I first heard mention of Extreme Ironing on a television news report several years ago. This report talked of the “1st Extreme Ironing World Championships” and had a short amateur video of people ironing in extreme conditions. Wikipedia reliably informs me that this would have been in 2002 and the event was won by Great Britain. Perhaps we should add it to that ever-increasing list of sports in which we excel.
It was the video which really caught my eye. Unsurprisingly, the video showed a man ironing. The surprising feature was the outdoor environment, his wetsuit and the fast-flowing stream in which he was doing said ironing. To this day I wonder whether the iron was battery-powered or simply on the end of a very long extension cable.
Battery power made more sense since the location looked to be quite remote. But battery powered irons are rare, if they even exist at all. Batteries that can generate the heat required to successfully iron an item of clothing are very dangerous.
On the other hand, it would have to be a ridiculously long extension cable to provide power in such a place. To my mind, both are unrealistic. Yet the power must have been coming from somewhere. Such that it was, it struck me as yet another of those things for which you cannot find an answer.
A few months ago, I read an article regarding a breakthrough in wireless power: researchers in the USA apparently made a 60 watt bulb glow from a distance of two metres. I won’t bore you with the finer details but it involved the ingredients of an exciting experiment: electromagnetic radiation, resonance and two copper coils. There was even a picture of the experimental setup, complete with glowing light bulb. As I read more, my mind swung back to that Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything: how to power an iron when outdoors.
This breakthrough could be just what is needed to take Extreme-Ironing to another level in terms of popularity. If people could remotely power their irons, then the popularity of Extreme-Ironing would go through the roof! There would be no need to find wire cables of extraordinary length. There would also be no need to plan tournaments around locations with easily accessible plug sockets. With remote power, the possibilities are endless.
As I pondered with ever-increasing amazement, it struck me that the iron itself would still need electrical equipment in it, so the problems of the battery powered solution would still present themselves. Furthermore, unless you wanted to provide wireless power to everyone in a locality, the unit sending the power to the iron would have to be very close by. This unit itself would need an electric cable and against all expectations, wireless power had compounded my problems.
At this stage, I decided that maybe, just maybe, wireless power was not the way forward for Extreme-Ironing. Just as cricket has found its saviour in the Twenty20 format, Extreme-Ironing would have to try ever more radical ways to extend its grasp on the public.
