It was early August last summer, I was still riding high from finishing the 3 peaks in impressive time with a great group of guys and little sign of a struggle. Gliding on this wave of confidence I started looking for my next adventure. So in the mindset of David after defeating Goliath, I googled ‘the 10 hardest endurance races in the world’. Isn’t youthful optimism a beautiful thing! I scrolled past the array of ultras and transcontinental follies until I saw a sight for an islanders sore eyes. A boat. Nestled amongst the week long Saharan marathons and 1,000 mile dog sledding races through the tundra, in an article on the Huffington Post, a well regarded source of fake news, I found The Yukon River Quest, affectionately known as the Race to the Midnight Sun. After very little research, not a very good argument for going and convinced that this was just more fake news - there must be challenges harder than this! - I asked a few select friends with the desirable qualities needed for the adventure (physicality, mental toughness and a susceptibility to peer pressure) to join me on a 740km paddle through the wilderness of Northern Canada. Quite surprisingly I received a wave of enthusiasm and ended up with one person (delete as appropriate) brave/stupid enough to come with me. Enter Ed Allen, the man big enough to return an Ikea chair to every individual part just by sitting on it, and whose timekeeping is truly legendary. Having already spent many hours rowing together in Exeter I am hopeful that our friendship won’t be tested to the point of me having to take on another mountain, but an even greater part of me is hoping that he doesn’t miss the flight in the first place! I’m confident that it can’t be as bad as it sounds (can it!?), especially with Goliath in the back of the boat to power me along. So here I am 8 months later, with muscles I haven’t ever seen before and a bank balance I hoped to have waved goodbye to the moment I stopped being a student, 8 weeks away from taking on the world’s longest kayak race... Wish us luck!