonna be the hardest thing

you've ever done you're an idiot so I think as long as you're aware of how difficult it's gonna be be, there's not going to be that many nasty surprises. But also I think the amount of people that get into this sort of thing, they're not going to do it lightly. They've already filtered out an awful lot of people just through the madness of saying that you're going to do it I think. Yeah, I think, yeah, that video scenario I've always explained and followed is a good, a good like litmus test I think for the general, no one in the room even thought I wanted to even think about it and I was just sat my own thinking, ah sounds going crazy. And I don't, like, I know I'm not normal, like against

the grain of what most people think is, you know, normal or whatever like that, but I just, like I said before, I find value in other things that some people don't. And I think that sort of, you know, as much as people want to progress in business and see how much money they can make and all that sort of stuff, that's admirable in its own world. But I'm not made of that sort of stuff. Like I want to see what I can put up with and what I can achieve in other worlds. And it's just sort of how I'm bread us both. People are bread differently.

Yeah, so going back to the race, so you've got yourself out of Portia, you're hopefully you manage to pull yourself away, you said that you can't drift into things, yeah, it's going to be finding your feet for the first week to 10 days or so. Yeah, and then what happens 10 days in where are we there? 10 days in is hopefully set rhythm. I know what my schedule on the boat is going to be more like, so maybe around three hours and resting for one hour or going to rest into, and you know, all the jobs on board, you do them while you're not rowing, so you're like cooking and cleaning and maintenance and all that sort of stuff, hopefully on top of all of that by 10 days in.

and small that sort of stuff. Hopefully on top of all of that by 10 days in. And yeah, and just sort of, you know, making good chunks into the distance. So the guys on the task race, for example, they've been running for like two weeks now and they're still only halfway through. Right. No one actually has passed the halfway mark.

Right. So it's just that, it's no and every day, let's break everything down in small chunks. So if you can cover 60 miles in a day, you're doing well as a solo. So that's, you know, you break that target, 60 miles, down to 30 miles every half day. Yeah.

And just keep on going through it like that. So yeah, hopefully by day 10, I'll be sort of, you know, a good chunk into the race a couple hundred miles down I'm just sort of not really looking at the miles to go because I'd be a little bit disheartened 3,000 on odd miles And yeah, and then just enjoying the experiences the main thing for me I think too many people come back from the race and they've treated the whole thing as a You know a pressurized race where they're not really appreciating where they are and what they're doing.

There's a book I've read recently, by the I call John Fairfax, who wrote solo in 1969. So he did it basically like compared to me on the bones of his arts, like he didn't have any kit. Not only the electro, but the cereal race. Yeah, definitely. He had no food, he courthouse to this food that you ate on the road?

No. So all that sort of stuff, I've got like fish and rods and a spear gun and as much as possible, I'll sort of try and enjoy the experience. Rather than just treating it as a sort of fully wall heavy. Yeah, well yeah. That's come up with a few things.

Yeah, there will something. Yeah, that would be quite cool. So, one thing that I didn't understand was how you secure yourself when you can't touch the floor of the ocean for sleeping so you don't drive. Okay, yeah. So you've got a thing called a para-anca, which is like a 12-foot parachute, and it's set out on like a 100-meter line. Right.

So you've got a big thick rope, you've attached to the boat, and then you put the power anchor out, so the current obviously is going underneath the boat. The power anchor harnesses that current, and it keeps the nose of the boat basically into the swell. So your position is held. Yes, you won't gain much distance while you're on the paranker, but ideally you're not going to lose much either. And also in bad weather, you can deploy the paranker and it'll keep the boat pointing into the bad weather. So that you're going up and down rather inside the side, for sure. And it's meant to eliminate the possibility of capsides, but it doesn't. Well, your friend's proven in twice and 24 hours. Yeah.

So the general rule of thumb is if you've got a boat that's say three meters wide, if you get hit side on by a wave more than three meters, you're going to go over. Yeah. And it's the Atlantic Ocean, so most of the waves are sort of eight or nine meters. Right. Okay. If you hit one side on, you go over. Wow. So I think it's important as well for if anyone's thinking of doing it is to understand it's how many times you're going to capsize rather than if you're going to capsize and being comfortable with the fact that it's going to happen. Wow. So in terms of the route that you're taking and you've spoken about the streams and the wind

that you're going to catch. Am I right in saying what you said to me that there's gonna be some times where you may be on the crest of a wave going in the right direction so to speak and you can kind of almost surf that a little. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. The hole at the right pace to ride that car.

