Ed, or Teddy as he is usually called, might have been recognised for his love of sporting garishly coloured trousers while on campus last year, or being one of the main energies behind Caledonian Society’s roaring social scene. The second year Environmental Geography student though is far more than meets the eye. I talked to him on a completely different subject matter to life on campus: his incredible background of adventure and climbing.
Teddy arrived at York in October 2011 off the back of a seemingly extraordinary gap year that took him all across the world, from catastrophe to record breaking achievements, from Mongolia to Argentina.
It all kicked off for Teddy aged 10 with competitive rock climbing, encouraged by his father, which soon evolved into trips to the Alps and Snowdonia – and by the time he was 16 he already had his sights set on climbing Everest. A-Levels came and went and the fresh faced boy from Surrey entered his gap year (not even sure on his university future) with only one thing on his mind; to push himself harder than he had ever done before.
A gruelling six month programme took him between working for sponsorship, from Kyrgyzstan to Nepal and finishing up in Argentina in early 2011.
“I truly learned what hard work was, it was a baptism of fire,” Ed said on Kyrgyzstan. He was thrown in at the deep end with no support but relished the experience. Three months later he was to become the youngest person, aged 18, to summit Baruntse in Nepal at 7,100 metres. This was a crucial stepping stone in terms of gathering sponsorship, and creating a unique selling point for his ‘profile.’
The culmination of this six months hard work was the challenge of South America’s highest mountain, Aconcagua at just shy of 7000 metres. Yet, despite successfully summiting the peak, the trip ended in tragedy. A member of the team passed away with fatal swelling of the brain due to the conditions at 6,500 metres on the way down, in the middle of a storm with temperatures below -40 as the sun was setting. In and amongst the rescue attempt, to add to the woe, Teddy contracted frostbite.
“You know these things can happen, but you always think they won’t happen to you,” Teddy reflected on the ordeal. “It was really tough, especially at aged only 18. If you’re inexperienced in that situation you can risk the lives of others.” He spent over a week in a public Argentinian hospital, not even able to shower himself due to his injuries. He added: “The experience totally changed my opinion of mountains, I was naïve before.”
Coming home running on empty, both physically and mentally, and a little disillusioned by the whole experience, Everest was now off the cards for the immediate future. Surprisingly his outlook in this regard wasn’t as downbeat as expected. “I realised I didn’t want to be doing Everest anyway, rather something more challenging and less clichéd.”
“People will come and say ‘oh, you climb mountains. Are you doing Everest?’ and I didn’t want that out of my climbing.” Instead he pointed out that there are far more interesting peaks to be climb out there, remarking: “One should really have a reason for climbing certain places.”
The reminder of his year out was taken up with the Mongol Rally. “It was the culmination of an amazing year,” he explained. Again, he learned from the experience. “It showed me how much of the world there is to see out there.
‘Maybe we care too much about the wrong things in life like cars and clothes; life can be so fickle. I saw at least three fatal car crashes happen on the way to Mongolia and a totally different side to the world.”
Teddy, now on what seems to be an extended or indefinite sabbatical from university life has been working full time in London for a recruitment company as of March 2013, and when I spoke to him he was keenly trying to stress the lessons he learned through his adventuring.
He applied for his current job obviously without a completed university degree, yet it was seemingly that “extraordinary experiences replaced my degree in that regard. I’ve got a weird CV, it’s all about mountaineering.” Nevertheless, he passionately believes that the skills he has learned through various exploits over the last three years have stood him in good stead.
“There is so much to be said for self-confidence,” Teddy adds. “What university degree gives you the ability to sell yourself and have common sense?” Amidst the physical aspects of his hobby, he honed skills that aren’t easily picked up, but that are so valued in modern life.
Public speaking and communications are now attributes he uses on a daily basis, and these were developed through completing various events such as the Excel Outdoors show, which proved crucial in the race to raise the necessary funding.
An innate maturity was also fostered apparently. “I was more mature on my gap year,” he reminisced. “I kind of regressed in that respect when I came to York. I found a lot of university life very unfulfilling.
“Life isn’t all just about academics, it’s important to know what’s on the other side.
“You see people who go straight from school to university and they have never seen anything else.” It is hard to disagree. It’s debatable whether university prepares students for the pressure, pace and rigours of everyday life thrust upon us after graduation.
Does university prepare us enough for the outside world? “To an extent, probably not,’ Teddy pondered. So what does Teddy make of taking gap years, either before or after university life? “I think they’re a really good idea,” he explained. “They provide a level of independence that is hard to grasp otherwise.” That can be coupled with the fact that many people develop themselves personally, as a result of their experiences during their gap year. For many, a year out provides the last significant period of time away from continuous work and education until retirement.
Our chat moved on to the idea of how his climbing had made life ‘less daunting’ for him, with the transition to the real world completed smoothly. “Finding something different is important from both an aspect of employability and, probably more importantly, to deal with the obstacles life will hurl at you,” he replied.
So what does the future hold for this intrepid young explorer? A trip to Ama Dablam in Nepal has been lined up for 2014. Apparently one of the most technical commercial peaks out there, Teddy would hope, if all goes to plan, to become the youngest person to paraglide off the 6,812 metre summit. Again, this for him doesn’t represent a ‘celebrity-style’ climb, but a way to fulfil his favourite pastime in a low key manner.
“I saw Ama Dablam while I was in Nepal back in 2010 and thought to myself ‘I want to climb you’ so that’s what I’m going to do,” added Teddy. One has to admire the determination of this young man, and experiences to date can provide important lessons in the way we approach life.
“There is more to life than doing something crappy,” Teddy triumphantly claimed, and it’s hard to disagree with someone, who has truly made the most of their life.