Daily Deep March 17

On March 13, 2010 Ray Zahab and Kevin Vallely made it!They had run and trekked across the frozen Lake Baikal in Siberia in record time traversing the 640km frozen surface of the oldest, deepest lake in the world in 13 days 16 hours, bettering the previous mark by over a week. Lake Baikal is a UNESCO World Heritage Site that holds more fresh water than three of the largest North American, Great Lakes combined. Ray and Kevin ran to raise awareness of the worldwide scarcity of clean water and inspire young people to push beyond their perceived limitations.  “We contoured our way...

On January 7, 2009, Canadian ultra-runner Ray Zahab, legendary arctic explorer Richard Weber (more than 60 completed Arctic, North and South Pole expeditions), and elite adventurer Kevin Vallely reached the South Pole, unsupported. Ray Zahab traveled the whole distance on foot in moon boots; his teammates accompanied him on skies. The team set a new record of 33 days, 23 hours and 55 minutes, breaking the previous record (39 days, 7 hours and 49 minutes) set by American Todd Carmichael on December 21, 2008! Todd also did it solo, unsupported, on skis until he ditched them on day 9 because of...

In 2007 three men ran 72 kilometers a day across the Sahara for 111 consecutive days. “When I decided to run across the Sahara Desert with Ray Zahab and Kevin Lin, I knew it would be a life changing expedition. But I could never have known that, in many ways, my life would be defined by this run and the film about the journey,” says expedition leader Charlie Engle. While running more than 4,500 miles across Africa was a difficult physical challenge, we were buoyed daily by enlightening encounters that opened our eyes to the people and the culture of...