So in what normal people would consider bad weather in certain situations for ocean rowing, it's really good for you because you'll get picked up by a wave as you're rowing. And then the common thread is to ditch the oars, just let go of them and they'll sit in the gates and then they're not going to go anywhere. And then you grab your hand steering ropes and basically steer yourself down the wave and you'll pick up maybe like between sort of six and ten knots, which isn't very fast walking from a to b, but surfing down away from the sort of free money source. Yeah exactly, so you're flying along. And then anyone

that understands surfing obviously waves come in sets, so if you're doing that every sort of 10 to 12 seconds, you're making up some really really good distance. So a lot of this, I guess a lot of the ease of the journey is going to be dependent on Mother Nature. Yeah, and also it depends on my, for one of the better term, my balls, because my friend Leven is doing weather reading for the like five teams on the talusca race right now. Yeah. And I was at Leven's house the other night.

And as we were speaking here, people on dashing away, they're like phoned people on the race and give them their weather options, right? And one of the teams who spoke to Warren Paranker because the weather was bad Yeah, and it was comments so they were just gonna sit there and ride it out and then he spoke to a foreman team A group of boys are from up here actually And they were they wanted more wind they wanted more speed so they were like surfing down the waves as we just described there so it's it's it's understanding what bad weather it's because there's a fine line between free speed and put yourself in the dangerous position yeah for sure but it's you know

it's not a bad idea that you rank on the scale would you say that you're I'm pretty happy because I mean at the risk of sound and too confident, I've worked on the Indian Ocean for sort of two or three years and you know, witnessed some pretty bad weather. Yeah. And that was when we were on sort of cargo, and cargo carriers and tankers and oil rigs. Yeah, and we were a little bit worried.

So that was pretty bad weather. So if I experienced anything like that, then definitely I'd be like a case of batting down the hatches and, you know, surviving. Yep. But I think most scenarios, it's going to be sort of harnessing what you've got. I'm just going to see some of it, yeah. So I saw something online that you posted about a sheepskin seat cover. Yeah. And then someone asked why you had a sheepskin seat cover.

Yeah. And what are you wearing to row in? So generally, I think 80% of the time people will row naked. Completely naked. Completely naked, yeah. So the idea is that if you, you could probably test it at home if you've got that much time in your hands, but if you see a typical, if your t-shirt gets covered in the saltwater and then it dries out in the sun,

the water evaporates, but the salt crystals stay in the material and they're abrasive. So obviously if the t-shirt rubbing on your skin, especially with rowing, you're gonna end up like soars on your armpits. Really bad, really fast. Yeah. And because you're at sea, the salt gets into the wound and it makes it harder to heal. And then obviously because you'd debilitated malnourished and all that sort of stuff, you'd probably slower at fixing itself anyway.

To bad environment for healing. And that's gonna happen anyway, you've got clothes on or anywhere with this friction. Whereas the sheepskin, because it's soft and fluffy and it's like more of an actual fiber, it's better at not retaining the salt crystals than sort of man-made fibers aren't. So the idea is that you clean it out

as often as you can with fresh water and then sitting on that nape gift, it's basically gonna provide less friction than rolling in a pair of shorts. So if someone goes past you on a boat, yeah, they're gonna see, and make you 100 and 30. Yeah, yellow, the end of the day.

But the name's growing. Yeah, for the first part, you'd wear shorts for that reason. For the middle of the ocean, there's not many people going to come up. Someone on holiday, a film on holiday and a yacht just coming on the corner. Exactly, but I'll be in a position where I'm at tired, I don't really care who sees me or.

That's what I just like to find. So in terms of avoiding sunburn and stuff like that, like even just like the volume of sun cream that you're gonna have to take. Yeah, so I use like these zinc stick things. Yeah. So I just stick that on, but I generally, through like jobs I've done in the past, I've spent a lot of time in the sun,

exposed to it in sort of big chunks. Yeah. So I get used to it pretty quick. And like I said before, when I was in Tanzania for a few years, it was, you know, something I put up with all the time there. So you get used to that pretty quick. But definitely for the first part, I'll be covered up. And, you know, after a hundred days of sunshining, you're going to come back with a wicked time as well. Yeah, I'll be quite leathery, I think.

