MORE PRAISE FOR THE IMPOSSIBLE FIRST
“Thrilling. Moving. Astonishing. The Impossible First takes you past the limits of what’s possible, revealing the inner potential in all of us. Colin shows us that greatness isn’t about the achievements of life, it’s about how you get there and with who. This isn’t simply an adventure story, it’s a story about the human experience.”
—Lewis Howes, author of The School of Greatness
“The body-breaking physical trials Colin endured and his mind-expanding, spiritual experiences are described here in an epic tale of adventure and discovery.”
—Paul Simon, Grammy Award–winning songwriter
“Colin O’Brady’s world-first accomplishment in solo crossing Antarctica is a triumph of lasting importance, and The Impossible First, his narrative of how it all unfolded, is an adventure classic…. Colin’s voice and vulnerability are bound to spark a connection in anyone who picks up this phenomenal book.”
—Aron Ralston, author of Between a Rock and a Hard Place
“As an entrepreneur and mother, I am so inspired by Colin’s story. His strength, fortitude, and perseverance are a lesson not just for adventure-seekers but for everyone. This is a page-turning story about the resilience of the human spirit, relevant to anyone with big goals and dreams.”
—Sara Blakely, founder and CEO of SPANX
“The Impossible First challenged me to rethink everything about my life and work. Like millions of others, I watched from afar as Colin attempted his crossing, reading the reports he filed and staring with wonder at the photos he posted. But until now, I only knew bits and pieces of what actually occurred. Somehow, I finished this book feeling even more in awe. In describing Colin’s achievements, words like ‘epic’ and ‘incredible’ seem too small.”
—Chris Guillebeau, author of The Art of Non-Conformity and The Happiness of Pursuit
“Colin’s story of organization, determination, and focus is a page-turner and an inspiration to adventurers, entrepreneurs, and leaders regardless of their field.”
—Tim Boyle, president and CEO of Columbia Sportswear
“Captivating as hell… Colin’s resilience and ability to constantly problem solve and persevere, despite the doubts and fears, are inspiring…. I know I’ll turn to this book when I need a reminder that nothing is impossible when you’ve cultivated the mindset of a champion.”
—Jesse Itzler, author of Living with a SEAL
“Looking for a true story that inspires you to your very core? Look no further. The Impossible First is a riveting journey for the ages. Colin will help you understand how far humans can go and will inspire you and those around you!”
—Joe De Sena, founder and CEO of Spartan
“In his quest to be the first to complete an unassisted solo crossing of Antarctica, O’Brady showed himself to be a brilliant student of extracting more from himself. Read this riveting account for its exciting scenes of obstacles surmounted, but also because it will inspire you with what’s possible if you just get the little things right.”
—Dave Asprey, author of Super Human
“Colin inspires the sh!@ out of me…. [He] continues to show that there’s virtually no limit to what humans can achieve when they have a will that can’t be broken. He’s a model—both for his staggering accomplishments and his drive to motivate others.”
—Tom Bilyeu, CEO of Impact Theory
“The epic journey that Colin has embraced shows all of us that nothing is beyond our reach so long as we keep a positive voice in our heads telling us, ‘I can do this, I am strong, I am capable.’… Colin once said, ‘Achievement is not for the select few. We all have a reservoir of untapped potential waiting to be released,’ and Colin’s will never be drained. This book shows how deep it truly is.”
—Greg Norman, formerly the world’s #1 ranked golfer
“Colin’s story and his fifty-four-day, record-setting trek across Antarctica show that great triumphs often spring from personal challenges. Definitely recommended as morning reading to feel inspired and take on your own impossible firsts.”
—Hal Elrod, author of The Miracle Morning
“Manifesting the life you want… that’s the true adventure Colin takes us on. Through his epic tale of solo crossing Antarctica, as well as other ‘firsts,’ O’Brady will inspire you to show up every day, push the edge of possible, and above all have fun.”
—Dierks Bentley, #1 bestselling singer and songwriter
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For Jenna B
The love of my life
The keeper of my memories
Impossible is just an opinion.
—Paulo Coelho
Author’s Note
This is a work of nonfiction. To write this book, I relied on journals that I began in childhood, voice and video recordings as well as photographs that I took in Antarctica and on my previous expeditions, conversations with individuals who played a role in my journey and life beyond it, personal memories, and researched facts.
No names have been changed and there are no composite characters. Others may remember details or events slightly differently. Any misinterpretations or errors are my own.
Although I’m American and typically note temperature in Fahrenheit, all temperatures in this book are recorded in Celsius since that is how weather forecasts were shared with me via the international weather report. Keep in mind, at forty below zero Fahrenheit and Celsius meet and are equal to each other. During my journey I tracked progress in both nautical miles and statute miles, but in this book I report my progress solely in statute miles for ease and consistency.
Prologue
I started thinking about my hands.
That was my first mistake.
After forty-eight days and more than 760 miles alone across Antarctica, the daily ache of my hands—cracked with cold, gripping my ski poles twelve hours a day—had become like a drumbeat, forming the rhythm of my existence. And that night the ache got to me. As I pulled my sled into a blizzard of cold and white—my jacket thermometer read thirty below Celsius, with blasting gusts of wind that made the windchill at least fifty below—I started picturing how intensely pleasurable it would feel to get out of my mittens.
