E404 | Ben Saunders: World record breaking Arctic Explorer and climate investor on grit, survival and fundraising

0:00Welcome everyone to another episode of the European Easy Podcast. Today, I have Ben Saunders with us. This is one of the craziest, most experimental, most exploratory conversations, quite literally, that we've ever had on the podcast. Ben is one of the, if not the most acclaimed explorers of this world. He has walked a trip in the Antarctic that no one else has ever done, 2 ,500 miles or so. Incredible track record. in that world. And on top of that, he has also worked to raise a fund that was called Quintana Ventures. And he actually decided not to do that anymore. He decided to fold under fund raise for many reasons that we explored here.

0:47So this conversation is the most honest, the most transparent conversations we've had on the podcast with someone who has raised a fund and decided not to do it. And with someone who knows the true face of grid better than anyone else. I really hope you'll enjoy the conversation as much as I do. This will definitely tear down this wall. It's more than just an ally. This is a union of values. United and determined we can serve as a model for other regions of the world. The nature of a problem requires a European response. Europe is a story of new beginnings. New beginnings. Let's start acting. This show is not investment advice and the hosts of this episode may be invested in the funds and companies featured.

1:44All right, Ben, welcome to the European VC podcast. Thank you. Great to be here. So everyone, as I just told you in our introduction for this, this conversation is going to be a special one because I'm talking to Ben, who has done a lot that no one else has done on this earth. And he's also done something that the majority of you have done either successfully or not, or are hoping to do and are thinking about how do I best prepare for this and so on. We, as many of you probably also know, have recently put out a big fundraising report. And that report talks a lot about grid. That's one of the core pieces of advice from all the GPs that we've had on the podcast.

2:34The advice that everyone has said is persevere. Find the resilience to persevere through thousands of no's and just a few yeses. So for that reason, I thought that this conversation with Ben would be an incredible conversation to explore grit from someone who has seen grit in the real world, so to say, in Anactica and the North Pole, but also seen what a fundraise requires. So Ben, I'll maybe put it over to you. Tell us a bit about yourself. Let everyone know who you are, where they can also follow you, because I'm sure that many will be enamored by you by this conversation. So I'm sure they'll want to follow up and get closer to your work.

3:16Thank you. Well, that's kind. So, yeah, gosh, how do people find out more? BenSaunders.com is my website. I'm actually a bit of a geek deep down. I've always had this sort of geek explorer, adventurer, alter ego. I bought that domain name in 1999. So I've had it for a while. So yeah, bensolens.com. I am PolarBen on Instagram. I'm actually not on X now. Are you not on X? I deleted my account in a sort of spat of like, what's happened to this place? But again, I'm like early adopter. I've been on Twitter since 2007, I think. So that was a, yeah, possibly spread of the moment, clicking on that one.

3:58I think I can. I think you get 30 days if you want to bring it back from the dead. So we'll see. Yeah, but you probably could have had Ed Ben. Yeah, I know. Yeah, back in the day, you should have thought that. So yeah, and we were actually chatting just now before we recorded about how I introduced myself. And I'm not sure right now because I'm in an interesting sort of pivot myself. and I spent just over 20 years doing these big polar expeditions. So there were 12 of them in total. Cummatively, I've lost count, like 8 ,000 kilometers, sort of 4 ,500, 5 ,000 miles on foot, either north of the Arctic Circle in Antarctica.

4:44Did everything I had dreamt of doing in that field and then some. And I guess ultimately the dream for a long time was to raise the bar, was to try and do something progressive and innovative and new. And long, long, long story short, that happened 10 years ago. So 2013-14 was the biggest, craziest expedition I ever did. There were two of us in Antarctica. My teammate is half French. He's called Tarka Le Pinier. I'll spell that for you later if you need it. But Tarka is an old friend, extraordinary human being. And he and I, in a nutshell, walked from the coast of Antarctica, a place called Ross Island, which is on the sort of New Zealand side of the continent, to the South Pole, where we turned around and walked all the way back to the coast again.

