Portland resident Colin O’Brady recently became the first solo person to cross the continent of Antarctica unaided (no food drops, no resupplies) and unassisted (no dogs, no kites, no propulsion other than himself).

It’s the fourth world record in endurance sports and adventure for O’Brady, who’s a full-time motivational speaker and professional athlete. He’s planning to write a book about his experiences.

Last month, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler proclaimed Dec. 26 -- the day O’Brady completed his 54-day trek across Antarctica -- as “Colin O’Brady Day.” O’Brady will also be featured on an episode of “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel” scheduled to air Feb. 26.

The Oregonian/Oregonlive recently sat down for an interview with our city’s conquering hero. The following interview is slightly edited for length and clarity.

So, how does one get into endurance sports?

I grew up in Southeast Portland, as a swimmer and a soccer player, always just passionate about sports. My dad was an Eagle Scout, so he really embraced the outdoors. We would take the family car and drive out to the trails most weekends, to backpack or ride bikes.

I went on to swim at Yale University. I decided to take a backpack and a surfboard and travel around the world after college, which was an amazing experience other than the fact that about halfway through that trip, I was severely burned in a fire in Thailand.

(The injury occurred when O’Brady was attempting the Thailand party tradition of flaming jump-roping and was tripped by the burning rope. We do not recommend you try this.)

I spent three months in a Thai hospital being told I would never walk again normally. Through that recovery I focused on the goal of one day completing a triathlon. That led me to race my very first triathlon ever, the Chicago triathlon, in 2009. I surprised the heck out of myself when I actually won the race -- and that kind of set me off for the next 10 years or so now of being a professional triathlete and now aiming to set world records in the outdoors.

What did you pack for your Antarctica trip? What did you eat?

One of the things I think people have gotten wrong when they’ve attempted this before is the nutrition. People have run out of food or people have gotten sick, and so I spent a year working with my sponsor, Standard Process, doing hundreds of blood tests, physiology tests, to figure out my exact biochemistry and create a custom food solution that they aptly named the Colin Bar. That’s what I ate predominantly every single day -- coconut oil, nuts, seeds, the nutrient blend I needed specifically for my body in these extreme conditions.

I was consuming about 7,000 calories every single day but I was burning 10,000, so as a result I lost about 20 pounds. I had added about 20 pounds of my body weight before the trip, so when I finished I was back down to about 165 pounds.

What were you craving when you got back?

People were like, ‘Oh it must have been a pizza, it must have been a burger,’ but I craved salad.

*Incredulous look from interviewer*

I know that sounds ridiculous, but I craved something fresh! In Antarctica, it’s a desolate, white landscape, nothing to see out there, and I’m eating this food that’s really packaged and prepared. Being back in Oregon now and seeing green trees or having a salad on my plate, those are the things I craved the most.

So, what’s Antarctica like?

The average temperature was about minus 25 degrees, and of course that was exacerbated by wind. The start is at sea level but the South Pole is at 9,310 feet, and so it was uphill, dragging a 375-pound sled.

Food and fuel were really the predominant stuff in my sled. I didn’t even have an extra pair of underwear, I didn’t have an extra change of clothes. I was out there for Thanksgiving and Christmas, I didn’t have different food for Thanksgiving or a Christmas present to cheer me up.

And you finally completed your journey the day after Christmas. What was it like? What did you see when you finished?

Nothing.

It’s an interesting thing to be setting a world record, and I know now it created this huge media storm, but here I am with an audience of zero, by myself, alone and still seeing endless white. I’m stepping off the shelf of the continent onto the sea ice, so it’s basically frozen ocean beneath my feet, and so other than knowing the distinction based on the mapping, it’s still a blank white canvas landscape that I’m standing on alone. It’s pretty underwhelming in that way.

How does one prepare and plan for a trip like this?

I started dreaming up this project about two and a half years ago, and really spent the last year in earnest planning. My wife, Jenna, and I do this all together. We have a nonprofit that’s about inspiring kids with these projects and developing curriculums with schools. There’s a lot that goes into it, as well as the fundraising, the sponsorship.

I worked with a coach here in Portland, a guy named Mike McCastle, who is incredible, he has four world records himself. He knew a lot about how to get me stronger.

And then there’s the mindset, the mental strength required. Being 54 days alone in this desolate, blank, white landscape where the sun never sets -- it’s 24 hours of daylight every single day in the summer -- certainly tested my mental strength.

For the last seven or eight years, I’ve been doing Vipassana meditations, going to these 10-day silent meditation retreats with no reading, no writing, no eye contact, and that was hugely beneficial. Because it’s 50-, 60 mile-per-hour winds, minus 80 degrees with wind chill, if my tent blows away I could literally die. The stakes are extremely high, so to be able to stay calm, focused and poised was so crucial to my success.

How did you use social media on this trip?

I love the early pioneering explorers -- Shackleton, Amundsen, Sir Edmund Hillary -- but we live in an era now where you can share things in relative real-time. My Instagram account, @colinobrady, was the main way we shared this project. I posted from it every single day. I brought a satellite modem with me. It wasn’t glamorous, it was heavy, it took about 20 minutes to post one image, but it was a way to share in real-time and bring people on this adventure with me.

And I’ve done that with all my projects. When I climbed Mount Everest in 2016, I was the first person to Snapchat from the summit of Mount Everest.

In Antarctica, I had four cameras with me. Of course, the batteries froze so I could only turn the cameras on for 10 or 20 seconds before the batteries would die, so I would hold the batteries inside my jacket against my chest to keep me warm. I also had a satellite phone and a GPS device called a Garmin inReach that would ping a satellite every 10 minutes or so, so people were actually able to live track me.

I guess my main question about your trek through Antarctica is ... Whhhhyyyyy?

My mother really guided me through that process (of recovering from the fire), of steeping me in positivity, goal-setting, the ability to weather these storms in our lives.

What I realized is ... we all have inside of us these reservoirs of untapped potential and can achieve extraordinary things. As I’ve gone through my career, it’s my way of spreading a ripple effect of positivity in the world, to inspire others to do extraordinary things.

Source : https://www.oregonlive.com/news/2019/02/portland-adventurer-colin-obrady-on-his-record-setting-antarctica-trek-video.html