Able to outrun the little known capercaillie (a huge Highland grouse) as well as resist the well known temptations of cake – he says “it’s just weakness entering the body” – we hooked up with world-class mountain runner Henry Blake to design him some mountain running clothes. The result is Bugs.

Murray Smith is prototypical of the emerging brand of athlete that’s unconcerned by traditional sporting boundaries, ripping up the ‘one sport’ model and redefining what’s possible in the process.

Despite just returning from a 355 mile ski-traverse of the Greenland Icecap and remaining open to the idea that his future might lie in big wave surfing, his current focus is on a 200 mile world record kiteboarding attempt between England, Ireland and Wales. While he reveals that later he may enter some contests “to see what it would be like,” right now he’s going out way beyond the current competition structure. As he says, you could probably pull those tricks on a tea tray if you wanted to – something you suspect he has tried. He credits his ‘take the B road not the motorway’ philosophy for his cross-disciplinary interests, and in 2012 he’ll be retracing Scott’s route to the South Pole in its centenary year.

In the meantime more immediate questions arise: Just how radical can his kiteboard look? And will Irish lifeguards really keep their promise to bring him a Guinness out at sea?

Fresh from canoeing through the Amazon, racing Sherpas in Nepal and paddling himself to exhaustion in the Pacific, Ed Donati is back in the UK planning to take up ultra-running, swim across the Lake District and row the Tasman Sea. Luckily we’re here to help him get off his arse and do something with his life. First up, we’re doing a bespoke wetsuit together.

Oh shit. Ed’s forgotten how to wear clothes. Photo © BBC

Will’s just a normal guy…except his muscles can operate without oxygen, he can dive deeper than anyone else on the planet, he’s broken 7 world records, and he hunts all his food underwater with a bow and arrow. We’re teaming up with him to work on a series of epic freediving projects in 2009 – 2010.

Photos by Igor Liberti – who only takes photographs whilst holding his breath. Show-off.