So fresh water as well, like water is a very, very heavy object to take with you. How's that working? Have you got something that you can distill on board as well? Yeah, so on board I've got a desalinated or a water maker and basically it's plumbed into the boat. So there's a valve underneath the hull, like the bottom of the boat, and it sucks up sea water. And then through loads and loads of different filters, mega high pressure, it turns it from salt water into drinkable water. It doesn't taste particularly great, but you know it keeps you going when you need it.

And then also because of the type of boat I have, it needs ballast to sort of sit it down in the water and again reduce the chance of capsizing. So the ballast is going to come in the form of about 120 kilos of fresh water just in plastic bottles that you get from a shop sort of thing. And then if the watermaker breaks and my hand-held watermaker breaks as well, yep I've got emergency water to last me the last week, you know, sufficient, however long it could. Yeah. And any idea with that would be if you drink any of the fresh water in the bottles, you can do for a place at the sea water and mark the box so you don't drink it.

Yeah. And that way you don't use any ballast. You're able to drink the emergency water. So that's hydration, what about food? Food comes in the form of freeze-dried meals, the sponsor that I've got fire pot, it's company called outdoor food that make that brand, they basically cook their meals and then dehydrate them. Right, okay. So they're way healthier than some of the other ones out in their market, so I

want obviously mention their names but they're super sugary. So you're actually having fully cooked meals that just haven't had the water taken out. Yeah, and then you just pour boiling water back in, back in pack for a bag, for whatever it is. We leave it for like 15 minutes, and that's rehydrated. And it's all like chili con carne and spaggol.

It's like all the more croppas soup. Yeah, exactly, yeah. And they're like a thousand calories each meal on stuff like that. So how much are you gonna be eating every day? So I've got four of those every day, as well as a snack pack. And the snack pack's got about 3,000 calories in it.

A snack pack with 3,000 calories. Yeah, it's like lots of, lots of, I've got loads of nut butter, some built-on, because apparently people say that you miss chewing, because all the freeze-dried foods, like quite sloppy and soft. So the built-on is just basically too tough. Yeah and it's obviously like mega-stack-pro-protein and then I've got sort of energy gels that are fat-based rather than sugary ones and then backload spars and flapjacks and stuff like that. So you're going to be sort of moderately well-ass opposed.

Yeah I think I'm going to be hitting about 7,000 calories a day and then the argument is you burn about 10,000 calories every day. So that's about pound a day of weight. Exactly. That's what you're off to be losing. So what if we say it's around about 100 days and 100 days from January 18th? Yeah, you're actually awake, going to be. I think the vast majority of people that do it say they lose about quarter of their body weight. So that's why I took the jump from 85 to 112. I am at 115, I think. Yeah.

But I think I'm about 112 with minutes. I'm there, I'm there about. Yeah. And then I'll do all that by the time I get if you come back in you're at 120. I'll be really long again. Super enough. I've got to go on a fucking cut now. I've got the lot by the time though. Yeah, I've already had the time. So tell us about the rock to recovery then because everything you've done here is based around the charity, right?

Yeah, so to get a bit candid, maybe a little bit controversial, I generally, you know, a lot of other people want to bring to the fore how much PTSD is ignored. I think people that come back from Afghan and Iraq and all that sort of stuff with injuries, physical injuries are pretty well looked after now. They don't get the best care that they could possibly wish for, but it's pretty good. So if you lose a leg, for example, you're going to get prosthetic and it's going to be a very good sort of standard. But unfortunately, the same can't be said for mental health. If you come back with a brain injury

or with post-traumatic stress or anything like that, you just not well looked after at all. It isn't clear what avenue you should be going down and to seek help. It isn't clear what kind of signs and symptoms to look out for in people. Do you think that this is across US, UK? Yes, it's like the suicide rate for veterans is sky high.

And a lot of it is because of post trauma sort of instance that they've experienced or if they've been in high pressure situations for huge chunks of the lives which Afghan and the right provided, you basically leave the service and you don't have any transitionary sort of support. You're just, you know, one day you're flying around jumping out helicopters and shooting people and stuff and the next day you're in weight rows getting annoyed at people with the law. Yeah, getting in your way when they're trying to buy tomatoes or whatever. So it's a really hard thing to come to terms with, especially with the fact that

