The Kid Who Climbed Everest: The Incredible Story of a 23-Year-Old's Summit of Mt. Everest

The Kid Who Climbed Everest: The Incredible Story of a 23-Year-Old's Summit of Mt. Everest Review

The Kid Who Climbed Everest: The Incredible Story of a 23-Year-Old's Summit of Mt. Everest Overview

Four years ago, a twenty-one-year-old soldier in the British Army named Bear Grylls was flying over an African desert on a routine parachute jump. He had a lot to look forward to - a long career ahead of him in the Army, a beautiful girlfriend back home. But those dreams were cut short when his parachute failed to open at eleven thousand feet.

He had cracked three vertebrae and come within a fraction of severing his spinal cord, which would have paralyzed him for life. A grueling eight months of physical therapy followed. Bear had to retrain his muscles to do all of the things we take for granted - how to sit, stand, walk, even breathe.

Bear endured over seventy days on Everest's southeast face. Eighteen months after his accident, at the age of twenty-three, he overcame extreme weather conditions and months of limited sleep to reach the summit of the world's tallest mountain.

The Kid Who Climbed Everest is a tale of courage, perseverance, and determination, and climbing the world's tallest mountain is only half of this remarkable story. Bear's quest for funding for his expedition (including an unannounced raid for sponsorship money at the mansion-home of the president of Virgin Airways, Richard Branson), his seventy days on Everest's southeast face, and a narrow brush with death after a fall into a crevasse at nineteen thousand feet make the story of the youngest Englishman to climb Everest an essential read for anyone who's ever had a dream and made it come true.

The Kid Who Climbed Everest: The Incredible Story of a 23-Year-Old's Summit of Mt. Everest Specifications

"Everest," writes British climber Bear Grylls, "is no place to prove yourself. The likelihood of reaching the summit is so slim that you're inevitably setting yourself up to be disappointed."

But, Grylls continues, mountains are most definitely an arena where alpinists express their deepest drives, and he had more ambition than most. Badly injured in a parachuting accident in 1996, he resigned his army commission and cast about for a new career--a decision he succeeded in putting off by enlisting in a climbing expedition to the world's tallest mountain. Now, Grylls points out, the odds of a well-conditioned climber's making the summit of Everest are something like one in a hundred; for climbers under the age of 30, who lack the experience and conditioning that age brings, those odds slim down to 1 in 1,000. Twenty-three at the time, Grylls took his chances nonetheless, despite the "sinking feeling that I had just made a commitment that was going to drag me a little too far out of my comfort zone."

He fulfilled his commitment, though surely not without discomfort, scared but determined, making his way up deadly obstacles such as the Lhotse Face Icewall and its deep crevasses. Other climbers were not so lucky, he writes in this you-are-there account of his time on the mountain, and death is a constant presence on these pages--which may deter readers who seek to follow in his footholds. For those content to travel up sheer rock and ice walls vicariously, though, Grylls's book is a spirited exercise in adventure writing and a promising debut. --Gregory McNamee

Available at Amazon Check Price Now!

*** Product Information and Prices Stored: May 01, 2011 03:50:05

Why a Curveball Curves: The Incredible Science of Sports (Popular Mechanics)

Why a Curveball Curves: The Incredible Science of Sports (Popular Mechanics) Review

As a kid, I was never a big science fan . . . I've now become
more interested in the subject and you will, too, if you
read WHY A CURVEBALL CURVES--edited by Frank Vizard.

This book is a collection of articles from POPULAR MECHANICS
by such contributors as Chicago Cubs manager Lou Piniella,
Olympic swimming coach Bob Bowman and Buzz "The Shot
Doctor" Graman . . . you'll learn how certain hockey
players achieve greater speed on the ice, why swimming is
all about reducing drag and even what Babe Ruth had to say
about the mechanics of his home-run swing:

* Coordination, that is perfect timing and harmony of action, is a great
essential. You have got to develop rhythm and full utility of every
muscle. My whole body goes with every swing. I swing right from the
hips. And those who have seen me take a healthy sock at the ball know
what I mean. With that coordination there is the fact that I assume that
strength is behind it.

Whatever your favorite sport is, you'll probably find it covered
in this book . . . baseball, basketball, bowling, boxing, cycling,
football, golf, hockey, running, skiing, soccer, swimming and
diving, and tennis all get covered in separate chapters, often
accompanied by memorable photos.

I often found out some surprising information; e.g., about the
importance of the follow-through in golf:

* Irrelevant. In truth, a golfer could release the club from his hands
the moment after impact and it would make no difference--except,
of course, to your playing partners, who might not appreciate
having your eight-iron embedded between their shoulder
blades. Still, a full release of your arms and torso, leading to a classic
pose, with your belly button pointed to the target and your hands high
above your front ear? Well, that always looks nice for the cameras.

And then there was this passage about hockey's Wayne Gretzy
that ended with one of my all-time favorite sports quotations:

* By his own admission, Gretzky, who played most famously with the
Edmonton Oilers as well as several other teams during the 1980s and 1990s,
was not the strongest or fastest or most agile player on the ice even though
he was named MVP of the National Hockey League nine times. What
Gretzky did have was an ability that amounted to being able to see into
the future and visualize what was going to happen in the next few seconds.
In an article appearing in WIRED magazine, scientists working for the U. S.
Olympic team and the Australian Institute of Sport concluded that skills
like Gretzky's come from an innate ability to intuitively translate physical
cues dropped by opponents that are not apparent to most other athletes.
Scientists are at work figuring out how this skill can be taught, but this type
of perceptual training is still in its infancy. On the other hand, Gretzky may
have just been following his father's advice, given to him when he was
a youngster: "Skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it
has been."

Methinks that's great advice for any sport . . . unfortunately,
putting it into practice was never quite that simple--or at least not
for me.

Why a Curveball Curves: The Incredible Science of Sports (Popular Mechanics) Feature

• ISBN13: 9781588164759
• Condition: New
• Notes: BUY WITH CONFIDENCE, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and service to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed

Why a Curveball Curves: The Incredible Science of Sports (Popular Mechanics) Overview

Sports. They get our blood pumping and our hearts racing. Fans scream and cheer as their favorite athletes run, throw, pedal, dive, or swing their way to victory. But what makes an athlete successful? Why do some players excel when others fall behind?
In Why a Curveball Curves, the experts at Popular Mechanics, along with top athletes, coaches, and sports journalists, explore the science behind sports. Fluid dynamics, biomechanics, and technology determine everything from speed in cycling to protection in football to performance measurement in all sports. This book is designed for both the player and the fan, helping athletes become better-prepared and giving enthusiasts a more complete understanding and appreciation of the subtle nuances of competition.
The explanations are clear, entertaining, and written by people who really love their game. The issues discussed range from Tiger’s swing to Lance’s legs, from gene doping to the physics of why a seemingly straight kick curves drastically just before its target—in other words, how to bend it like Beckham—plus so much more. 
Among the specialists who weigh in are: Matt Bahr, who kicked the winning field goal in Super Bowl XXV; Bob Bowman, who coached swimmer Michael Phelps to a record-setting eight medals in the 2004 Olympics; Lou Piniella, manager of the Chicago Cubs; Peter Brancazio, Professor Emeritus of Physics at Brooklyn College and author of Sports Science; and Jim Kaat, a major league pitcher for 25 years.

 

Available at Amazon Check Price Now!

*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Sep 30, 2010 19:31:04