5:37No one had ever done that before. No one's done it since. No one had ever traveled that far on foot in Antarctica. It was effectively 2 ,900 kilometers, 1 ,800 miles, give or take. So we broke the record. I still hold the world record, like longest ever polar journey on foot. And perhaps more importantly, we finished the journey that Shackleton had attempted on his first expedition in Antarctica, an expedition called Nimrod. And then there was a British explorer who had a big team called Captain Scott who went down a few years later, got to Antarctica in 1911. His team of six died. Sorry, team of five died down there.

6:17Five in the end. It's going to be six. and for a long time you know I met very well qualified experts in that field who considered this journey impossible you know there were for years I had so many was given so many reasons why I couldn't do this thing it wasn't going to happen so so that was the sort of I guess the the kind of pinnacle of what I achieved in that world I skied solo to the North Pole as well back in 2004 and i've been solo to the south pole 2017 18 so i've i think i'm the third in history to go solo to both the north south pole what makes someone do this ben why would you why would you because i think we've all thought of doing something and then we go out strap on our boots and go for a walk and think i'm like in the beginning you're like i'm someday i'm going to walk freely fucking far i'm going to do a real journey here and then after 10 kilometers 15 20 you know or it's a bit cold one day and rains and then you're like i'm never i'm never going to do this so what makes someone actually do it yes it's a very good question and the the motivation evolved um profoundly over that two decade period but um starting out and i remember hearing something so so part of my peculiar immersion into the world of vc was back in i think it was 2016 i was asked to give a talk for sequoia in the bay area at an event called base camp and it was the first time they'd done this it was a sort of off-site retreat um in the hills above menly park on a sort of ranch in the middle of nowhere and um it was mad like i you know i was the first speaker opened this event the next speaker was jamie diamond they had condoleezza rice you know saty adela elon musk that evening general stanley mccrystal the next day and then and then everyone you know there was a fireside chat with elon musk and like roloff bota and it was insane like just and then we're hanging out drinking beers by the campfire so maybe maybe that was well not even maybe i mean that was for sure where the the seed was for me was so i was like this is this is interesting i've done hundreds and hundreds of sort of paid corporates you know mr motivator speaker engagements over years.

8:38And almost always I leave with a secret feeling of like, oh, thank God I don't have a job with me. Like that would be sold. But with Sequoia, I was like, this is interesting. Like everyone here feels wired a bit like me, like some pretty maverick character. And then of course there were like a hundred or so portfolio founders and some extraordinary successors. So that's kind of how the VC chapter started. But If we just tie the knot on that, because I do think that you're absolutely right in that Morgan Dreesen famously calls being an entrepreneur building a company like chewing glass. And everyone else has kind of a similar way of putting it, that this is not for the faint of hearted.

9:23And I think that most that have gone through it would probably also say, well, whether you're in a, and this is how I always put it, whether you're an extreme sports person, like I used to be a bodybuilder. I know a lot of bodybuilders. I used to be a big guy. Some of the guys I know are still very, very big. and the grit that it takes to chow down 7 ,000 calories in pure protein and no bad food, like day in and day out, going to the gym, never seeing, you know, doing anything, never going to bed later than nine or whatever. Like every day in and day out, that takes grit. It takes perseverance.

10:05Whether you do that because you're trying to build a company or you're doing the equivalent because blah, blah, blah. I do think that there's the consistency element that's very similar between being a VC, a founder, or a bodybuilder. Absolutely. And then I think for you, there's also the extreme tension you're under, which I think cannot probably be equated to anything. Well, so I think it was at that first event I did with Sequoia where Doug Lione was talking about founders and how he assessed founders. And he had this thing, I think Bobby Storr has this thing, where he likes to try and understand their childhoods.

10:44And he looks for founders who've had a challenging past and a bit of trauma, a chip on their shoulder, something to prove. And in my case, the early motivation for my Polar career, and actually I did an event with Fred Destin, I think it was last year, which was sort of fireside chat thing. But I jokingly said to him in front of this audience, like, oh, well, you can boil it down to two words, you know, dad issues. But there is a lot of truth in that. I didn't know my dad growing up. My parents divorced when I was a toddler, and then my dad just disappeared not long after that. And I grew up without knowing him.