there's no help out there. And rock to recovery is a charity that's sort of changing the face of that. So they're providing help for veterans and the families who have to deal with PTSD and sort of brain trauma and do reason and stuff like that. And it's like a fast action charity as well. So if anyone, for example, if you had a friend or a relative or whoever that was in the forces that you were worried about, you could call rock to recovery and they literally fly up to see that friend or relative and give them immediate one-to-one support, like they're in them. Good scenario in the sport. Yeah, it's a really serious experience. I obviously got cost-of-fortune money for it, a charity like that and

track away the awareness of them as well is like really important. I think I've got friend BT Urella who started Vetsport in America which is a wounded and PTSD supporting sport to lead so they play like baseball and a whole bunch of other stuff and he gave probably one of those moving talks I've ever heard about a year and a half ago. And he went through all the different bits, all of the problems that his friends have had with PTSD. And he said that he was one of the guys who'd come out physically injured quite badly. But given the choice between being physically injured and mentally injured, he was glad that he was able to, that he glossed the leg, that was his analogy that he did. And I think it just sounds so alien, the concept of PTSD and obviously being in that high-pressure situation,

the level of adrenaline that they have experienced, that soldiers have experienced in one day of combat, will be more than most people experience in the lifetime. And not only that, even get away from the trauma side of things, just looking at something as simple as transitioning from one career to another. For most people it's quite stressful, but for people like in the backgrounds that I've sort of encountered, you go from this sort of high level like, you know, where the level of octane and adrenaline and all that sort of stuff that you're experiencing on a day-to-day basis. It goes from like a hundred to zero and you're expected just to deal with that. And what you're used to and the people that like people around you, their behavior that you used to, that changes all of a sudden as well. So you can't rely on people to you know

treat you the same way or anything like that. So you've got to transition your head and the way you act and everything you've ever known, completely change that without any support whatsoever. Yeah, at least, and like if you're joining the military and you're doing that role reversed, so you're going from a very sedentary lifestyle and all that sort of stuff and then joining the military, they take almost a year to train you up to a standard that they can then send you to war. And then when you come back from war and you want to go back into like civil street, you're just sent there. You don't get sent in. So they transition every step. They die so down but they don't reverse the life you back up. Exactly. So like that has a massive effect on how people act, on their reactions to things like how they process stuff in the heads and there needs to be help for that.

There's like at the moment there's no prosthetics for the mind but if people lose legs or lose arms or something they can get those limbs replaced there obviously no any of us as good as having your original leg or whatever but this like I said there's no prosthetic for the mind so the more help that people can provide by using these charities like Rectura Covering, you know, one's like it. It's super important to get to a point where people aren't running out of options

and they're arriving at the door of suicide and people are using their families and love of uns, sort of thing. So that's the goal is to raise as much money as possible where are you up to? Yeah, so we've raised about five grand for them so far. The bulk of the money that's going to come from the row itself will be a while away.

I've experienced in the buildup to the event itself that you're taking far more seriously when you tell people you're going to do it, and then that sort of dies off a bit. Then you buy a boat, and that makes people think, Jesus, he's actually going to go through with it to the boat. And then all that training and all that sort of dies off a bit. Then you buy a boat and that like, I think makes people think, Jesus, he's just actually gonna go through with the two-door boat. And then all the trains, all that sort of stuff. Yeah.

So I think as soon as I set off, that would be a big thing. Yeah. And then also one of the founders of the charity Foxy, he's on TV quite a bit with the SES program on Channel 4. And then he's got another program coming out about drug cartels and stuff like that in Venezuela.

He's not going to meet him at one of the more you want your ovens. No, yeah, well he gave me a load of heads up about what Venezuela is like at the moment because it's basically a failed state. Pretty lowless, yeah. So getting there is going to be interesting. Yeah, you might just jump back in the bottom turn around, right? Give me some more food and I'm going back. Yeah, but he's basically going to help sort of, you know, spread the message and all that sort of stuff.

And I think like I said, when I'm actually out on the road, that's when the money will come trickling in. And the BBC are going to do it if you're on the 5th of January. And then one of the main sponsors is making a documentary. So I think in terms of raising money there's about sort of the next six months is going to be the big big push yet. So in terms of you've got rock to recovery on there and I know that you've got my protein as well. Who else have you got on there that are this sort of. Yeah so the two main sponsors are true potential

yep they're an investment firm based in new ones so they're an northeast based company and then the other one is air fair and they're basically a flag claim flag delay compensation company both owned by friends mine and they're both northeast based sort of companies as well so you're taking a good sort of local base yeah so that like, that's an important thing for me. I wanted to get sort of people on the local area involved in it. There was a story in the Chronicle and all that sort of stuff. And then like I said before, BBC Look North are going to come do a feature on it.

