Few people make the leap from heavy-smoking, hard-drinking partygoer to extreme outdoor adventurer. Yet that’s exactly what Ray Zahab did. Twenty-plus years ago, Zahab set out to find a new challenge. He soon progressed from 24-hour mountain bike races to winning the mega-sufferfest 160-km Yukon Arctic Ultra—a turning point that launched his ultrarunning career.
Since then, Quebec-born Zahab has completed more than 40 expeditions, including a 7,500-km run across the Sahara documented in Running the Sahara, crossings of Chile’s Atacama Desert in temperatures approaching 50°C, and an unsupported 1,130-km trek to the South Pole. He has also crossed Baffin Island multiple times in mid-winter, on foot and by bike.
While the distances and extreme environments are remarkable, Zahab’s expeditions serve a larger purpose. Through his foundation, Impossible2Possible (i2P), he uses adventure as a platform to educate, inspire and empower young people around the world.
Check these highlights from Feet Banks’ recent conversation with Ray Zahab:
“Pretty Much Anyone Can Do It”
ML: You’re about one of the best in the world at doing stuff most people would never want to do. Talk to me about that suffering. Why do you do this?
Ray Zahab: I don’t know if I’m one of the best in the world, but I’ll tell you this: I’m definitely one of the most tenacious because I like to get after it and do stuff. As corny as it sounds, I believe anybody is capable of anything they want to do. It’s just making it happen. Whether the challenges are physical, financial, or something else, people can do anything.
I’m a guy who used to smoke a pack a day and drink my face off and transitioned into a life of adventure. If I can do it, pretty much anybody can do it.
“I don’t know if I’m one of the best in the world, but I’m definitely one of the most tenacious…”
Related content from ML:
“Hey Dude, Don’t Complain”
ML: Are you having fun the whole time through?
RZ: I wouldn’t say that I’m having fun, but I’m almost agnostic to the whole situation because I’ve reminded myself that I chose to be out there. The contractual obligation to myself is, “Hey dude, don’t complain. You brought yourself out here.”
When it gets really tough and it really sucks, I remind myself of that. If I’m with someone else, we usually laugh about it. Humour is critical. If I’m alone, I’ve definitely questioned my sanity. But then I get through it, and in retrospect I forget how painful it was. A lot of times I end up going back to those same places.
“A Completely New Person”
ML: You made a leap from those heavy-smoking, hard-drinking party-animal days. How did that happen?
RZ: Through my teens and twenties I was doing what everyone was doing. We were partying, going to concerts, rock festivals. That was all I loved to do. I got close to 30 and people were moving on with their lives. I felt stuck. I wasn’t feeling great about myself. I was very unfulfilled and unhappy and couldn’t see a future at all. My brother was this amazing dude who figured life out. He got into mountain biking, climbing and all these things I’d never heard of. I saw him physically transform himself, but also mentally and emotionally transform himself. I thought, “Wow, I just want to feel a little bit like him.” It was that simple.
I started with rock and ice climbing, then adventure racing, then mountain-bike racing. Within a few years I was racing mountain bikes all over the world. Then I read an article about the Yukon Arctic Ultra. It was a 100-mile race. I entered it. It was the first running race I’d ever done, and I won it.
That transition period was the strangest sensation. It was like I was reintroduced to a completely new person that I’d known my entire life. Walking upstairs winded was normal to me. Then all of a sudden I realized I could run upstairs and ride my mountain bike up steep hills. It was mind-blowing because it was like I bought a new car, but it was my body. It made me realize that what we become status quo with in our lives doesn’t have to be that way. We can change huge things in our lives.
“It was like I bought a new car, but it was my body.”
Beating Unhappiness
RZ: Being unhappy is like a warm sleeping bag in the Arctic. Once you get in, it’s really friggin’ hard to get out of that sleeping bag. But if the coffee’s on and you’re willing to get out of your sleeping bag, you’re gonna have an awesome cup of coffee and you’ll get over the cold, you’ll get over it, you’ll adapt, right?
Listen to the whole convo HERE. Also check out Kevin Vallely’s trip report of his and Ray Zahab’s winter traverse of Ellesmere Island.
