Norwegian adventurer, mountaineer and pilot Thomas Lone doesn’t do anything halfway. He’s the youngest Norwegian to summit the Seven Summits — the highest peak on every continent — and now he’s setting his sights on the 2027 Red Bull X-Alps. Meanwhile, he and his wife just welcomed their first child into the world, guide paragliding, backcountry skiing and snow kiting tours, and Thomas has quietly become one of the more formidable race-to-goal pilots on the circuit.
Thomas operates where the margins are razor sharop, the air is thin, and the consequences of getting it wrong are real. How do you sustain that level of ambition across mountains, races, guiding, and a brand new family? That’s exactly what this conversation is about. Buckle up — Thomas’s energy is contagious, and his advice is well beyond his years.
Follow Thomas and his wife’s Jannicke amazing adventures, speaking engagements, and guiding (paragliding, tandems, backcountry skiing, snowkiting) here: http://teamlone.no/
Thomas is the manager of the local club here in Hemsedal, which is a great starting point for anyone who wants to travel to Norway for flying:
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Risk management in extreme sports The influence of wind sports background on flying skills Mountaineering in the death zone and decision-making The allure of unexplored peaks and adventure Balancing risk and safety in pursuit of goals
Sound Bites
“Why do I do this? I could just buy a paraglider” “Work on your biggest weakness, that helps a lot” “The mountain is still as beautiful as ever”
Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Setting the Scene in Norway 01:28 Mountaineering near K2 and the Inspiration from Antoine Girard 03:30 Early Fascination with Wings and the Love for Kites 05:04 Transition from Kitesurfing to Paragliding and Technical Skills 12:52 Getting into Mountaineering and the Army’s Impact 16:13 Climbing the Seven Summits and the Passion for Exploration 26:22 Attempting Mochu Chish and the Draw of Unclimbed Peaks 28:38 Challenges and Risks in High-Altitude Mountaineering 36:44 Experiences in Antarctica and the Unique Environment 39:23 The Hardest Mountain: Denali and Extreme Weather 45:04 The Impact of Flying and Mountaineering on Perspective 45:56 Balancing Parenthood and Extreme Sports 57:55 Close Calls and Lessons Learned in Paragliding 01:07:27 Closing Remarks and Future Adventures in the Alps
gavin (00:01.546)
Thomas, good morning. Well good afternoon to you, good morning to me, but thanks for making this happen. I understand you're back at home. In what's the name of the town? Hel Hell
Thomas Lone (00:12.384)
It's called Hempstadal. Yes.
gavin (00:14.036)
Hemsidal, okay. And that's a ski area area, nice place to be in the mountains.
Thomas Lone (00:19.32)
Correct. Yeah, it's in the middle of the big southern chunk of Norway. and I moved here for skiing, but now I eventually I found out it's great for for flying as well. It's a great c cross country starting point, so.
gavin (00:28.852)
And is this is this kind of past the prime of your season and Norway's really good in the spring, or is it still really good now?
Thomas Lone (00:37.61)
It is perhaps best in the spring, or I guess we have more you could do more long flights in the spring. but the the very longest ones, if you're lucky, you will probably get them in June or July. but we're getting getting late in kind of the prime time season, yes. for sure. Exactly, exactly. But you could still have like we had a call front last week and then suddenly we got this one good day, and I flew a 200k plus
gavin (00:50.751)
Okay.
gavin (00:54.72)
Starts to get more stable, I imagine. Okay, gotcha.
Thomas Lone (01:06.454)
open distance flight. So we you know it happens in the summer as well for sure. but it's not that typical. And and of course I have to say two hundred plus case you know in the Alps it's nothing but you know here that is like that's a proper flight. Yeah. Yeah.
gavin (01:11.296)
Gotcha.
