The WORST (5) Injuries: Long-Distance Swimming!

Wow never thought 💭 you have to go through all this . All the best in your second challenge

Amazing resilience! Rhabdo is full on, i had close to 50,000 CK levels and had my heart and kidneys shutting down because of it. It has been a long road to recovery but I’m back in the best shape of my life and still pushing myself each day 💪🏽

Bro is Australian version of david goggins

Just did Everest Base Camp last month (Feb 2023). Woke up at 1am, hyperventilating with an Oxygen saturation of 46%. Luckily had hot flask of tea by my bed and a bowl of sugar. Spoon after spoon of sugar in my mouth followed by hot black tea. Managed to bring the heart rate under control and therefore, get enough oxygen into my lungs and subsequently into my various organs inc the brain. Lucky escape.

I'm over here thinking "Ah that 10k I ran today sure made my knee hurt". Absolutely mental.

Before I start playing this video, my mind was like, "Hmm.. Shoulder pain must be up there." After watching the video, I don't think this is about fitness anymore.

By the way, I'm having a shoulder pain after being off from workout all together. I stopped working out to accompany my wife when she was on labor. Unfortunately, my first daughter was stillborn and I needed some time off even from work. But when I started the push ups again, somehow I lost my strength from the time off and now I'm left with a shoulder pain, somewhere on the inside part.

Very interesting video... Thanks Ross team!!!

And the root cause of them all!? ... Athletic Insanity!

Man, you're such a beast for wanting to go back at it.

This time though, we want a happy finish and the longest swim record beaten! Not a record for the most failed number of attempts!

Happy Training!

You’re an inspiration big man. Rugby- knee hyper extended, grade 3 PCL tear, meniscus tear and broken tibia. Back of my leg was as purple as Barney the dinosaur

I could just Imagine the Doctors worried faces at Russ saying "remember to thank all the people on the cruise ship" 😂

You're built entirely differently lol I can't compete injury-wise. I'll list them below for shits and gigs haha!

concussion (Muay Thai)
Broken Ribs (Kickboxing)
Herniated Disc (Kickboxing)
Sciatica (Kickboxing)
Smashed metacarpal (Kickboxing)
Torn groin (Kickboxing)
nearly broke my back pulling a wardrobe on top of myself as a kid. Couldn't walk for 6 weeks!
ripped my arm open and could see the elbow bone clearly (Skateboarding)
Smashed my teeth out on an old school metal till as a kid lol (Running downstairs)
And the proud owner of 36 scars, (last time I counted) Due to Mountain Biking and other dumb stuff!

Looking at it written down, I'm actually quite proud of that list. Good health everyone! haha...

Great Video Ross!

I once contracted sepsis from dirt that got into my blood stream. I ran one of those Tough Mudders and cut my toenails short the night before..I had no idea how vital decent toe nail length is to survival 😂

The sepsis tracked up both my legs and 2 days later and I ended up in hospital unable to walk.

Both big toenails had to be cut off to clean the infected toes..it was grim!

I hope this is a warning to others!

My first Jiu Jitsu competition I still can't remember thanks to a secondary concussion (a bad throw 2 weeks before had given me a mild concussion which meant i shouldn't have completed). Took up judo to get over my fear of being thrown so i could keep training and competing. My first judo competition ended with surgery to fix my radius and ulnar bones, both of which were snapped clean through. Despite those bad starts I've keep going back to the mats and am now purple belt in Jiu Jitsu and yellow belt in judo.

Wow… you are a super human. I have had many sport injuries with a few requiring surgery BUT the worst was when I accidentally dropped a 10 lb weight from squat height on my big toe with no shoes on. I crushed my toe and my bone popped out through my nail bed. Initially shock and then pain so horrible it put me into shock lol (for real actually) 😳

I'm just impressed that Ross was able to push himself to the point of almost death. That's insane

“I was looking at the footage and was like: that’s not swimming, that’s horrendous”
Cuts to Ross swimming just like I do 🥲

I am, of course, a complete layman, so do forgive me Ross but surely a 20,000 Creatine Kinase reading would be akin to eating through significants amount of muscle in one go?!

Dude! Those injuries are insane…you almost got boiled like a lobster! 😬😬😬😬😬 there is something incredible about surviving injuries like that though, and then to be able to laugh about them afterwards. It’s a cool thing when pain becomes your friend.

