The last place you'd probably consider for taking a bicycle ride has been conquered.
The hostess of a children's TV show in England is being touted as the first person to use a bicycle on part of an expedition to the South Pole that ended Saturday.
(I wonder how she would have fared in Seattle's snowstorm/freezing-rain event last week?)
The adventurer, Helen Skelton, 28, also traveled 329 miles by kite ski and 68 miles by cross-country ski to complete the 500-mile journey across Antarctica in 18 days.
The bicycle she pedaled for 103 miles across the frozen continent was a Fortune Hanebrink all-terrain bicycle, manufactured in the US. She rode the pedal model, weighing in at about 40 pounds, instead of the electric-powered vehicle that weighs nearly twice as much.
Skelton was not alone. She was accompanied by Norwegian explorer Niklas Norman. Also, the journey was filmed by the BBC for broadcast on Jan. 23.
She undertook the challenge to raise awareness about Sport Relief Mile, an event in the UK to raise money for people struggling in the UK and around the world.
At the Sport Relief Mile website, she says:
“This has been a massive adventure and at times it felt like it was never going to end. My body hurts in so many different places, mentally I'm exhausted and I’ve only washed once in the last 30 days, so to be finally standing at the pole feels incredible. I’ve seen how Sport Relief money makes a big difference and that's why I can't complain about any part of this because it's nothing compared to what some people go through every day of their lives.”
She spent a couple weeks in training in Antarctica before flying to the starting point with her crew. She survived temperatures that fell to about 50 below zero.
The Fortune Hanebrink bicycle features 8-inch-wide tires to distribute the weight over a wide area. Even so, she wrote on her blog that she had to push the bicycle across extremely powdery snow one afternoon.
The bikes are said to be popular in southern California for beach riding. Road.cc reports that Fortune Hanebrink was founded by Kane Fortune and cyclist and former aerospace engineer Dan Hanebrink. Read more about her bicycle here.
Photo above from Sport Relief Mile.
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