DUTCHMAN AIMS TO BREAK RECORD IN FREEZING BATH
The Telegraph
December 9, 2008

Original Link

A Dutchman who is able to withstand freezing temperatures that would kill most people will submerge himself in icy water for almost two hours in a world record bid.
 
Wim Hof, known as "The Ice Man", has spent the last 20 years testing his talent in the most extreme conditions from scaling mountain tops wearing nothing but a pair of shorts to swimming under sheets of ice in the north pole.

Now he is set to break his own world record by submerging himself in a Plexiglas container filled with ice at temperatures as low as -20 degrees for more than 1 hour 45 minutes.

Mr Hof discovered his unusual talent over 20 years ago during a stroll in the park in his native Holland.

"I had a stroll like this in the park with somebody and I saw the ice and I thought, what would happen if I go in there," reveals the 48-year-old Dutchman.

"I was really attracted to it. I went in, got rid of my clothes. Thirty seconds I was in and a tremendous good feeling when I came out and since then, I repeated it every day."

It was the moment that Mr Hof knew that his body was different somehow: he was able to withstand fatally freezing temperatures.

Mr Hof began a lifelong quest to see just how far his abilities would take him.

In 2000, dressed only in a swimsuit, he dove under the ice at the North Pole and earned a Guinness World Record for the longest amount of time swimming under the ice.

Braving temperatures of minus three degrees in the water the temperature dropped to as low as minus 30 degrees when he exited the water.

"The first big challenge was to swim a distance of 60 metres under an ice-deck of a metre thick beyond the Polar Circle," he recalls.

"My goggles froze and I lost the track and so I went off course a little. I probably did the best record ever - around 80 m.

"I missed the 60 metre hole and must have swam finally the double distance before a diver gripped my almost unconscious body, and drew me back to the 60 metre hole.

"I know I went further but I am happy with the 60 metre record."

In 2002 Mr Hof travelled 100 miles north of the Arctic Circle to run a half-marathon in his bare feet.

In the same year, Mr Hof completed four additional half marathons as he travelled across Europe.

"I completed five half marathons in 2002," he says.

"The first was a the base of Mount Everest at 5,000m, then two in Finland, the Alps at 3,500 m, and here in Holland.

"I can tell you it was cold the floor temperature was minus thirty degrees and the air temperature was as low as minus 15-20 degrees."

In April 2007, Mr Hof returned to mount Everest where he became the first man scale 7,400 metres wearing nothing but shorts.

"I stayed in the area for a few weeks to acclimatise," he said.

"But the walk its self was very quick - only a few hours."

Whilst many scientists around the world find Mr Hof's ability an anomaly, Mr Hof says it is merely a case of mind over matter.

Practising an ancient Himalayan meditation called "Tummo," or Inner Fire, Mr Hof says he can generate his own heat.

Mr Hof now travels the world teaching the technique through his record attempts, lectures and talks.

"As one can solve maths by concentrating do I focus on certain places in my body and generate heat because of it," he says.

"Every body has mind power, I have learned to direct it toward my body and thus influence the cold and heating-system of my metabolism.

"Mind power is like electricity, it is an potential (current) which I have learned to use toward different places in my body, that is the real yoga."

However during a recent world record attempt in New York, Dr. Ken Kamler, author of "Surviving the Extremes," attempted to explain Mr Hof's unusual ability.

Studying him as he sat in a container of ice for one hour 12 minutes Dr Kamler noted: "He's not moving, he's not generating heat, he's not dressed for it, and he's immersed in ice water."

And water will transmit heat 30 times faster than air. It literally sucks the life right out of you. And yet, despite all those negative factors, "Wim Hof was very calm, very comfortable the entire time that he was immersed in that water."

On December 20, Mr Hof will travel to Cologne, Germany, where he will attempt to break the world record he set in New York earlier this year by sitting in a container filled with ice for one hour and 45 minutes.

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NHNE On Extraordinary Human Capabilities