From the world’s highest summits to its frozen poles, Colin O’Brady has made a name for himself by setting his sights on the world’s extreme reaches — and moving past them. Now a documentary directed by Academy Award–winner James Reed (My Octopus Teacher, The Shark Whisperer) will follow O’Brady’s next daring feat of endurance: a solo, unsupported, nearly 2,000-mile, water-to-water crossing of Antarctica, starting November 2025.
Over roughly 110 days, he’ll haul a 500-pound sled across the continent’s interior and nearly 1,000 miles of ice shelves in brutal conditions. From minus 60 Fahrenheit temperatures and katabatic winds (gravity-driven blasts of icy air that can reach hurricane force) to sastrugi (hard, wind-carved snow ridges that batter sleds) and hidden crevasses, the perilous journey will play out for the world to see.
With the epic crossing, O’Brady aims to build on a streak of record-shattering expeditions: In 2016, he blitzed the Explorers Grand Slam (reaching the North and South Poles plus all Seven Summits) in under five months; in 2018, he raced to the peak of every US state high point in just over three weeks; and later that year, claimed to have completed the first solo, unsupported, self-powered crossing of Antarctica in 54 days, chronicled in his 2020 book The Impossible First. His new expedition raises the stakes to a longer, water-to-water push, with no resupplies of food or fuel.
The documentary will weave in the explorer’s past milestones with his latest attempt, offering a front-row look at the physical and psychological toll of one of the most ambitious polar efforts in history. Its director is as intrigued as anyone to see how it unfolds.
“Colin is an exceptional athlete, there’s no doubt about that, but I want to find out who he is as a person and what really drives him,” Reed tells Tudum. “One thing that really drives my curiosity is that I genuinely don’t understand how he is going to complete this Antarctic crossing — it’s further than anyone has gone before and twice as far as he went last time, pulling much more weight. It just seems impossible to me, and I’m fascinated to see what happens. I think the rest of the world will be too.”
Stay tuned for more updates on the documentary covering O’Brady’s next epic adventure.
