Ross Edgley, a man who seems to defy human limits, has done it again! The 38-year-old ultra-athlete has achieved feats that are almost unimaginable, pushing the boundaries of human endurance to new extremes. He holds world records for running 1,000 miles barefoot with a 50 kg rucksack, swimming 500 km nonstop in 56 hours and completing an Olympic Distance Triathlon while carrying a tree.
Edgley’s latest challenge, however, may be his most daunting yet. For his documentary series “Shark vs Ross Edgley”, he faced off against sharks, pushing his physical boundaries to the extreme. For the series, he attempted to outsmart the world’s fastest shark, the mako, by swimming like a white shark, turning like a hammerhead, and eating like a tiger shark.
In an interview with LADbible, Edgley revealed that out of all the four tasks, he felt most confident in his ability to eat the same amount as a tiger shark, saying he “could actually compete at” eating like one. According to him, tiger sharks can travel hundreds of kilometres in search of food, devouring everything from tires and bin lids to whale corpses and turtle shells. These apex predators can consume massive amounts of food with Edgley calling them “trash cans of the sea”.
As part of his documentary series, Ross Edgley and his team devised a unique experiment to measure the feeding capacity of a tiger shark. They created a large, gel-like “jelly lollipop” for the shark to bite into, allowing them to estimate its potential food intake. The team discovered that if the “jelly lollipop” were a block of whale fat, the tiger shark would have consumed an astonishing 20,000 calories in a single bite.
Thus, in an attempt to replicate it, Edgley participated in a 48-hour weight-gain and loss challenge. He began by cycling and jogging for almost eighteen hours in a heat chamber in an attempt to drop as much weight as possible.
Then, after going without food for a while and developing “paper thin” skin, it was time to begin “re-feeding,” during which he ate a variety of foods. “My record seven litres of custard – that was what I was most proud of. It was amazing,” Edgley told LADbible.
However, while you may assume that after spending so long without eating, you’d be craving a big meal that wasn’t the case. Edgley explained to the news outlet, “I was like ‘no, no, hydrate’. We did electrolytes and a Hulk smoothie as well which was just a green smoothie – just to replenish the body.” After that, things got silly when his mother gave him two “slabs worth of cheesecake” to celebrate the custard drowning.
His hearty “Shark diet” also consisted of two whole cinnamon breads, a pizza, four bags of Haribo mix, fish and chips, burgers and fries, two full English breakfasts, four tubs of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream, and four Mars bars.
The man consumed an incredible 41,103 calories in total and gained a full 22 pounds (10 kgs) in a single day, as per LADbible.
Ross said, “I felt pretty good about myself with that 40,000,” before they realised that a tiger shark could eat half of that in a single bite.
Catch his documentary series “Shark vs. Ross Edgley” on Nat Geo WILD UK on July 22nd as part of SHARKFEST to witness his incredible challenge.
Comments
0 comment