Back the Road to the Pole
Five years. Six expeditions. The full solo unsupported ski to the South Pole from Berkner Island, around 1,400 kilometres, which no South African has ever done, documented in public from the first training day to the Pole. This is a platform to build a brand around, not a logo on a jacket for one event.
No South African has ever done this.
In 2030 I am attempting the full solo unsupported ski to the South Pole, from Berkner Island. Around 1,400 kilometres from the coast, alone, hauling everything.
The name on this story is still open.
Start the conversation
Sponsors rent a moment.
Partners own a story.
A five year platform, not a three week banner
Most sponsorship is renting space on someone's shirt for one event. You pay, you get seen for a weekend, it's gone. This is the other thing. A five year story with a real destination, filmed and documented the whole way, from the first training day to the Pole. Come on now and you are not renting a moment. You own a piece of the story, and the audience that grows with it.
The cheapest this will ever be
is before it happens.
The road
A polar primer in Svalbard. Where it started.
Twelve days on the ice in Svalbard. The first real stretch.
Greenland. 553km, 29 days, unsupported, as a team. The first big crossing, and the one that proved it was possible.
Finnmarksvidda, solo. The first time out alone.
Iceland, solo. North to south through the winter highlands. Storm country, and a year closer to the Pole.
Antarctica. Onto the continent, a year before the Pole.
The South Pole. Solo, unsupported and unassisted. The one everything is for.
Greenland again, together. The homecoming.
Every one of these is a chapter a partner's name travels with.
The coverage scales with the record
Here is the part that matters for timing. This gets bigger every year. Harder expeditions, a larger audience, and the biggest South African polar story of them all waiting at the end of it. A solo, unsupported South African at the Pole has never happened. I am 50 now. I will be 54 when I ski into the Pole. When that lands, it makes national news, and the price of standing next to it goes up. The brands who move now grow into the biggest moments for the least. The ones who wait pay more for less.
Records make headlines.
These headlines don't have a logo on them yet.
What a partner gets
Your brand on the ice, in the films, in the photography, and in the writing that follows every expedition.
Original film and story material from real expeditions, yours to use across your own channels.
Your name tied to endurance, honesty, and doing hard things properly, in front of an audience that follows the whole road.
I also coach performance and speak to teams. A partnership can include a keynote at your event or a session with your people. Exposure, and something your team actually experiences.
Ways to partner
Every partnership can attach to a single expedition, a stretch of the road, or the whole thing through 2030. Start with Norway in 2027 and scale as the story grows, or take the full road now.
Sponsorship works when the story does the selling, and this one has everything the good ones have. A hard deadline. A real chance of failure. An attempt to become the first South African to complete the full solo unsupported ski to the South Pole, which makes it a hometown story for a local brand and an origin story for an international one. Four years of content with a live-tracked audience on every leg. And a person you can put in front of a boardroom, a conference, or a camera the week after the ice.
The name on the road. One or two partners, category exclusive, woven into everything from here to the Pole. Your brand travels with the story: every expedition, every film, every talk, every interview between now and 2030. Naming on the expeditions themselves. First call on content, activations, and appearances. Your people get the inside line too, expedition briefings, keynotes for your teams and clients, and a story they follow live. This is for a brand that wants to own a South African first, not rent a corner of it.
Quarterly partner reporting: reach, engagement, content delivered, coverage.
Product on the ice, proof in the content. Your gear gets tested where marketing claims go to die, and the content comes back honest. Field footage, reviews, and usage rights, with a credible voice saying it held at minus 30 because it did. Category exclusivity in your lane. For brands whose product can back the story up.
Quarterly partner reporting: reach, engagement, content delivered, coverage.
The entry point. Product support, pro deals, services in kind. A listed place on the road, and first option to grow into a bigger seat as the story builds toward 2030. Every partner at the top started with a smaller yes.
The proof
Greenland was not just a crossing. It showed the story travels.
- Featured on Hot 102.7.
- A quarterly column in Joburg Style, a high-end print title, on the expeditions, the training, and the life around them.
- 29 days of live physiological data tracked on the ice, still being read.
- Original films and photography.
That is one chapter's output, before the records even start landing.
The reach
94,000 plus on Instagram, earned one expedition at a time. Substack, YouTube and the newsletter are the growth curve building behind it. None of it is bought. They found the story and stayed, and the audience is built to scale: every expedition adds to it, and the biggest chapters are still ahead. Partners who come in now ride that curve from the start. The full breakdown is part of the first conversation.
These numbers grow every month, and the road has four years left to run.
The Brands on This Road
These brands have supported the road so far. I use them, I believe in them, and I trust every one of them.
Worn across Greenland and years of Arctic work.
Leatherman
In my pocket the whole way.
Stanley
On the ice with me every day.
Wedgewood
The nougat that crossed the ice with me. Morale in a wrapper.
OM System
My stills camera of choice, and a brand I stood beside as an ambassador for years. Every image from this road is made with them.
These are brands I already stand behind. The conversation about making it official starts now.
Be the brand that saw it first.
Whose Name Travels With It.
The next four years happen either way. Norway, Iceland, the Last Degree, then the Pole. The only open question is whose name travels with the story when it gets told. If it could be yours, get in touch. You will have the full numbers, the plan, and a straight answer on fit within 48 hours. Just a conversation.