27 May 2011
A Coventry explorer wants to achieve a world first – and two city businesswomen are backing him to do it.
Mark Wood, 44, is a full-time explorer and is planning to be the first person to walk solo to the South Pole and the North Pole back-to-back.
The former Finham Park schoolboy is in the process of raising sponsorship money for the adventure, which he will begin later this year and is set to take six months.
Julie White, managing director of D-Drill (Master Drillers) Ltd, and Lee Thomas managing director, of Aesthetics Events Ltd, have both sponsored Mark in his efforts and they will also join him later this year as he walks to the Base Camp on Everest.
Mark said: “I went straight into the military and following that went into fire and rescue. I undertook a couple of challenges and got a thirst for adventure and it went from there.
“This is going to be my toughest ever challenge – nobody has ever done it before. It’s not about ego but you need to do something that has never been achieved in order to get your message across.
“I can then use that as a platform to help talk on issues such as climate change. A lot of what I do is about education. While I am undertaking a challenge, I very often feedback what I am doing to schools around the world.
“It’s important that children understand what is happening on the planet and I can tell them the things I am seeing live.”
The challenge will see Mark facing some of the earth’s toughest climes – with temperatures dropping down to -60 degrees centigrade.
It means he is risking his life to complete the world-first quest. “It’s a calculated risk,” he said. “I’ve worked in this climate before so I know what I have to do.”
Julie and Lee are also preparing for their own challenge as well as supporting Mark in his own.
Julie said: “We are delighted to be supporting Mark – it’s a great to see a local guy taking on such an amazing international challenge and also educating young people in the process.
“Our challenge is nothing compared to Mark’s but it is still going to be unbelievably tough.
“I’ve been friends with Lee for some time but we’ve never done anything like this before together.
“It should be a fantastic experience and is one we are both very much looking forward to.”
Anyone else who would like to undertake the walk to the Everest Base Camp should log onto www.snowballexpeditions.com
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