Maria Leijerstam

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Maria Leijerstam during her Antarctic expedition in early 2014

Maria Leijerstam (born June 14, 1978 in Aberdare ) is a Swedish-born , British extreme athlete and adventurer . It operates various outdoor - endurance sports (.. And a running , cycling , canoeing ), partly under extreme climatic conditions. She achieved international fame mainly because she was the first person in history to reach the South Pole on a bicycle on December 27, 2013 .

Live and act

Private life and work

Maria was born in 1978 in Aberdare , Wales . Her parents, Adrianne and Anders Leijerstam, emigrated from Sweden to Great Britain in the early 1970s. In her childhood and youth, Maria played tennis , hockey and netball . After studying mathematics in Plymouth , she worked as a management consultant for Siemens , BAE Systems and Ford of Europe . As part of her professional life, she made many short and long business trips abroad; she also lived in Germany and Sweden for several years before moving back to Wales. There she lives with her partner Wayne Edy, founder and boss of the running shoe manufacturer Inov-8 , in Bonvilston-Llantrithyd in the Vale of Glamorgan near Cardiff . In Cardiff, Maria Leijerstam runs the MultiSport agency for coaching and ( personal ) training for athletes and adventurers. She is also the organizer of the Burn Series multisport adventure race .

Sports

During her time at the University of Plymouth, Leijerstam used the sports activities of the University Officers Training Corps , a junior organization of the British Army . Here she found pleasure in training in nature and became an enthusiastic outdoor athlete. Accompanying her studies and her professional activity she learned over the years various outdoor, water and winter sports, including long-distance running (single and double marathon , ultramarathon ), in particular in the field (u. A. Cross-country running , trail running , orienteering , mountain running ), mountaineering ( 2009 ascent of Mont Blanc ), hiking and trekking , skiing and cross-country skiing , cycling , especially off-road ( mountain bike , cross country ), multisport (including duathlon , triathlon ), canoeing ( canoe marathon , sea ​​kayak , surf ski ) and sailing and off-road - and rally racing .

In many of these sports, Maria Leijerstam also successfully participated in competitions all over the world. Her many successes include top places in the Devizes to Westminster International canoe race (2014), the multisport adventure race Patagonian Expedition Race (2013), the surf-ski race Rhoose Ski Race (2012), the Siberian Black Ice Race , a More than 600 km long cycling race across the frozen Lake Baikal (2012), the triathlon Ironman UK (2010), the Land Rover G4 Challenge car rally (2009), the multi-sport Three Peaks Yacht Race , consisting of sailing, cycling and running (2008), the Turas World Series Adventure Race (2008), and the Marathon des Sables , a stage ultra marathon through the Sahara (2007).

Record ride by bike to the South Pole

  • Routing of the route used by Leijerstam (blue) on the South Pole Traverse (red)

  • Maria Leijerstam on her Polar Cycle

  • Maria Leijerstam at the South Pole

At the end of 2013, Maria Leijerstam went on an Antarctic expedition under the project name White Ice Cycle , during which she rode a bicycle, more precisely a recumbent trike, from the coast of the Antarctic continent to the South Pole. According to the entry in the Guinness Book of Records , Leijerstam is the first person to have reached the Pole by bicycle. She also holds the record for the fastest journey from the edge of the Antarctic mainland to the South Pole with muscle power.

Leijerstam covered the almost 650-kilometer stretch from the Ross Ice Shelf on the edge of the Antarctic mainland to the geographic South Pole in just over 10 days. In the drive, she followed the South Pole Traverse , a runway regularly used by heavy tracked vehicles to deliver fuel, food and other equipment to the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station . This piste leads over a steep ascent through the Transantarctic Mountains , over the 2941  m high Leverett Glacier and finally almost 500 km over the Antarctic plateau. While driving, she had to fight against extreme cold, strong wind, snow drifts on the route and other adversities.

Leijerstam used a trike called the Polar Cycle for their ride . This is a modified model from the British manufacturer Inspired Cycle Engineering (ICE) with roughly profiled, 4.5 inch (114 mm) wide balloon tires and a modified gear shift with particularly short gear ratios. In order to cross snowdrifts, ski runners could be mounted under the front wheels. Leijerstam was only able to choose the short route over the South Pole Traverse because of the trike's ability to cope with steep inclines; On this way it was significantly faster than two male competitors who made a parallel record attempt with conventional two-wheeled bicycles and who used the traditional, flatter but considerably longer route from the Hercules Bay on the edge of the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf .

Web links

Commons : Maria Leijerstam  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b British adventurer Maria Leijerstam achieves world first by cycling to South Pole. The Independent (Online), December 27, 2013, accessed July 8, 2014 .
  2. ↑ a b c The pain and ecstasy of cycling to the South Pole. ITV , January 27, 2014, accessed July 8, 2014 .
  3. ↑ Maria's 30th will be a real adventure; Athlete is primed and ready for a brutal world race . In: South Wales Echo . Cardiff, Wales June 7th, 2008 ( Archived online at The Free Library ).
  4. ↑ a b c d I wouldn't mind going to the moon, says adventurer Maria. WalesOnline, September 14, 2012, accessed July 8, 2014 .
  5. ↑ a b c Graduate profile - Maria Leijerstam. Senior Business Improvement Consultant. (No longer available online.) Plymouth University, formerly the original ; accessed on July 9, 2014 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www5.plymouth.ac.uk  
  6. ^ Maria Leijerstam. Blog. Blogspot , accessed July 8, 2014 .
  7. ↑ a b c White Ice Cycle. Retrieved July 8, 2014 .
  8. ^ A b World record cycle to the South Pole. (No longer available online.) ICE Trikes (Inspired Cycle Engineering), archived from the original on June 26, 2014 ; accessed on July 8, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.icetrikes.co
  9. ↑ Matt Brett: Maria Leijerstam's South Pole trike. road.cc, December 10, 2013, accessed on March 17, 2015 .
  10. ^ A b South Pole cyclist Maria Leijerstam on battling injury. TV report. BBC News , January 9, 2014, accessed July 8, 2014 .
  11. ^ Jill Homer: South Pole cyclist reflects on experience. Half Past Done, February 6, 2014, accessed July 9, 2014 .
personal data
SURNAME Leijerstam, Maria
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British adventurer and extreme athlete
DATE OF BIRTH June 14, 1978
PLACE OF BIRTH Aberdare , Wales , United Kingdom