11:21And he was also he was an orphan, so there was no family tree on his side. I have no idea on my paternal side of my family where my roots might lie. No idea. and I think as a kid you know my mom remarried but that didn't go very well so I think as a kid I was looking for male role models and I latched on to what I now view as these completely over the top like caricatures of sort of macho individual accomplishments so my my heroes as a boy in fact behind me probably probably that much and it goes up one shelf as well like they're all the sort of adventure books you know kind of polar and mountaineering so as a as a boy my heroes were all men and you know wearing big boots doing heroic things you know crossing ice caps climbing himalayan peaks sailing around the world single-handed and i i wanted you know naively in my in my i guess late teens i started thinking about this and setting these goals i wanted to to literally follow in their footsteps to emulate these these these characters that i held up as heroes in the completely mistaken belief that happiness lay in a sort of external validation like if i can if i can only achieve if i can do something impressive enough like my heroes and if enough people say complimentary things about what i've done i will be happy now like spoiler alert that's not how happiness works it turns out it took me you know one or two of these of these camping trips to kind of figure that one out for myself but by that point I was starting to get so deep into this polar expedition rabbit hole that that my motivation was was already changing and it was shifting to I think probably a healthier form of motivation which is this this sort of um how to describe it almost like a craftsman like I just enjoyed the the focus and like trying to get better at my thing there's a really good book i mean there are several very good books by by this guy but a really good book by cal newport who's written like deep focus and there's a more recent one but he wrote a book a while ago called so good they can't ignore you and the um the i guess ultimately the the thesis of that book is that when it comes to happiness uh it's sort of peace of mind equanimity when it comes to those things what you choose to do with your life is is far less important than how you do it and the sort of attitude and mindset that you apply to it.

13:51So yeah, it went from like having this giant chip on my shoulder and this big blank space where, you know, some sort of male role model should have been to after a while becoming a professional, you know, in an obviously very challenging niche and also becoming an innovator, like eventually getting to the point where I was able to kind of chip away at the boundaries of what was considered possible in that world. And that became satisfying and enjoyable in its own right. Can I then ask you, Ben, because I said just before that many VCs would say that it requires grit, it requires resilience to raise a fund.

14:34The hardest thing you're ever going to do is raise that first fund and all that stuff. It is very hard. It is very difficult. But is it fair to use the word grid? Do you think so? Like if someone knows what the outer spectrum of grid is, I guess it's you, right? So, and you've been there both places. I mean, there's a kind of irony here because of course I haven't raised a fund. I decided back in June to quit, like quit fundraising. And so on the one hand, like hopefully you'll have some listeners who are like, yeah, yay me. Like I've done something that this fricking world record breaking, you know polar explorer decided was too too difficult so in some ways in some ways like there's an irony that i've decided to to stop raising a fund i don't think however i stopped because it was too hard i think i just stopped because i'd i'd for various reasons sort of paused to step back and get a little bit of objectivity and realized that actually i've got a pretty full life anyway and trying to cram in being like an effect being a good VC into a life that is already quite busy and has become busier we have a two-year-old son you know I just thought this is going to be it's going to be too compromised and um and there are other things I want to do like writing my first book that I've been procrastinating on for many years now that are never going to happen if I if I'm like professional asset manager running a fund and hopefully raising a second one and blah blah so i think also my it's probably important to emphasize my definition of grit isn't like the ability to keep going no matter what it's it's rather to sort of optimize your ability to deal with obstacles and challenges in the pursuit of the thing that you want to do and one of the big lessons for me on my very first expedition 2001 so i was 23 years old and trying to get to the north pole from russia on foot about eight weeks a thousand kilometers give or take and I was traveling with one other guy called Penn Haddo Penn was my sort of polar mentor and taught me so much on that first trip but I got frostbite in my toe my left big toe on that first expedition and I got it I mean A because like back then the gear the equipment isn't quite as good as it is now and all those things but I got it predominantly because I had this mistaken belief that success on that expedition was going to mean gritting my teeth and ignoring all of the warning signs and the pain and the discomfort and just this ability to keep going no matter what.

