Tear you apart

You will not see him at the Athens Olympics, but Bob Brown is one of Britain’s leading athletes. A veteran of long-distance races across the world, he is now at the front of a pack of runners attempting one of their sport’s greatest challenges—a run across the US. … Brown and the six other competitors are attempting to run the distance in 70 days—the foot-busting equivalent of a double marathon each day.

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However, Brown is not coming to all this without training or a track record. The last country he ran across was Australia and, in the mid-90s, he was ranked among the highest in the world at extreme endurance events, which are known to competitors and fans as ultra sports.

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For that event, which Brown describes as the hardest in the world, he trained himself to sleep for one hour at time, spent entire nights on his exercise bike before going to work the next morning (so he could cope with sleep deprivation) and spent seven-hour training sessions in his local pool to gear his mind up to the boredom of a 24-mile swim.

(via Guardian: “Keep on running,” by Simon Jeffery [July 19, 2004])

“I’m feeling like my body is light. It’s the best I’ve probably felt as far as energy in 10 years,” said John Corson, 56, the day after he was struck by lightning while working outside his home.

(via AP: “Lightning Strike Energizes Maine Man” [July 23, 2004])