Last April, Nigel Gower did a million metres in seven days, four hours, 44 minutes and 22 seconds. Neil Rhodes, who'd already done a couple of one million metre rows in just over a week was determined to beat his time. He set off on Monday, October 1st. This is his diary:On day one I started later than anticipated, due to one of the official verifiers being late, so I knew I was going to be behind target on the first day. Start time was 11:18am. I did think about 'catching up' that day, but thought it would be better to play safe and grab some sleep, as this was only the first day. Found it difficult to eat a lot that night. 101,278 metres. Tuesday - 7am start rowing, feeling OK so pushed on relentless at Asda. All was fine until around 5pm when I 'hit the wall', something that I had never done before. It was quite interesting, I could move up and down the slide, but had no energy, pace dropped to 2:24, with the last session 2:37. Incredible aches in gluteals and lower back. I stopped at 20:36, shattered and only having covered 147,973 metres that day. I was so tired, it took me three attempts to lift the erg into the back of my car! Again, I had difficulty eating that night. I felt hungry, but eating made me feel sick. I weighed myself. I had lost five kilograms. Wednesday - 7am start again – Safeway's today - glutes and back aching after the first 40 minutes. Changed my eating arrangements, decided to drop the pace to try and avoid hitting the wall. Better to take a little longer and survive, was my reasoning. Apart from the aches, a good day. 160,980 metres Thursday - 7am start at Sainsbury's. Much the same as yesterday until about 5pm, when the aching back was really becoming a problem. Dropped the pace again and broke my sessions down into smaller chunks of time. Stopped at 21:07, distance covered 151,353 metres Friday - 7am, another day, another supermarket. Ask me where the deals are, I'm an expert now. An ordinary day, just plodding through the metres, trying to hold a steady pace and forget the aches. 156,432m Saturday - 7am start at The Brighton Health & Racquets Club. I was way behind target to reach my goal of six days, so drastic action was required. I knew I couldn't raise the pace, so there was only one other option...STAY ON THE ERG. I took a three minute break every hour, until the club closed, I then moved venue, a quick sandwich and started rowing again. Finish time was 11:35:55 on the Sunday morning. I rowed 281,984 metres in 28.5 hours, to catch up. At the end of the day, my total time was six days 17 minutes 55 seconds. I missed my target of six days, but I can live with that, for the moment. Each time I do this I learn something, it's a monster but it can be tamed. The travelling, lifting, and setting up on my own wasted valuable time and energy, but it was all in a good cause and having done it again, I know I can go faster. I would really like to thank all the verifiers, Godfrey Rowing, High Five and UltraFIT, for all their support and great products. Just in case you read that and thought, pah, dead easy, I could do that, (well, you might. Unlikely I know), Neil has got one final word of warning:Please don't make this sound too easy, it was hard and it would be wrong to send the wrong message to people. It's a huge challenge which needs a huge amount of preparation and could be very damaging for those who do not think about the enormity of such a challenge.