17:22So like my foot, my toes went from like really painful to nothing to like numb me in the course of a day. And of course, like that evening, getting the sleeping bag, I'm like, oh, my toes are like white, like hard. Oh, that's not good, is it? So it's still there. I still have all my toes, but they're not very pretty, my foot modeling days. So I think that was a really important lesson, like early, early on, that when you're trying to do difficult things, you know, pioneering things, trying to do things that no one's done before. It's not all about, like, yes, you have to be able to keep going.

17:59You've got to have a bit of determination and a decent work ethic and the ability to find energy when you don't feel like carrying on all that stuff. But it's absolutely not about ignoring the warning signs. Which, if we then take it and tie that to raising a fund and also the final conclusion for you, which was, wait a second, Does this really make sense for where I am in life and where I'm trying to get to? Maybe now is not the time. Did you ask, because you raced for two years, basically, through the worst time and everything. I don't think anyone can hold anything against you. I actually also thought that when you first told me your story, in 2021, having your background would be a blessing.

18:47because every LP would want to have that in their portfolio because everyone wanted to kind of back these crazy stories. But then actually, I'm sure you've had, and I would also say I've seen a bit of a counter movement, which is the last thing you want is to be the one caught with egg on your face because you backed someone, the stereotypical tourist walking interventor, right? Absolutely. This partly famous guy who can definitely say, I know everything about Grit, so for that reason, I can help a founder. But then it can very quickly be turned as the opposite story, which is, yeah, you've got this guy who obviously knows everything about building a startup just because he's walked to the fucking North Pole.

19:35So you kind of want to be the poster boy, perfect poster boy to being the worst poster boy. Absolutely. Absolutely. And what's annoying is that I could totally appreciate that because part of me was finding the whole thing so frustrating. I was like, I mean, I never said this point blank when I'm pitching to LPs, but part of me is like this entire industry, like venture capital is predicated on outliers. And why is it that right now LPs just seem to be doubling down on the incumbents? Like this makes no sense to me. Well, no, yes and no. But then, of course, if I was in their shoes, I wouldn't be backing the lunatic who like, wait, wait, what's your track record as a professional asset manager?

20:16Zero. I've never done this. I'm backing myself because I did these long walks.

20:25That's it. That's it. So I obviously met you while you were fundraising. And I was very excited to see it because I thought, so obviously I'm also probably a risk taker more than many LPs. But my read on how venture works is brand matters a ton. A small fund, solo GP, all you need is a slice. if you've got a great brand and you know something better than anyone else which is how to persevere how to manage tough situations how to make life work in tough situations that should be enough to get on the cap tables you want if you get invited to talk and paid to talk with people like elon musk at sequoias can you then get into good deals i think you can So to me, it kind of seems like an obvious.

21:17Yeah, that was kind of my stance. And then when people pushed harder on the like, well, okay, but what makes you think you run a farm? Like, well, because my entire Polo career entailed, like these were expensive camping trips, like maybe not by private equity standards. But I raised and spent several million dollars in 20 years. And that meant that I was competing with these really sexy sponsorship properties like motorsport or yacht racing, which were way safer, way less risky, and had a stack of benefits like corporate hospitality that I couldn't offer. You know, sponsor a yacht racing team.

21:56They're like, well, bring your C-suite or bring your clients for a day on the boat or bring your team to a day at the racetrack and watch whatever. Yeah, that doesn't happen on the North Pole. I can't find it at that. So in some ways, my case was that I had spent 20 years raising money. And the funding came from global brands. The big money came from companies like Jaguar Land Rover, who I worked for like 12 years, came from Intel, came from Ernst & Young, came from Canada Goose. These are global brands. Add them all together. Revenue in the tens of billions. Reputation means everything. like ton of risk, worst case sort of scenario, you know, downside risk wasn't that I return a whole fund to zero.

22:44It was that I die and a bunch of other people die in a flaming plane crash in a nature reserve, Antarctica, Greenland. And it's all over the news with your logo. So I knew about managing risk. I knew about like long term relationships because these sponsors, they're not giving me money. They're not donating this cash. it's an investment it's they're expecting return now it's not not a capital return but maybe it's sort of marketing and whatever else what are their objectives are so to me like the further down the vc rabbit hole i went the more familiar it felt more it's like this is just like my old world and and then what do i do when i raise the money i've got to find these incredible problem solvers in in the polar world and decide very quickly like can i trust these people A, to do the thing they think they can do, because that's a crucial part of the jigsaw I'm trying to put together.