So have you found it difficult because you've said that you're a little bit averse to kind of putting yourself on a pedestal and searching the accolade that's a little bit more extrinsic and stuff like that. Have you found it uncomfortable to have to be the Instagram story guy, the constant update guy? Because obviously, as you've said, when you, when you publicize these milestones in the buildup to it and presumably throughout as well, when you do those, you kind of battling against two things there. One of them is it'll raise more money for the charity and generally not right about the race, it's good.

But on the flip side, if that, you're maybe doing something that naturally you wouldn't have a conclusion to do. Yeah, and it's really, I did a blog post about it recently because it's sort of, you know, it's one of those things. I don't berate anybody that does it and that builds their profile and all that sort of stuff because generally they're doing it for good reasons. And I do understand that the more people I tell about the road, the more exposure the charity gets and the more money that we raise and all that sort of stuff.

But also, at the same time, I've chose to do the road so low for a reason. I like my own company. I like my own space and I like being able to do things without any sort of fuss and stuff like that. And I also strongly feel that in terms of like raising money before the road and telling people what's going to happen before the road. To me it's sort of, it's not important until I've completed the task. It's one thing to say you're going to do it, but actions are remembered long afterwards, I forgot them. So actually completing the challenge, you should come back and have them the story, for me it's way better than going around telling everyone you're going to do it. There's obviously seven years worth of me preparing for an Atlantic road, has seen me see seven years worth of other people preparing, and the amount of people that put it off for

a year or don't actually follow through with it or said all these big promises and failed. It's crazy. So I don't want to put myself in that position where I'm telling everyone I'm going to smash it and I'm going to do this and I'm going to be the sky and I'm going to raise this much money and all that sort of stuff before it's actually done. I think I'm in a better position to talk about it and raise the profile once I've actually achieved the milestone than to talk about it before it happens. But it's just, it's one of those things, it's a world we live in, it requires that sort of excitement beat up and big hoopla that social media is now.

And I hope I've done an alright job of it so far. But I could always obviously use like more shares and follows and all that sort of stuff. So while that you're on the role, if people want to keep up today with what you're doing, is there going to be a, have you got access to Twitter? If you got access to it. Yeah, so I've got people to keep up. There's a thing called a yellow brick tracker that people will be able to download the app for that and follow me on like a Google Maps sort of image, like a Google Earth image and there'll be a little like arrow which will

be me making like a really slow progress across the thing. And then also I can Facebook and tweet using that device as well. I can send photos and stuff and perhaps the odd video. I was going to say it's the guy who tumbled over. He would look like a GoPro sort of thing that was attached to the front. Yeah, so there is a capability these days for that, that sort of stuff. But it's just, it's very sketchy with satellite comms if anyone's ever had experience with that stuff.

It's hard to get the videos up and out. Well, when you can't get 3G in the middle of... Exactly, I'm just gonna say, yeah, try to get a video. Or, in the middle of the Atlantic, I was... But it should be good. I think it's one of those things that you start sending on Tuesday morning and it actually goes up on Friday afternoon. I'll be like that. But yeah, I mean, there'll be a blog every day and all that sort of stuff and then Lauren's going to control the social media stuff and do all the hard things and stuff like that for

the week. So you're going to have to be careful, especially if you're growing naked, if just what for instance does end up going up. Yeah. We're interested. Yeah, well, so drawing everything to a close, where can we find more information about the row over the next few weeks and then once everything's up and running where can you go and keep up to the story? If everybody goes and checks out Rock Through Recovery UK on Facebook and Instagram, it's just at Rock Through Recovery UK and it's a number two not T.O. So go

look on that or if you go to any of the platforms and put in Atlantic Solo Stue, so to at Facebook or Instagram, and there'll be links there towards the fundraising pages and Rock Through Recovery. And then basically like I said, I'll release like a page that people can follow while I'm on the road, like a week before I leave, so that I'll have the track and information and everything on there. And yeah, that'll be the best way to follow it.

Fantastic, man. Well, thank you very much for coming on. I'll make sure that all of the links to everything you've put in here to rock to recovery to the links to follow yourself will be in the description. Good luck, man. That's all I can say. Thanks for having me. Really appreciate for everything.

Yeah, it's fun. Thank you. See you in a month. Cheers. Bye. you