What are
gavin (01:20.284)
Yeah, ex we have to put things in perspective, don't we? I know. If you if you just watch the three hundreds going down in the Alps, you're you're never gonna be satisfied. where I want to start, Thomas, is this great quote you had in the XC Mag article, you know, you thought you were hallucinating. So you're standing on top of Broad Peak or somewhere near the summit, 8,000 meters. You know, Broad Peak's got a lot of attention in paragliding circles lately because it's the
Thomas Lone (01:28.373)
Exactly.
gavin (01:45.727)
It's the go-to from the Cream of Bad Valley and Antoine Girard and they've been doing really cool stuff out there, but you're mountaineering it. we're gonna talk a lot about your mountaineering, but you're standing up there and literally you see Antoine Girard fly over your head. Is that is that actually what went down and got you kind of fired up about all this?
Thomas Lone (02:01.761)
Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah, and yeah, because you know, climbing a broad peak is it's called K three, right? So it's a neighbouring mountain to K two, which is much more famous of course. so you're basically climbing for two, three months with all the prep work and acclimatization, all that stuff, and you're just looking at this beautiful K two peak every day. and suddenly I look towards K two and I see this tiny little white dot just moving across the sky.
towards K2 and and yeah it was just insane and I remember realizing I was so tired and I realized just like why do I do this stuff so much hate and misery for so many months to get up here and then you I could just buy a paraglider instead and fly up there, you know Yep. Exactly, exactly.
gavin (02:48.138)
Just fly in one day and fly out and have a beer.
Thomas Lone (02:55.767)
So that was that was kind of the point I realized I have to I have to do this now. I have had many cues in my life but that was like, This is it, you know.
gavin (03:02.986)
Yeah, because your your background is well I don't know when the mountaineering started, but I I you know, from your article in in Exumag, you talk about just your fascination with kites and and spending all summer at the at the local kite school and begging your parents, you're ten years old. So you've had this fascination with wings. I don't know if you would have called it that when you were ten, but
Where where did all this come from? Where where did the where did the desire for for not flying, but just kite and wind and understanding those kind of dynamics, where'd it come from?
Thomas Lone (03:41.218)
Yeah, it's a good good question. I I have always had some kind of a desire to fly at least. so I guess that's a a common theme with with many paragoliter pilots. Like we we have some crazy desire to be like the birds and just be free. and I had that for sure as a kid. So I I actually have this this story that I I went up on the on the loft and I found this old kind of fly to, you know, a very old tent.
gavin (04:05.941)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (04:05.997)
and I would take this very weak string that my mom used to have in the kitchen, you know, to like gift to kind of, you know, create the gifts and stuff. And I would tie that to all the all the connecting points on the fly and walked up on onto the roof. It was like you know, five meters, fifteen feet down. and I was about to jump. I was about to launch off and break both my legs. I was like eight or nine or something. And luckily she was coming back from from work just then. So
I to this day I've never heard my mom shout as loudly as that day. But but she got me safely down from from that roof at least. And and ever since I yeah, I knew that I wanted to to, you know, get into paragliding or skydiving or or something of the sort. But because I was too young, luckily kitesurfing came to me because that was kind of the brand new sport of in the early two thousands, right? So
So I could start that in Norway and that was kind of the the start of the journey, I guess.
gavin (05:10.304)
Do do you still kite?
Thomas Lone (05:12.789)
I do, I do. So that kind of became my my life because I got totally addicted. always I've loved the math and science and technical things. I have my Master of Science degree as well, so so I think a big part of the interest has been kind of the you know, the technicalities of the wind and the aerodynamics and the lift and how everything works together. so so that was my life until I joined the army basically. So until I I turned eighteen.
spend most of my winters in the on these giant mountain plateaus we have in Norway. because Norway is actually you know, the you're a kite surfer as well, but Norway is like the Mecca for snow kiting, which is just a tiny part. It's like two percent of kite surfers kite on snow as well. But it's it's actually really fun and we used exactly the same gear as you do on water. So that was most of my life and then in the summer I would try to travel, you know, you could go to Sweden or Denmark and sometimes further south and
And kitesurfing is just a wonderful adventure. So and then I went to the army and and that was kind of the big big pause of things and that actually turned me into the mountaineering. but I never stopped kitesurfing. So now still here in living in Hamstadal I have courses in the winter and I try to get out and do some competitions once in a while and you know, I I my progression has kind of flattened out, but it's all about the staying on the try to stay on the same level. Yeah.