23:38B, can I trust them with the capital I've raised and the reputation raised to my sponsors because they're global? And C, can I trust them with my life? And like over years, so that's what I had to do. So in so many ways, venture felt so familiar in terms of the challenges, which is why it was sort of all the more frustrating not to get this sort of instant traction. not to get somebody like, oh, yeah, love it. I'll write you this big anchor check. Let's go. And then on top of that, venture is different from every other asset class in that it's very soft value built or contingent or dependent, which makes me think even more because you could argue, well, private equity, no one's going to take you into their SME because you're Ben Saunders.

24:31Like, no, it's not, it does not work like that. So for that reason, they trust you to come in and help them with their turnaround. But in venture, like we have these minority stakes, it's minority stakes business. So all you need to do is say, well, do I want to have this famous guy putting his name in and help me get in, talk about how to get New York Times to care about you. As an example, it's pretty simple. Okay, so now I want to ask you something else, which is, you shared a chapter that was called What Doesn't Kill You. And there's a passage in it where you said, so I reached the North Pole on the 11th of May, 2004.

25:12The moment was, in many ways, the ultimate anticlimax, mainly because there's nothing there, not even a pole. Intellectually, of course, I understood that. And then you go on to describe that the North Pole obviously is moving and stuff like that. But this realization that something that you strive towards for so long can be super anticlimactic, I think resonates with a lot of VCs. You finally raise the fund and now you're ready to go. Well, it doesn't really like it just continues tomorrow. And you made the bet and you're super excited. And then two weeks later, no one asks you about that portfolio company anymore.

25:54They're not in the news. And it's going to be 10, 12, 14, 15 years before they actually exit. And this is something that every VC SaaS is the hardest part of the game is figuring out how to live in the long term and the short term and marrying the two and find gratification in that. so maybe I'd love for you to kind of talk about how did how did you manage that how do you talk to others about it yeah no it's it's a it's been a sort of perennial theme through my polar career I mean you talked about uh when I got to the North Pole in 2004 I mean yeah like nothing there and then uh 24 February 2014 um 10 years after that when Taka and I made it back to the coast of Antarctica you know we'd achieved the the most audacious ambitious goal that I could have set in my career like we had properly raised the bar like new world record finished the journey that had defeated Shackleton like it was just it was like completely completely game-changing and there's there's a definite finish line there's a crack between the the ice and then the the land like the shore of this island where we actually finished Ross Island and I remember making sure that Taka was right next to me, you know, before we crossed this finish line.

27:15We took our skis off, so we sort of stepped across at the same moment. Like, we'd done it, longest ever polo journey on foot, you know, first ever return journey to the South Pole under, you know, human power, all this stuff, and nothing happened. Like, there was no sort of lightning bolt, immediate feeling of elation or triumph or you know just maybe like a vague feeling of relief that we didn't have to go any further like we and we were still alive but then but then you know the next few weeks you know get traveling home and and life after that achievement rather than my life becoming like immediately more more awesome having achieved the biggest goal i could have set in my professional field it got a lot less awesome for a long time like partly because i was completely burnt out and then i came home to a whole string of of commitments and obligations and promises i've made to sponsors and the media and of course like like make hay while the sun shines so i'd achieved this thing and i'm on the news and tv and you know so just when i most needed a vacation i was like like really busy and it took about nine months for me physically to recover from that expedition i lost 22 kilos in four months in Antarctica.