I saw myself securely inside my tent, massaging life back into the sore, stiff, cold-battered knuckles, holding them close to the hissing flame of my stove, pressing them up against the little aluminum pot as it began to warm and melt the snow for my drinking water and dinner.
At about 8 p.m., with the twenty-four-hour sun just a pale yellow dot overhead through the thick clouds and blowing snow, I stopped to make camp. I unhitched from the harness that connected me to the sled, unzipped the cover, and fished out my tent.
Then I paused for a moment, hunched over in the cold, looking down at the tent in my hands. I’d made camp in storms and sun and wind, and always done it the same way, through muscle memory forged by repetition—anchoring one end of the tent to the sled, then driving anchors into the ice at the opposite end and around the perimeter. It was the most secure way.
But that night, in my fatigue, and with the cold ache of my hands crying for relief, I decided that a simple stake into the ice would be good enough rather than securing it to the sled. It was much faster. It would be fine, I told
myself.
I rushed it.
That was my second mistake.
I drove in the stake, unrolled the tent flat, and walked back around to the far end. I knelt down on the ice and pushed the spring-loaded tent poles into their little metal grommets, popping the tent up. The next step felt utterly routine, too, at first. I inched back and pulled the tent toward me, straightening it out into a point of tension with the first anchor, preparing to put a second stake down into the ice.
Then it happened. At exactly the wrong moment, before my second anchor was secure, a monstrous gust came straight at me over the top of the sled, as though it had been taking aim from the farthest reaches of the continent. Between my yanking on the fabric and the sudden blast of wind, the first anchor I’d planted on the tent’s other side lost its grip in the ice.
In the next instant, I saw the far side of the tent rise up, now unsecured and disconnected. The horror of the scene flooded through my body as though I’d stuck my finger in an electric socket, but it almost seemed like slow motion, too—as the tent, with each new inch off the ice, caught more and more of the oncoming wind from beneath.
And because I’d just pushed the tent poles into place, popping up the semicircle spine of the frame, there was more surface area to catch the wind. So as the tent rose it caught greater and greater force, like a kite or a sail. In a split second, I lunged forward and barely grabbed the edge of the tent, making me the tent’s sole attachment to the planet.
What could happen next played out before my eyes like a waking nightmare: I lose my grip. The tent rises, I leap desperately for it but can’t catch it, and I stumble and fall. The tent disappears almost immediately into the white. I get up and run for it into the storm… and then… and then… I am lost. The tent is gone. I turn back and see nothing but the full whiteout of the storm. I have nothing to guide me back to the sled and no hope of surviving the night.
The horrible vision kept playing out as I held on desperately.
I had no backup tent. No rescue party could ever make it through a storm like this, with zero visibility and rugged, uneven terrain that would prevent a plane from landing. I’d grow sleepy, then increasingly irrational, and finally I’d just lie down, thinking that the ice was a nice place to rest. I’d die alone, in the cold, my body temperature falling.
It wasn’t the fear of death that really got to me—it was the realization that I’d never make it home. I’d never get back to Portland, never walk along the Willamette River holding hands with my wife, Jenna, never laugh around another campfire at the Oregon Coast with my parents and the rest of my family, never again smell the deep, peaceful aroma of a damp, bark-lined forest trail in the Cascade Mountains.
My hands were now everything. They gripped the edge of the tent as my airborne home yanked and jerked over my head. I knew that everything depended on what happened in the next few seconds—on how long I could hold on, and what I did or didn’t do.
I knew I had to flatten out the tent somehow so that it wasn’t catching so much wind. But the only way I could think to do that—pulling it down and crawling on top of it to hold it with my weight—might snap the tent poles. That would create a different crisis. Aiming to save a bit of weight on the sled, I’d left my spare poles behind on a brilliant sunny morning that now felt like a lifetime ago.
As the wind blasted into my face, the cold deepening with every second, my panic increasing, I relived that sunny, long-ago moment of choice. I could feel those poles in my hand, see myself digging a hole in the snow and burying them along with other supplies and tools for later retrieval. All that equipment had seemed so heavy and so dispensable.
Maybe, I thought, that was actually my first mistake—the place where the great chain of error really began. Such a tiny thing, it seemed: tent poles. A few ounces saved, another mistake, and I was living the consequences.
Choices and consequences. Everything in the universe was simplified into those giant words. Overhead, my small tent seemed suddenly huge, a fluttering, flapping red monster, bigger and harder to hold with every passing second. And my cramping hands were starting to lose their grip.
