Diving into a -1 degree sea in the North of Norway to complete the Ice Mile was Marion Joffle’s crazy challenge, without a wetsuit, just with a swimsuit. The young Lexovienne covered 1550m before getting out of the water, just 59m from the finish line. Story of an adventure that will not leave you cold.
His reddened eyes reflect all his emotion and fatigue at the time of his live Facebook with his loyal subscribers. In a few minutes, the « smiling penguin » as she calls herself lets out a mixture of pride and frustration at the exit of this extreme challenge: the Ice Mile in the Arctic, 1609 meters in icy water.
Just seeing this place makes you shiver. Welcome to the north of Norway, on the island of Spitsbergen. Longyearbyen is quite simply the northernmost village in the world! Here, 2,000 inhabitants coexist with wild reindeer, people travel there by snowmobile or pulled by dogs. A small paradise of nature for its inhabitants. As far as the eye can see, frozen mountains swept by the arctic winds. In winter, temperatures drop to minus 30 degrees.. At the moment, it’s rather « soft » with -11 (-17 degrees felt with the wind…).
This is where Norman swimmer Marion Joffle wanted to jump into the water. She, used to cold waters, even the specialist, multi-medal winner last February for the ice water swimming world championships. In Poland, the water was 3 degrees. In Norway, the thermometer drops a little more: 0 or even -1 degree in water. A small difference with big consequences, because the body gets tired much faster.
Ice water is like a kind of vampire that sucks your heat away very quickly.
Dr Alexandre Fuzeau, general practitioner and ice water swimming champion
To fight against hypothermia, you need a lot of training but also innate skills. Marion is a little piece of a woman, « not big enough, but very brave » said of her Alexandre Fuzeau, another Norman champion of the discipline, general practitioner in the Eure. « You need fat to face the cold. Ice cold water is a kind of vampire that sucks your heat very quickly. »
Fat, the Norman did not really have any to spare after being affected by a bacterial infection in the stomach a few weeks ago, as she testified before leaving for Norway. « It caused me kidney failure so I didn’t eat anything. The recovery was difficult because I had lost a lot of weight. First of all the fat mass that I need to swim in cold water and above all muscle. »
She gradually returned to her ideal weight, while offering longer and longer passages in cold water.
« The toughest challenge of my life is coming and I’m ready to give it my all »she announced three hours before the big dive: 8 laps of 200 meters in the port. « The mind will be the most important and I’m ready to give it my all. » It was snowing heavily then…
Swimming in such an idyllic place is amazing
Marion Joffleextreme swimmer
The first kilometer is going very well. « I was happy to be in the water, moreover I smiled all the time. It proves that I love ice swimming. » Except that little by little the cold penetrated her more and more. « Failure is common at this temperature »testifies his counterpart of the Eure. « For me, 40 minutes is a bit the maximum I can do. From 20-25 minutes, everything accelerates… With hypothermia, you become obsessed, we no longer think very well. The limbs work in slow motion, and there is a risk of drowning. The ice mile is extreme both mentally and physically, you reach the limits of human physiology. »
With hypothermia, we become obsessed, we no longer think very well. The limbs work in slow motion, and there is a risk of drowning.
Alexandre Fuzeau
Finally, Marion Joffle stops after 1550 meters… « Only » 59 meters from her goal. « The last 600 meters are harder than the first 1000 so the cooling is intense and fast. What she has done is already an achievement. If her team stopped her so close to the goal, it is because she was already in severe hypothermia, at 30-33 degrees (body heat).You must at least of them hours after that to find a lower temperature. »
Annabel Médard remains for the moment the only Frenchwoman to have completed an Ice Mile Zero, it was in the Netherlands, on February 13, 2021 in a lake at 0.76 degrees.
Time to warm up, Marion then reconnected to the world by showing all her emotion on social networks in a touching video. « I didn’t succeed, but I’m very close. It’s really a victory over myself, it’s incredible, I didn’t expect to do so much in such extreme conditions. »
Regrets ? Surely a little, but the sobs are already giving way to the desire to go back. « There will be other events and I will succeed! The magic of the event, to be able to swim in such an idyllic place, it’s incredible. I will try the experience again with great joy. Now it’s time to rest. »
A quite relative rest because the day after his tremendous challenge, the young woman from Lisieux offered herself a dog sled outing… « Live your dreams, live your adventures, because what I’m going through when I’m only 23 is just incredible. There’s still a lot to live for, now I will focus on crossing the English Channel. » It will then be a completely different type of challenge, in less icy water, but for a much longer effort!