gavin (06:39.83)
I'm surprised to hear, you know, I I
also started with with kite surfing and not so much because it really drew me like it did to you. You know, I I had this I was sailing around the world and looking for a way to have to get more clients. And you know the as all good stories go, I met a girl and she had just taken some lessons kite surfing in the Caribbean and she well why don't we do kite surfing trips and and you know we we called Rafael Salas at F1 and they came out and they made a film and they gave they left left us all their gear
And that's how I got into it. It wasn't this, you know, 10 years old dying to, you know, I w I it wasn't jumping off a roof and trying to create this stuff. It was just, it kind of fell into my lap in a sense. But
You know, and it with the business and that became my life for almost fifteen years. Of course, you know, I I love kiting, but it it never compared to paragliding for me. And I got into paragliding later, you know, later. It was kiting kiting was first, but I don't know, just the the aesthetic, the unknown, the freedom of it, you know, rather than going back and forth. And I know there's there's the downwind thing and there's you can definitely turn it into an adventure, but that it it has never it never did grab me and never as much you never
Now I live inland, there is no kiting here. There's no kiting here, but you know, I it's not one of those it's not I'm not reaching for that stuff very often.
Thomas Lone (07:56.46)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (08:03.341)
Yeah, I think maybe it might have been a little bit different to me because of the terrain we have here in the winter. Because from day one it was much more adventurous, you know. eventually I got into all the tricks and the you know, the back mob and slim chance and all that stuff. But but first and foremost it was about getting into an element that was kind of hard to reach. or you you needed a a good excuse to to bother, you know, to go out in the super cold winter on the
gavin (08:08.799)
Mm, mm.
gavin (08:13.727)
Mm.
gavin (08:18.004)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (08:33.375)
on the flats with your cross country skis or whatever. But suddenly with the kite I could you know have a sled and a tent and I could really go out and explore. So so that's also been more kind of kiting for me now is more into the exploring part and go with a sled, bring my dogs along and have a tent and everything. So so yeah, it's it's definitely grabbing me from kind of that feeling of freedom as well, for sure.
gavin (08:51.467)
gavin (08:58.785)
How much do you think that background in wind sports and kitesurfing, how much do you think that has affected your kind of intuition and your rapid progression in flying? And when did you get into flying?
Thomas Lone (09:15.839)
I started around four years ago now. and and I remember when I when I went on the course it felt like when we started to ground handle on the first day, it felt like just going home, you know. I just needed to twitch my mind a tiny bit that my hands were opposite, you know. and that was it basically. So so I think early on the the kind of the basic wing wing control, but also the
gavin (09:18.495)
Okay.
gavin (09:30.327)
gavin (09:37.025)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (09:45.896)
of course there was a lot with the wind and the air moving that I did not know, but I had at least a basic intuition of weather systems, when the wind would pick up or or ease off and direction and strength of the wind I could kind of you know, feel it intuitively in my face, if it was launchable or not early on. so that has been a a major advantage, I would say, for sure.
gavin (10:10.613)
And w what about your love of science and math and solving problems and all that? How does that play into this? 'Cause it it you know, from the outside, we do I think in general, you know, I've been at this a long time now, so I'm kind of one of the old farts that that are doing it, but we do see when I got into it, which was two thousand three, two thousand four, you know, it was in general it was ten years. You could you know, ten in ten years you'd be flying a
you know, a C C C glider, which back then was an open class glider, but it was you know, they were just
Whoa, someday, you know, and now you're seeing it more like what you've done. You you know, you're you're racing, you're you're you've you've gotten really good really fast. And I mean you're racing at a really top level. You were just out at the Monarch and did really well. I was chasing your ass. but you know it's it I'm I'm I'm wondering how much of this was built on the back of your background and the way you work. But we're also seeing it I think it's also gear in in in some way.
It's just gotten so nice, but it's yeah, t t tell me more about your your kind of background and and how that solves some of this puzzle for you.
Thomas Lone (11:14.465)
Yeah. Yeah.
