On January 25, Kathy Braegger ’92 and four other tired but happy women arrived on skis and snowshoes at the South Pole, joining the ranks of a handful of women to have reached both the North and South poles.

For Braegger, the expedition was as much for the dozens of school children tracking her progress as it was for herself. Inspired by classroom visits from Braegger before the quest began, students from second to eighth grade closely followed the team (dubbed the Polar Opposites) by reading her daily blog updates and posting encouragement and questions.  

“My 6th period class is completely enthralled with your journey,” one teacher writes. “Every day they run in and ask if there is an update. They are trying to track your coordinates and figure out where you will end up.”

This is just the type of reaction Braegger hopes for, and it isn’t the first time she’s been the topic of classroom excitement. In 2001, students tracked her every ski-stroke as she and 11 others became the first all-women team to reach the North Pole from the Russian side. Classes across the United States and Canada kept up with the team through satellite phone calls directly to classrooms, a live webcast from the pole with NASA scientists and a broadcast from the pole on TV’s Good Morning America.

Braegger has spent her life adventuring outdoors. A native of Idaho, she began skiing at the age of two and took part in a variety of sports growing up. As a student at USU, Braegger spent much of her time rock climbing and skiing in northern Utah’s canyons. Later, she climbed a 20,000-foot peak in Nepal, and three 20,000-foot volcanoes in Ecuador. In between her two trips to the Earth’s poles, she made a three-week ski trip around the southern end of Ellesmere Island, the northernmost part of Canada.

At first, Braegger’s adventures were inspired by a desire to “do what [she] saw in National Geographic.” She wanted to see the world for herself, rather than just reading about it. Over time, however, her motivation has expanded.

“I still want to see and touch things that are so remote that they’ve never been seen or touched by human hands, but I also want to inspire kids and show them they can do whatever they want to do,” she says.

Braegger, who works as a senior product manager for Qualcomm, a San Diego-based wireless company, tries to challenge herself more with each new expedition. Her South Pole trek was twice as hard as the trip to the North Pole, though the distances the women traveled were equal.

The South Pole is 10,000 feet above sea level, but the thinning of the ozone layer over Antarctica causes a reduction in oxygen, making it feel like 12,000 feet. Also, temperatures are lower at the South Pole, and often hovered near minus 30 degrees F during the Polar Opposites’ time there. Add frequent high-speed winds to the picture and you’ve got an environment to challenge anybody.

Braegger and her teammates work hard to prepare themselves for such a brutal environment. They begin muscular and cardiovascular training at least six months before an expedition. Carrying heavy packs and sleds up to 10 miles every day through thin air takes strong legs and lungs. The human body spends a lot of energy simply staying warm in such conditions and the women burned 5,000 to 6,000 calories a day in Antarctica, each losing 15 pounds by the end of the trek.

Just as important as physical stamina, however, is mental stamina, Braegger says. Spending weeks in temperatures of minus 30, buffeted by winds, surrounded by endless miles of ice can take a toll on a person’s mind. Perhaps most difficult, she says, is the feeling of complete isolation, and knowing it might take a few days for help to arrive if there were an emergency.

“I don’t think you could ever match the exhilaration of a ski plane dropping you in the middle of nowhere. To watch the plane fly away and know that you are truly on your own is humbling and frightening at the same time,” says the January 20 entry of Braegger’s blog. “We’re constantly conscious of our gear and ourselves to keep from making mistakes. When you’re this remote, the smallest mistake can turn disastrous.”
Braegger wants to continue challenging herself physically and mentally. Within the next few years she plans to ski across the icecaps of Greenland.

The trip will take her four times as far as her South Pole trip through similar brutal weather conditions, continuing her tradition of raising the difficulty level with each new adventure. And just as before, she wants to make her trek about more than just herself: she hopes to use it to raise awareness of global warming and plans to again involve students. Even with such noble goals, Braegger is also still driven by an explorer’s need to experience and discover.

“I’m not satisfied with just seeing a picture of something. I want to take a picture of it myself,” she says. “If space travel is affordable in my lifetime, you’ll probably see me on the moon.” —Devin Felix ’07