Iron Man: Every day for 10 days, he swims 2.4 miles, cycles 116 and runs a marathon

EVERY day for the last seven days Mullingar man Gerry Duffy has spent up to 14 hours swimming 2.4 miles, cycling 116 and finishing with a marathon run of 26.2 miles.

Gerry Duffy, 43, and his fellow competitors in the Enduroman Ultra Triathlon Championships, will continue with the herculean daily physical challenge until the event ends on Sunday.

Of the initial 20 entrants, just a handful remain in the competition which is being held in the New Forest, Avon Tyrell in the south of England.

“My sole objective every day is to be one of the lucky ones that’s at the start line the next morning at 6am,” says the former 50-a-day smoker, who previously completed 32 marathons in 32 days. “To finish a race like this you need to be extremely fit and tough, both physically and mentally. This is a test on training the mind to prepare one-self for such a hard race.”

After successfully completing the 32 marathons last summer Gerry found himself spending last winter looking for a new challenge. He wanted to find something shorter but even harder.

After much research he found the very unique event of the DECA Ironman challenge (10 Ironman distance triathlons in 10 days). When he first encountered the event, he thought the distances involved were a misprint.

Training involved immense physical training building on the fitness he had built up last summer for his 32 marathons in 32 days. To put it simply he had to add a gradual 10% increase per week in his training volume and time commitment.

He found the biggest mental challenge came in the 90-minute swimming sessions which he had to carry out in a 20m pool.

Cycle training consisted of six-nine hour sessions, some days putting 150 miles on the clock.

Running was never challenging for Gerry. With 262 miles on foot, that is the equivalent of running from Belfast to just north of Co Kerry.

For all the pain he has gone through Gerry Duffy is looking for people to donate a euro a day or more (€10 for the 10 days) for Irish Autism Action.

The Westmeath man has currently raised almost €1,800 online through mycharity.ie for Irish Autism Action and hopes to raise €5,000.