Anyhoo, not really an injury, but I gave birth to my son in a tub at my house and I’ve never felt more victorious in my life than when I was holding this new little life while sitting in a pool of my own blood 🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻 I didn’t know one person had that much blood to bleed but here I was bathing in it and not thinking twice about if I’d have any left to live on LOL good times

Hi Ross, New to the channel and really like the content.Thank you. I’ve been a (pool) swimmer for 40+ years. I recently watched the Nyad movie (on Netflix) with the Mrs and was wondering if you fancied a crack at that swim at some point?

Broken femur, torn miniscus, torn mcl, partially torn acl. All at the same time during American football.

So much respect for you brother. Taking your body to the limit takes a different kind of mentality. My worst swimming injuries it's just a shoulder tendinitis and the classic rotator cuff, acromion and bursitis. Just finished an Oceanman of 10k last October and that's the farthest I've gone...for now haha I do mean to keep pushing. You should come to Mexico and do the cross between Cancun and Isla Mujeres!! probably i'll be a warmup for you haha but it's such a wonderful swim. Take care LEGEND!

What I would love to see is you swimming in the freshwater lakes in the middle of k’gari island (Fraser island) in QLD, Aus. Such a magical place.

Amazing how shark attacks aren't in the list of injuries from long distance swimming in open water. Yet, whenever i tune into the discovery channel i witness testimonies of folks being bitten, one after the other whilst splashing knee-high deep off the shore lol

I did a few 8k swims, 1 10k swims, I had some calf cramps which felt like my leg was going to explode!!… watching this, I will just man up and keep swimming…..lol

After 25m I got foot cramp! Hands down the worse 30 seconds of my life.

I've managed to avoid most bad injuries but I did dislocate my pinky finger player aussie footy and it was at a right angle. I did get nearly hypothermic in my first 5km open water race when I was 12, the conditions were super choppy and it was about 16 degrees in the middle of summer, I got out, felt fine albeit a little cold and the surf lifesavers wrapped me in a space blanket and took me to the showers. In Feb 2018 (I was 17), we did a 2.5km open water and the entire course was just blubber jellyfish everywhere I got stung bad enough that it welted up. Twice in 10km swims (one was a race in 2017 and one was training for a 24km Dec last year), I have gotten such bad sunburn that my back was all blistered up.

My brother broke his hand in a lane rope, he got it caught and twisted to get it out and he ended up hypothermic in the middle of summer on a 28 degree day, he was swimming a 2.5km no wetsuit and ended up disorientated, then our teammate swam past and he pulled out of the race. Where I never swim with a wetsuit, he can't swim open water without a wetsuit, he's 176cm and 62kg so he just freezes.


Who knows, I may end up with a few more because I want to swim Bass Strait unassisted which is about 200km. I've already done a 24km swim (6 hours 6 minutes, with the current), hope to do the english channel but I've got to get better with the cold and then a lot more training to do Bass Strait, though aiming to do within the next 10 years.

Soooooooo, I currently have Rhabdo, when I got in on Saturday night My peak level that night was 37143 and my doctor said that since my symptoms had been reducing they were probably in the low 40K's. Currently sitting at about 25K doing another blood test this Wednesday.

I had a pretty tough workout, I weigh about 86KG on Wednesday, really hot day, I was slightly dehydrated, hadn't done a pushups or tricep isolated session in over 6 months, did a combination of different pushup techniques fora total of 50 in less then 5 minutes, then went on to a tricep machine where you push back with your elbows with your triceps on plastic pads, very tight machine with heavy resistance, then went on to do body weight dips which i haven't done since I was 10KG lighter, did 5 on the 5th I went to failure and was 80% on my way up to resting position, found the strength to push myself all the way up and then went on to play some volleyball. Before going out I also played tabletennis and for two weeks before Wednesday I had trained different sports and strength almost every single day.

Thursday I had band practice and didn't work out much due to how sore I was after Wednesday but late that night I did do another strength session at night carrying heavy bags uphill for about 25 - 30 minutes.

Friday My body started telling me something was slightly off, my arm hadn't come down from the pump on Wednesday, It was sore to the point where it was minor pain, like a decent 1 to 2 out of 10. I have never before in my life experienced soreness as pain, at most I have felt it as inconvenient discomfort, mostly just mild discomfort. My arm also had severely reduced mobility, I could barely push my arm past a 45 degree angle, whereas on my left I could touch my shoulder nearly with my palm, only being stopped by the underarm and bicep colliding. That's when I called the doctor and suggested that I could potentially have Rhabdo, which is a condition I actually learned about from this video. Or rather I knew before that Rhabdo could happen, I just didn't know it was Rhabdo.