28:35So yeah, it was like physically, mentally, completely, completely shattered. And then mentally, like I'd lost the goal. I'd lost this dream, this sort of mission that had been for so long giving me all of this energy and determination, like a reason to carry on despite so many setbacks, like over years and years and years. And the more sort of setbacks and failures along the way, like just the more my determination grew and then when we achieved it it was it was gone there was nothing nothing there to replace it because this was the kind of goal that took a hundred percent of my bandwidth and my energy and everything else my time all the money I could raise so um I always you know when I'm sort of in keynote speaker stage you know kind of mode on stage I always say that this this probably sounds like the most demotivational thing I could be telling people like you know i set my sights as high as i could in my field like experts said now this this this can't be done no one's ever come close like worked my butt off raised a whole ton of money built this brilliant team did it and it it didn't feel like i was like where am i going here like what's the moral to this to this story and i think i think there are two points i think firstly a long time ago, I had made the mistake of thinking of success as a one-time deal, as a threshold, as a finish line in the future.

30:01Things aren't great. Things are tough now. Things are shit now. But when I get there, they're going to be amazing. And that's a very normal, typical human sort of mindset to get into. We are obviously like sort of goal-oriented creatures. That's just how our minds operate but there's a trap i think that we often fall into telling ourselves that you know when we like i'll be happy when and and i i absolutely that's that's how i was operating for for a long long time and then i and then i got there you know i literally crossed the biggest finish line i could have ever crossed and nothing really changed like life life went on you know so i think personally it taught me that success isn't a finish line it's it's like it's how you play the game how you show up every day because that like there isn't really a finish line just life life keeps going until it doesn't anymore but i think that's crucially transfers to business because there definitely isn't a finish line in business now for a founder perhaps they're aiming for an exit at some point down the road but that doesn't mean they want the company to shut down like well that's it like servers off lights off lock the door like done like shut down and everything like we're finished i don't think that's the point i don't think any founder is is aiming for their company to end and yet that's kind of how i was thinking in my mind i was aiming for this like destination that was going to change everything so i'm kind of rambling here i feel hopefully that makes some sense i think there was also um in terms of like the sort of um what do you call gratification yeah yeah huge part of it and of course um you know some i often get asked when it when it comes to well I guess my entire polo career but particularly this the longest trip I did 10 years ago like what was the hardest point and I think in many ways it was super early it was like day two or day three I forget exactly but there was a sort of a a bit of a climb this ascent up onto this area called the Ross eye shelf and in many ways everything is not everything many things are toughest at the start because you're you're kind of you're in shock you know like three or four nights ago we were in a hotel in the southern tip of chile like with wi-fi and and a breakfast buffet and a nespresso machine and like fluffy duvets and and now we're living in a tent and it's like minus 45 degrees centigrade and you know um and you're dragging a sledge and that's 200 kilos each at the start now so so everything and also we're super early in the season so it's very very cold so everything is really hard and um in some ways you have to trust that things will improve like we just if we can stick it out we're literally traveling into the summer the sun gets a bit higher every day the ambient air temperatures will increase we're eating food every day so the sledge is going a little bit lighter we're burning fuel in our cooker in our stove to melt snow to get water so that's going to get lighter so you have to trust that these things will improve but um yeah day two day three whichever it was i think we did it was like 5.6 kilometers or something like that it was like 5k in eight and a half hours and you know if you've run a 5k you'll know that eight hours is not a respectful time and we had you know we had the total round trip like 2 900 kilometers that's the goal we've just done five kilometers so it's like not even doesn't even register in terms of progress and we've used a day's worth of resources.

33:33Like we've eaten a ton of food and we've burnt fuel in our stove. And like, what have we got in return? So I remember that night in the tent, feeling this sense of like absolute shame, like self-loathing. Like, oh, of course this is impossible. The numbers just don't stack up. Like how hubristic could I be? Like why didn't I pay more attention to all these experts who've been telling me why this hasn't been done, why it can't be done. So the next day, I remember just being in a really bad state mentally. And the tactic, and no one had advised me to do this. This wasn't something a psychologist sort of suggested.

34:13It was just, it was the only way I could deal with the situation. At that moment, the goal, the ultimate goal, rather than being a source of motivation that that gave me energy and the drive to continue was the opposite. It was so far away that it just felt completely hopeless and just abstract, like just absurd. We're going so slowly. The idea of doing nearly 3 ,000 conferences is just, it's ridiculous. So I kind of had to remove the goal and just give myself permission to quit. I'd be like, okay, well, it's obviously impossible. We're obviously going to quit, but not right now, because that bit of ice on the horizon looks really good.

