A POOLE soldier who lost both legs in a bomb blast in Iraq is to compete in a 3,000 mile rowing race across the Atlantic.

Lieutenant Neil Heritage, from Hamworthy, will spend up to 70 days at sea with five crew members when he departs from the Canary Islands in December. All the rowers in the team have served in the armed forces.

A husband and wife crew, a seniors’ team and an all female group will also be competing in the 2011 Talisker Whisky Atlantic Challenge, which follows the so-called Columbus Route west-bound across the mid-Atlantic.

Competitors are expected to arrive in Barbados from mid-January onwards.

Lt Heritage, 31, who now works as an athletic coach, was in Iraq working for a Royal Signals bomb disposal team in November 2004 when he lost both legs above the knee in a suicide bomb attack.

His then-wife Claire was six weeks pregnant with their second child.

Lt Heritage will compete in the race without prosthetic limbs and will rely solely on his upper-body strength to help him through the race.

Fellow crew member lieutenant Will Dixon, 27, from Gloucestershire, had his left leg amputated in a field hospital after he was caught up in a blast involving an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan in 2009. He was halfway through a six-month tour with 3 Rifles.

The six-man team comprises four soldiers who were injured in Iraq and Aghanistan.

The men will be raising money for Row2Recovery, a charity supporting servicemen and women wounded in action. They will row in two-hour shifts and will eat and sleep on a mattress in one of two small cabins on board.

Although the men hope to finish the race within 60 days, they will carry 70 days worth of food. Dehydrated packaged meals such as apple and custard will help to replenish their expected 8,000 calorie daily loss. Each crew member could lose up to two stone on the trip.