Due to my pain tolerance and tolerance for discomfort I haven't experienced any major fatigue, or severe pain or anything that I see people describe, the most uncomfortable thing while i was in hospital was the inconvenience of having the IV attached to my arm.

I did experience some brief weakness in my hands and arms for about a day, but nothing more severe then that. Other then the IV I didn't use any medication or pain relief other then what my body naturally provided.

I feel strange talking about it like this when an athlete like yourself that I admire talked about it like such an extreme experience. It's fascinating to me how different our experiences are. Right now I feel almost 100%, I feel strong and healthy, I have no pain, I've got a decent headache but nothing bad and I'm tired from the stress of being in the hospital and having had little to eat there.

If you see this I'd love to hear more about your experience with recovering from Rhabdo.

Loved your books and now have seen Videos of you for the first time. You are a huge inspiration, mate 😎🙌🏻🤙🏼

This guy is a living legend but be careful man as a doctor i fear for your health. You're most amazing tho!

As a nurse in ITU we have has a few patients with rhabdomyolysis that was auto immune related and there body chemistry was always very unusual and they suffered so badly with uncontrollable muscle pain and fatigue as you said. These patients actually had levels above 20,000 so to hear that your medics haven’t seen higher than 20,000 is just crazy. I will never forget someone who had a rate of 80,000 and she was paralysed and had to endure months and months to of rehab just to learn to walk again.

If he can swim around England he can can swim anywhere

Crushed my calcaneous (heel) bone into five pieces. All the tendons had to find new routes around it so they hurt and yanked on my hamstrings for a year or so. Three years on and I’m still limping… but still running. :)

Hello sweet soul Ross: what I'd like to know: I know you don't complain much but how did you feel when you had these high CK values? I once had rhabdomyolysis in my legs because of a brutal leg-workout with a (at that time) relatively untrained body... Even if I had severe muscle soreness several times in my life, it did not compare to what I experienced with rhabdo. You just mentioned in the video that you were very fatigued, but was it as painful as the high values would suggest? And did your whole body hurt or was it just in specific bodyparts like shoulders/chest/legs?

This year I have been a bit unlucky. I broke my rist, my finger, and my toe all on seperate occasions and all were sport injurys. I never broke something before. This year all the luck I have been having finally caught up with me.

To the absolute limit, and then a little more. You absolute savage 🔥

my worst injurie was when i rode my bicycel home from work late one night and crashed and broke my femur neck, ended up with some extra screws in my leg and daily pains since then😅

Man mr ballen who talks about weird mystery story has a whole story related with what you said about halucinating a boat and it might résolve it

Thank you Ross for sharing youre adventures. Youre positiv attitude and view on swmming and sport as a whole is immensly inspiring........i started swimming regulary this january and it has become my meditation an a way to calm my mind. so my worst swimming injury: One sunday this june i went to the pool and wanted to do a nice short morning swim. So i didn´t pack any water oder food. I proceeded to get into a very peacefull state of mind an didn´t have the urge to stop swimming. i swam for about 3 hours straight without pause and about 8km until i got out of that state and felt a bit tired. when i got out of the pool i was really wobbly on my feet and proceeded to drink 3 cokes, eat a burger, chips, icecream and a lot of biscuits at the poolrestaurant. even it beeing over 30°C outside i was really cold and my pulse was at about 40 beats/min...... when i finally wobbled home it took a 2 hour nap on the couch to get back on my feet and feeling ok again :) lesson learned, always bring something to drink and food :) thanks again Ross for sharing bits of youre lifes story. youre a legend.

So those Doctors confirmed you are a Demigod 🤣

My worst injury i had to ever deal with is almost losing my soul and becoming slowly and surely a psychopat without return, basically losing my mind and soul, myself.
The injuries which are invisible, spiritual matter are the worst because you cannot treat them by physical matter nor drugs, they do not heal the wounds fully and restore your soul from trauma or hearthbreak or envy or jelausy ect...

Those hand and foot water wrinkles and amazing to look at. Bet they werent too pleasant to experience. Just a few from a bath on the finger tips are enough for me!

This is absolutely wild. Just casually picking bits of your tongue off like you've just brushed with Oral-B whitening toothpaste. Can I ask though, What skin care products and body wash did you have to use in order to heal up that nasty chafing?

My back hurts a bit.

With all the respect in the world u are one crazy guy truly inspirational though

Luv you tom your a hero of mine brother

Very inspiring and kind of you to read, like and reply to so many of the comments. You're such a jolly fellow, one of the most jolly I've ever seen. We need more jollyness! Ahoi mate

Very interesting, the veneers are terrible tho 😂