VERY - Day 42 - Antarctica Expedition

Thank God it’s sunny!

It’s VERY cold, VERY windy, VERY gritty snow, VERY treacherous sastrugi, VERY heavy sled, VERY strong inclination, and of course VERY little power – drastically reduced power.

After 9 hours daily of hard daily labor, for 43 days in this harsh environment, with a calorie intake significantly less than my daily calorie needs, my body is no longer responding as it should be – as it did for the first 30 days.

What a lesson to learn, and learn through practice. But better now, then on the last and toughest Pole of my Three Poles Challenge: The North Pole.

I have learnt that one never embarks on a polar expedition with a lean and mean body. It does not matter how fit and strong I am, the very nature of the long winded expedition requires the very opposite – it requires stored energy, or what our body stores as FAT.

Before I embark on my North Pole expedition, I will work with a physician to increase my body fat to above 20%, and I will further complement that with a full stop on training a few weeks before my departure.

Otherwise I will simply not make it up North.

But for now, I must endure another 7 or so days of this, a sure-fire way of never forgetting my lesson – so help me God.

It has become so difficult for me to move forward that I no longer thing about the Pole, not even the day ahead, but only the pulls – one by one – as the minutes and hours grind along.

At every break, and with the end of every pull, I ask myself “Will I make it to the next?”

And sure enough, the day comes to an end, a successful albeit out-of-breath end.

My latest inspiration is the Yak – an animal designed for the harshness of the Himalayas. I now move slowly and steadfastly, like a yak, to conserve energy and increase efficiency.

Previously I would not ski in line with my teammates – my wandering spirit couldn’t handle that – but now I do, constantly staring at the one ahead, listening to the one behind. Like cars of a train, we are a team steamrolling forward, together.

I am so close, yet I feel I am the furthest I’ve been since the beginning of my journey. My energy levels are still unstable, they may drop further and I could stall altogether. If the latter were to happen I would have to call for an evacuation, which would take me back to square one, square one.

My energy levels are so low that I have constantly cold hands and feet, along with superficial yet ever so glaringly pronounced frostbite on my nose… but then again, that might be a blessing as many have told me my nose is too big!

Please keep up your prayers and encouragements, and I promise to literally live up to Bank Audi’s motto “Grow Beyond Your Potential”

Bye for now…

Max