 My doctor, he said Martin, don't do this, don't do this, don't do this, don't swim, you're gonna die I'm different because I found a way. I don't feel any pain anymore My name is Martin Strel, 62 years old, born in Slovenia, and I am a professional marathon swimmer I have five Guinness World Records. I swam the longest rivers on the planet. I have swam the Danube Mississippi, Parana, Yangtze, and Amazon Everybody said, man, you are just nuts, you are crazy. The river will take you He was having infections in his stomach, larvae infection in his brain, hallucination He was peeling off the skin. I thought this is the one for him. No one can survive this Most people understand running a marathon. When you put this to the lab that Martin sets out to do, he says, I'm going to swim now for 60 days. That's 60 of these marathons Some people ask me, well, how he can swim for so long? I don't know how. I still don't know how Water kills people, usually, but not me, not me I'm like half animal, half human Martin is most known for being an overweight athlete I'm a little off, a little sick, a little crazy His whole life was nothing defined by normal, and just doing something that most people cannot even comprehend the thought of being able to do So Michael Phelps, what's different between me? Michael Phelps is not a marathon swimmer He is much faster than I am, sure. He is very successful in the swimming pools I'm successful in swimming the rivers. He's not ready, sure, for the Amazon because he's too skinny When I swim, I'm losing 600-700 calories per hour My body is like a Mercedes, BMW, good Martin does not resemble an elite runner or an elite cyclist in their lean factor So for Martin to be able to swim at that kind of range is really extraordinary With Martin, I really am just baffled When my body is in trouble, I swim I have excellent memories of my childhood, this beginning But father was too much violent many times and because fighting with me came home Very smart in, he's here, oh, he's trying to catch me Where to go? I jump in the water He was running around, he said, come back, no, no, no, no I was under the water, sometimes more than two minutes The water became like part of my life, very good friend for my safety I wasn't so confident at the beginning, very, very afraid I didn't sleep, my pulse was very high, even on the Amazon Swimming the Amazon, most people would have just difficulties staying afloat There's no way anyone could survive two months in this river On the Amazon was a terrible moment, attacked by piranhas You're back, you feel fire, they eat so fast, they open my back And I go with fire, my back, piranhas It is still the longest swim in the history He had a lot of issues, the Mississippi River He dropped 55 pounds in two months, he was just losing so much weight So we even worried that he must be getting sick or something I swam one of the most polluted rivers on the planet Bodges, pollution, everything I was touching by lightning, it was unconscious one minute Pushed me out of the water, I was flying like a plane We literally thought he was a dead man These guys go, Martin died I stop for a couple of minutes and then go, Martin Like nothing happened, you know, we're like, I guess he's alive He's fearless, he's not afraid of death He's one of the people, I'm either gonna do it or die trying Most of the people simply don't understand how you can swim like 12 or more hours per day When I swim, it is impossible to think about the stroke under the water I even count this, one, two, three, four, five 100 in the beginning, that was terrible It was lots of pain swimming hours and hours in the oceans, lakes, rivers Many times I said by myself, it's simply too hard You have tears in eye, you don't know how to move this What to do, what to do, but you have to swim You have to finish this It was hard to swim And then on the Danube, it happened, I found a way It's hard for me to explain what is meditation or hypnotization Here is something that helps me a lot, that happened while I was swimming My concentration is very, very deep, like meditation And then when it's done, I don't feel any pain anymore Can somebody explain it to me, something where some physician, scientist could say This is not possible, sure, for him it's not possible, but it's possible for me I think that everything is here in your brain, here I am still strong, sure, I can swim more I would like to swim Grand Canyon And another target is swimming around the planet Because today's world is not good, we are not on the right way I swim for peace, friendship and clean waters especially I am just a simple man And I can change still this world