Outdoor Life Network will launch an outdoor adventure competition in 2003,
culminating with the first live television program from the summit of Mt.
Everest next May.
Global Extremes: Mt. Everest--4Runners of Adventure is scheduled to premiere
on Outdoor Life Jan. 5.
The weekly primetime hour will bring 12 people together for a set of
endurance competitions around the world, with an ascent on Mt. Everest the final
leg, and $250,000 going to the winner.
The ascent, and live presentation of its finale, coincides with the 50th
anniversary of the first successful expedition to the mount's top by Sir Edmund
Hillary and Tenzing Norgay.
The show will run over five months, including a second run on Sunday nights
and a Tuesday cablecast.
Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A. Inc. will be the program's main sponsor, and join
Outdoor Life as co-organizer of the event. Twelve people will be selected from a
pool of 50 contestants competing in mountaineering, rock-climbing, skiing and
white-water rafting events this fall in Utah and Colorado.
Africa's Kalahari Desert, Borneo and Iceland will be the pre-Mt. Everest
sites for Global Extremes, patterned in part after the long-running
Eco-Challenge series on Discovery Channel and USA Network, and other extreme
adventure ventures.
Prospective participants have until Aug. 30 to submit an
application.
