OK, so you’re scheduled to run a marathon across the North Pole to raise awareness of climate change. But spring is on the way and opportunities to acclimatize to the freezing conditions are sparse. Enter EarthFireIce’s marathon running nut-jobs and a discipline of science that’s (allegedly) kept Walt Disney’s head on ice for the last 40 years.
As previously reported by Global Cool, Ed Stumpf and Sean Cornwell last month endured baking temperatures to complete the Sahara Marathon - the world’s toughest footrace. Having both successfully finished the gruelling 26 miles and 385 yards, the athletic and altruistic duo are heading to the North Pole tomorrow (Tuesday) to undertake an even more daring and arduous marathon.
Given the limited facilities in the capital to train in subzero conditions, Ed, a city banker, and Sean a strategist at Google, procured the services of The London Kriotherapy Centre, which affords likeminded lunatics the opportunity to spend two minutes holed up in a sealed chamber at -135C. According to the literature scattered on the centre’s reception coffee table, the therapy stimulates the temperature receptors in the skin to communicate with the brain. The brain then triggers the various body systems to react to the ‘challenge’, which is apparently “beneficial”. Although hell will freeze over before this Global Cool correspondent will run a bath let alone a marathon, the temptation of donning a pair of cotton boxer shorts, knee socks and clogs before entering a sci-fi freezer was simply too much.
After dispensing of clinical dressing gowns we were guided into the first chamber that turns over at a paltry -60C. But, before we had time to figure out why on earth we had signed up to such a preposterous procedure, we were prodded and poked into the second chamber that clocks in at an unearthly -135C. Here we proceeded to run on the spot whilst making an expletive-laced racket to pass the seemingly eternal two minutes.
Fuelled by camaraderie and a shared sense of the ridiculous, the first minute past jovially. However, around the time that the one-minute marker was tapped on the window, this writer’s legs began to go numb from the ankle up and the previously present rush of adrenalin dissipated into a feeling that one had just downed a fear-flavoured Slush Puppie.
This shared but unspoken sense of panic in turn inspired further clattering of collective clogs and chants of ‘I don’t know what I’ve been told, but Kriotherapy’s f*****g cold’. Thankfully, after what seemed like a millennium, the vacuum-sealed door swung open releasing us all in a slightly over dramatic cloud of dry ice.
Whether or not this unusual training method will go some way to helping Ed and Sean succeed in their ambitious goal of finishing two of the world’s most extreme marathon’s remains to be seen. But watch this space for further updates from the North Pole and please visit the EarthFireIce website to find out how you can pledge to reduce your CO2 emissions as part of Ed and Sean’s innovative yet exhausting initiative.
Click here for EarthFireIce website
Click here for North Pole Marathon website
Click here for The London Kriotherapy Centre
how many tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions does the kriotherapy centre create through their intense energy use, and how do they neutralise them?
Comment by MirrorMan — April 3, 2007 @ 12:02 pm
I second comment number one and I add: given that the real race took place in -30c temperature, this kind of preparation is one of the dumbest thing I’ve heard in recent times. It is of course extremely wasteful too, but if you are flying all over the globe to combat global warming, you probably have more money than brains anyway
Comment by AP — April 27, 2007 @ 7:42 pm
We’re an agreeable bunch. Good point on the wastefulness of the activity. In terms of preparation for running the North Pole marathon, nothing works better than training in similar conditions. Next time, come to North Dakota in January or February for a week or two of running in -10F to -30F weather. After that, cold weather will be no big deal. Congrats on completing both races.
Comment by sundog — April 28, 2007 @ 9:21 am
Why don’t you offset deez nuts bitches
Comment by mandingo — April 28, 2007 @ 2:12 pm