Four-time Reebok CrossFit Games athlete Khan Porter has completed over 34 kilometers on a ski-erg to raise money for charity.
Porter, who came third in the Pacific Regional this year (and first in 2015), was very excited about the marathon row at this year’s Games, writing on his Instagram,
When @thedavecastro announced the workout I was laughing. I’m not sure exactly why, if it was disbelief or nervous excitement. Either way after thinking about it, day one is the most excited I’ve ever been for a day of competition. Especially this event. Not for how it will feel physically, that’s going to suck so bad, but for the mental test that finishing the day with a marathon row is going to be.
This week he further tested his love marathons with a ski erg marathon of 42.195 kilometers, despite the fact that he’d never skied more than 3 kilometers. The idea was to donate “whatever (his) average 500m pace ended up being” to Australian farmers affected by the devastating drought that’s blighting the Eastern part of the country.
After 15 kilometers he was on pace to break the world record for his age group. At the 34-kilometer mark things started to go south. Here’s how he tells the tale but be warned — scrolling sideways in his post will show you a fair amount of vomit.
The longest I’ve skied before was 3km, so I wasn’t really sure what to expect, initially I wanted to finish in under 3hrs 30min, however 15km in I was on pace to finish in under 3hrs and a few minutes ahead of the world record pace for my age group. I held this pace comfortably for 34km and then suddenly, disaster struck.
With 8km to go I started to feel a little dizzy and my stomach began doing flips.
I threw up. A lot. (See clip 3 😂)
I went back to skiing and barely 500m later threw up again.
This continued, progressively getting worse and worse until I had to sit and ski using just my arms as I was so dizzy from throwing my head up and down with each stroke.
I hadn’t event considered that could potentially happen. (EDIT turns out I think I may have had food poisoning, so it wasn’t the skiing at all… talk about shitty timing!)
I finished the marathon and then spent the rest of the night throwing up and shivering with a fever unlike any I’ve had in years.
I believe resilience needs to be practiced, but last night I blurred the line dangerously close between resilient and ridiculous. I felt like I was drunk, hungover, had food poisoning and vertigo all at once. I haven’t been that sick in years 😂
Not my brightest idea.
However today I’m stoked to be shipping $216 (2:16 average) to drought relief, to help farmers effected by the drought in Aus.
Now to see if I can stomach some food.
[Here’s what a world record looks like: watch 2017 World’s Strongest Man Eddie Hall break the 100-meter record here.]
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bmb5Ki8Bpvv
So things could have gone better for the guy (what a time to be hit by food poisoning) but we commend him for donating to help Australia’s farmers during their time of need. Hope you recover soon, Khan!
Featured image via @iamkhanporter on Instagram.