34:51We could pitch the tent there and they could land an aircraft there. We can call for a rescue flight. They could land a ski plane. We can get picked up. So for the next hour, everything, all of my focus, bandwidth, energy, just went into getting to that point. And then we get there and I think, okay, we haven't collapsed. Oh, wait a minute. That bit of ice, further south. That's even better. Let's just get there. So I'd kind of play this game. And then we'd get to the end of the day and we'd put the tent up. I think, okay, well, let's sleep on it and decide in the morning. And I'd play the same game.

35:22And then after a few days, we'd built up this collateral. We'd done 25K, 50K, 100K, 250, 500, 1 ,000 kilometers. And suddenly it's, I mean, A, you have this sort of, not invested, but you've clocked up all of this progress. So you're going to lose more if you quit. And B, everything's improving. You're closer to the mid-summer. it's warmer the sled is lighter you're going better so focus was was the most important thing um for sure when it came to to to carrying on you know to grit to resilience down there and not just in terms of narrowness of focus that was vital i remember super early on losing my shit just we had really bad weather really strong headwinds and i remember just like yelling into the wind like just every swear word i knew which was quite in a way felt quite therapeutic but then i just stopped of course no one is no one else around my my teammate but he's maybe 30 meters in front of me and he can't hear me in this wind and we've got goggles and a mask and everything but i'm just yelling and yelling and yelling swear words and then i stopped and i was like the wind hasn't changed at all i i i can't i can't do anything about the wind and in fact i've just burnt a load of energy.

36:40I've just wasted a load of calories on something I can't change. And there's a really important lesson there that of course goes all the way back to the freaking stoic philosophers and probably before then, which is the importance of understanding what is within your control and what is outside your control and focusing as exclusively as you can on the former. So that was a big lesson for me and not just on that expedition, but everyone. like like control the controllables you know focus your energy and your time and your bandwidth on on things that you can affect and you can change and i think anyone listening to the story you just told that have also been on the fundraise trail and it's not by coincidence it's called the trail right oh yeah um because it is similar uh in in in that you maybe have 20 million to raise if it's a It's a first time fun between two people or alone.

37:36And, you know, in the beginning, you have a blank pitch deck, so to say, you got to figure that out. But even when you start raising, having those first calls and, you know, you send out the email, you've packed everything, you expect this to be received like a godsend. Because I'm this guy, I know my gift. And then half doesn't reply. the other you know the other half replies says yeah maybe let's have a talk but yeah i i gotta i gotta i can get a call with anyone out of like novelty valley they just want to hear the polar stories that was what but that gave you an even bigger issue than many right exactly but but it also probably taught you an early lesson of fundraising which is you gotta just know exactly who you need to talk to and who's your for sure for sure yeah and i i'm i mean okay i have a i have a crazy network and and that that's again there's a sort of paradox there because um i spent most of my career in in like extreme isolation in the most remote place on earth and that's somehow giving me the most incredible network and that's that's come largely through yeah but it's that's come through speaking which which continues to be this incredible Trojan horse.

38:54I mean, I met most of the partners at Sequoia back in 2016, like hanging out with drinking beers by the fire. So it's given me for two decades this incredible access. So I love that. I would highly recommend, yeah, if you're looking for a way to improve your ability to network, like spend a load of time on your own in the middle of nowhere for as long as you can. And I was thinking, you said something earlier just that made me think, when I decided to sort of call time on fundraising, I think one of the realizations was that I hadn't tried everything. If I had to, I'm 100 % convinced I'd back myself to raise a fund.

39:33And one of the things I didn't do that in hindsight was probably obvious was actually a sort of old-fashioned roadshow and to go to the U.S. because I've got a great network in the U.S. And it's an enormous generalization, but it seems to have held true so far. My story just is received differently in America. And I think in America, it just seems almost universally valid to be ambitious and to talk about your dreams and your ambitions. And I'm British, English, and we can be a pretty cynical bunch at times. We definitely do the whole tall poppy syndrome thing quite well. But yeah, so I've always had like a different reception in the US.