CHAPTER ONE The Captain
PRE-EXPEDITION
The Russian-built Ilyushin cargo plane that rumbled and rolled over Drake Passage toward the Antarctic ice had all the comforts you’d expect from its hard and pragmatic Russian design, which meant essentially no comforts at all. It was built to withstand the worst weather you could throw at it, land and take off on runways of pure ice or war-zone rubble, and deliver cargo where few other planes could go. It smelled like damp canvas, machine oil, and old sweat, perhaps with a hint of spilled vodka for good measure, and it was utterly beloved, or so said our pilot, a weathered, wiry Russian in his fifties who’d wrestled with the Ilyushin’s cockpit controls over the ice for thousands of hours. This plane was a tank that would save you when other planes would fail and falter, he told us as we boarded, giving the fuselage a loving pat. That it was the only way to get to Union Glacier’s windswept ice runway and base camp—and the starting point for just about anybody heading into the continent’s interior—was also totally in keeping with the plane’s lack of frills. “Take it or leave it” might as well have been written on the side.
On this morning in late October 2018, there were only a handful of paying passengers amid the jammed-together jumble of boxes, tents, generators, and mysterious crates being shipped south for the start of the summer expedition season. I was one of them, strapped onto an ancient, rock-hard Ilyushin bench seat, with the plane’s big steel ribs arcing overhead. Strapped in next to me and sharing the same bench for this four-hour flight was perhaps the most intimidating man I’d ever met: Captain Louis Rudd.
Rudd was forty-nine and British, wrapped in a cloak of vaguely scruffy steeliness and BBC English. He sat firmly erect on his half of the bench and looked across at me with piercing hazel eyes. He spoke like a commander, in the crisp declarative sentences of the British military that had shaped and sharpened him for more than three decades. We were each headed to base camp to await further air transport out onto the Antarctic ice for the formal beginning of a historic race to try to become the first to cross the continent alone, unsupported, and unassisted. In planning our course, each of us had chosen different routes. But our paths, though neither of us could fully see it then, would become intertwined.
“Henry Worsley and I were on one team, doing Amundsen’s route. The other team started from Scott’s hut at McMurdo,” Rudd said, leaning toward me as he described his astonishing Antarctic expedition in 2011, which replicated the great race to the South Pole in 1911 between Roald Amundsen and Robert Falcon Scott. Just the names of such giants, and Rudd’s connection to them, took my breath away: Amundsen. Scott. Worsley. Frank Worsley had captained what was probably the most famous Antarctic ship in history, carrying Ernest Shackleton off into legend on the Endurance in 1914. Henry Worsley, a distant relative, had continued the family Antarctic legacy, with tragic consequences. Rudd had walked in the company of gods.
“It was a brutal expedition, sixty-seven days to the Pole,” Rudd continued, his eyes boring into me. “Severe storms. Henry and I each lost more than four stone. That’s something like sixty pounds to you Yanks. Anyway, we beat the Scott team by nine days, so I guess history repeats itself and the Amundsen route was better,” he said. He finished with a wry smile that looked like he appreciated the irony: The 1911 race had been a national contest between Norway and England, and Amundsen’s Norwegians had won, beating Captain Scott of the British Royal Navy to the South Pole. Scott and his men all perished trying to get home.
I mumbled something like “wow, that’s amazing,” but in truth I couldn’t stop thinking about sixty pounds and sixty-seven days. My mind was suddenly back on Chile’s southernmost windblown tip, in a tiny Airbnb apartment in Punta Arenas, preparing for my transport flight to the ice. Equipment and food bags were spread across every surface, from kitchen countertops to the bed an
d the floor between. The featured fare: oatmeal and protein powder, crunchy dried ramen and freeze-dried dinners. Deserving special attention, though, were wallet-sized protein bars that were piled high like decks of cards. They’d been made by a Wisconsin nutritional supplement company that had taken me into their food science lab and produced a one-of-a-kind calorie bomb they’d dubbed the “Colin Bar.”
The checklists prepared by my wife and business partner, Jenna—the logistical road maps for the expedition—were laid out on a table, and she and I were scurrying from pile to pile, organizing, sorting, and weighing all the things I planned to drag across Antarctica in a sled, so absorbed that we nearly collided once in coming around a corner. In the eleven years of our relationship, she and I had been in more than a few exotic and challenging places, but at that moment the stakes had never felt higher, and we both stopped after our near collision, standing there in front of the refrigerator, arms full, leaning forward for a quick kiss.
We were redistributing everything so that I’d have less.
I’d planned on carrying seventy days of food and fuel, which put the sled well over four hundred pounds, a weight I’d realized I couldn’t pull. So on a tight deadline before the flight south, we’d been stripping out what felt like surplus, reducing my margins. Seventy days of food became sixty-five. Now, on the plane, that number sounded suddenly and frighteningly a lot like sixty-seven, Rudd’s number of days to the Pole on his previous expedition, losing around sixty pounds along the way. I started doing the math in my head. Sixty pounds was almost a third of my weight.
I didn’t know what to say. My stomach was suddenly churning as though the whale-like Ilyushin had hit turbulence. Rudd had replicated Amundsen’s route. He’d known Henry Worsley, whose amazing life and tragic death had so moved and inspired me. Worsley had died in 2016 attempting the very goal that Rudd and I were aiming for—the first ever solo, unsupported, unassisted crossing in history, something that many people after Worsley’s passing had come to call “impossible.” And the thought echoed through my head: Rudd is already ahead of me. He knows everything.
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