What On Earth Possesses You?

By the time you reach this page it is likely that you know what the challenge is – it is to race to the South Pole over 800 kilometres in the world’s harshest environment. We will man-haul 90 kg sledges (pulks) up to 16 hours each day for 45 days. We will be sleep deprived, hungry, cold and tired. We will risk Polar shock and wonder why we are there at all.

It is this question of ‘why’ that has been preoccupying me and what I find myself writing about now.

Last Thursday, after the official press launch of the race, I was interviewed live by BBC News 24 (see: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7500747.stm). The interviewer asked me a question that I’m not sure I really had an answer for: “What on earth possesses you?”

A reasonable question and one which many people have asked me over the years since I’ve been involved in sport. Why get up in the early mornings and go rowing? Why race until you are physically ill in an Ironman? Why run in the heat of the Gobi desert until tears run down your face? Why ascend to Everest base camp at 5,500 metres with your heart thumping and head pounding and then race a marathon?   And now - why enter a race to the South Pole?

My answer at the BBC was about extending my world. It was about stretching my boundaries. Going beyond the safety of my house, to a job, to study and now ten years on I am wondering if my world can be extended to the South Pole. But my explanation did little to answer for me, the interviewer’s question: “What on earth possesses you?”

On reflection however, the day of the BBC interview and official press launch perhaps offers an insight into what this is all about and why these adventures matter to me so much. The official race press launch was in the Ice Bar in London’s Piccadilly at 10:30am on Thursday 10 July. Apart from me, five others in my team were due to attend. Simon O’Donnell (race team-mate) and Ross Whitaker (documentary maker) were coming from Dublin. Noel Hanna (team-mate) was coming from Belfast International Airport and Tim Chrishop (Operations Manager) was flying in from Belfast City Airport.

I was set to travel with my girlfriend, Simone (blog and book editor), from Dublin. However, as I came out of a late meeting and turned on my phone, Simone had left a message for me to say that Dublin Airport was closed due to a broken radar. No flights were landing or taking off. This was a disaster as I felt, in the interests of the overall project, that it was really important to be at the launch to represent our team. With time and options running out we had to move fast.

Simone was already in the airport. I was in the city centre and we had no way of getting to London. Or perhaps more accurately, we could not fly that night and couldn’t be guaranteed to fly out the following day either. But there were other options - it was just they weren’t clear straight away. We simply had to get to London…

By the time I heard the bad news on my voicemail, investigations into those options were already well under way. Simone’s sister Lisa had been put on internet search duty to check alternative airports to leave from – Cork, Shannon, Belfast.  Simone was liaising with the ground staff in Dublin Airport to get us priority on the red-eye the next morning in case that was our only hope (thanks so much to all at BMI and especially Aisling and the ladies who were so understanding despite an airport full of demanding angry people), Simone’s friend Elaine and her baby Robin in London were investigating train and bus options from the ferry port in Holyhead to London and finally, when I was contactable, I was instructed to find out about getting a ferry across the Irish Sea, (at one stage Simone was going to ferry and drive us the 6 hours to London!). Just as I found out we had missed the last ferry, Lisa called and said she had flights ready to book out of Belfast and so the race to get to the London and the press launch was on…

I hopped in a taxi to get my gear, Simone held on in the airport and checked bus options to Belfast and Lisa paid for our Belfast flights online. I arrived at the airport at 11:00pm and we boarded a bus to Belfast, pulling out of Dublin at 11:20pm. The journey should have been 2 hours only and as the second hour passed I dropped off to sleep for a few minutes. I woke with a jolt, feeling like I had shouted out loud and feeling a little strange I checked my watch.  We were 1 hour late and as I tried to work out what was happening, Simone told me that we were stuck outside the gates of a closed bus park after coming off the motorway and that the driver couldn’t turn around until the gates were opened in order to get us back out.

Spirits were starting to slide. An exhausted Simone asked me if I would never speak to her again if we didn’t make the Belfast flight, but the Dublin one the next morning, which we had jettisoned, took off on time! Eventually a security guard appeared and opened the gate and saved me from having to even think about that possible irony and we reached the Belfast terminal falling into a taxi to my Dad’s house for a 90 minute pit stop. Johnny P, my wonderful Dad thought nothing of being woken in the middle of the night and Larry my retired guide dog gave us a stunningly slobbery welcome. Simone was herded in for a quick nap and I used the time to unpack and repack my gear – (a slightly obsessive compulsive feature of any adventure I go on!); a quick shower and a cup of tea and we were off again to Belfast International Airport for a 5:00 am check-in. There we bumped into Noel by chance. A quick call to Tim and it looked like at least four of us were going to make it on time. Ross and Simon had headed out early to Dublin Airport but their un-delayed arrival was not looking likely.

We arrived in Piccadilly at 10:00 am and Tim joined us in a café for a quick coffee before the launch. Simon and Ross weren’t far behind but it sounded like they would miss the bulk of the press…and Simon had our team kit in his bag. After the hassle in the airport I was pretty pleased with the result of our efforts. It seemed somewhat appropriate to have overcome a little hardship by the combined labours of both our formal and informal team on the day the race was launched. Getting to London on time or at all had been an expedition in itself.

The Ice Bar is in the middle of London. It is kept at minus 5 degrees Celsius and the walls and pillars are made from ice. Even the glasses we drank from were made of ice. We were slipped into ponchos with fur hoods and entered the bar which was filled with photographers.  Noel and I sat with the other competitors at one end of the room while Simone and Tim mingled with the photographers and journalists. For the photo call we sat in the middle between James Cracknell, former Olympic Gold Medallist and one of the other competitors in the race. It was all very strange and exciting – I could hear the cameras clicking and I presume the flashes were going off all over the place.

We emerged from the icy chamber to be greeted by Simon and Ross who had just arrived. They had missed the photos inside but there was a lot more to come. Within seconds, Ross was filming and Simon had passed out our team kit – fleeces with our web address www.simplydecide.com all over them. As we pulled on our kit and the journalists and photographers buzzed around, everyone got to work. I suddenly realised that without instructions, without job descriptions, our little team knew what to do and got to it.

While I was doing interviews, the rest of the team were talking to journalists and photographers. As soon as I was finished, Simone had something else for me to do. Tim took on the PR role and was collecting journalists’ details so we could find them again, Simon and Noel were talking to the other competitors and Ross was there recording it all for the documentary. At home, Kevin and the technical team had been working on the website to go live the same day, while Elaine was alerting people about what was going on. In the meantime, we had Jane and others getting the press release out and pushing the media angles. As a result, our story was picked up by BBC News 24 and the Daily Telegraph and Telegraph TV. A live interview on the BBC was just the type of PR that our team needed and thanks for that go to Kate, Treeva and Catherine at BBC News 24.  Everything came together because enough of us pushed enough of the right buttons – which ones worked to produce a cracking launch I’m still not sure, so I hope I haven’t forgotten anyone else who was working for us on that day – thanks to you.

Things slowly came to an end, and as it all calmed down we went for our first team lunch. I loved it. The others were talking about the day and what they had learned, who they had spoken to and planning for the next few months. They were all over it and it was happening - the team was starting to create itself!

It is this - the common purpose - that is the reason for the adventure. The team and the bonds that develop between them are the answer to: “What on earth possesses you?” This is what inspires adventurers to take on the challenge.

Yes, the Antarctic offers the wildest extremes of personal challenge, yet it is the common purpose that explains the reason for going to this icy wasteland. Water, sand, rocks and ice, the challenges can vary, but the common purpose is the driving force that runs through it all…