Thomas Lone (11:24.141)
Yeah, I guess I guess my short answer it's it's a little bit of everything helps a lot, right? so I I try to kind of work on your biggest weakness if that makes sense. So if you can have some natural intuition that's great. And then of course the hours is I think extremely important. and then you also need the determination, you need to kind of be
You need to have some goals and and focus on them and be willing to put in the effort that many pilots don't do, so you will have some advantage there. yeah, and then of course it's like the the safety side of things and doing SIVs and getting more wing control that way. So but for sure I've been trying to focus on being analytical. It's been a very big part of
my progression. and I'm not just talking about being analytical in terms of the conditions and where did I find the good thermal and all that kind of stuff, but also analytical onto the progression itself. Like yeah which actions do I do that actually makes my progression faster and safer and try to amplify that. That's I think that's been a key as well.
gavin (12:45.591)
Let's talk about your mountaineering. You said it was the army that you got you got you more into big ascents.
Thomas Lone (12:52.405)
Yeah, that's that's where it started because before then of course I've I did all this kiting, but I was I was never really necessarily pushing my limits, you know, kind of more laid back style, out in the mountains, having fun, all that. if it was too cold or the wind was too strong, I would just pack up and and, you know, go home, grab a beer and be in front of the fireplace or something. So
so the army changed my mindset completely. because I applied for this kind of in Norway we have this one year commander school. So you have the opportunity, even though you're just eighteen years old, you can do six months of training, which is very intense training, and then for the next six months you will be a leader. You will be kind of the low level commander and you will have a full team of sixteen people.
that you will kind of you will lead them, you will manage all their training and and all these field exercises and everything. so that was amazing year. One of the by far best best years of my life. and I really learned how to how to go through some tough times, long periods of time with absolutely no sleep and no food.
And I liked it. I kind of of course I didn't like all the all the hate, but I I really liked the feeling of accomplishment, pushing my limits way, way past levels I'd been on before. and that mindset became a part of me. So when I started to to study the next year, I just wanted to find kind of a new arena to really push my limits and get more mentally robust. So that's how I got into the mountaineering actually.
gavin (14:40.777)
And you're the youngest Norwegian to have done all the seven summits, is that right? When you were twenty four or something, you completed them all? That's a that's a big endeavor. That takes a lot of time. Did you were you doing this while you were in the army, you were enlisted, or is this after?
Thomas Lone (14:49.133)
Correct, yes.
Thomas Lone (14:57.485)
So everything started started after because I I only went there this one year. and then I did my studies as a civilian. So I went to like the the Tech University of of Norway in a in a city called Trondheim. and actually my third year I went to Boston as an exchange student. So I I have this one year of experience from the from American universities and and the Norwegian ones are very different. Like in the States I feel like, you know, I had all
gavin (15:02.025)
Okay.
Thomas Lone (15:27.531)
bunch of homeworks and I have to kind of I had to deliver continuously through the semester. Whereas in Norway, as long as you're there for the four final exams and you submit those, you're kind of off the hook. You could do whatever you want. so I could work yeah, exactly. So I could work much, much harder for you know a month or two and then I could have a lot of free time to to travel. So I tried to save up money
gavin (15:43.585)
So go to school in Norway.
That's the takeaway.
Thomas Lone (15:55.956)
And went to Kilimanjaro to start with in Africa and then eventually to Aconcagua in in Argentina. and
gavin (16:03.682)
W were were you did you set off before Kilimanjaro? Were di were you thinking already, Okay, I wanna do the seven summits? Or was this I'll climb that and then I'll climb that and
Thomas Lone (16:13.261)
It was a little I had read some books on Everest and kind of I I guess I had some some wild fantasies or dreams, but nothing was like it was not like a goal yet, you know. so I kinda went there with some friends to just Yeah get into it and I've always in my life tried to focus on finding out what's actually really for me, you know, when you find your thing, it feels like falling in love to me at least, you know, then you just know it, like this is your thing.
gavin (16:23.435)
Okay.
gavin (16:39.532)
Mm.
Thomas Lone (16:41.343)
And then I can easily apply all my energy and time into it because I know it's gonna be so much fun. and I got that luckily after Killy. so then I did Akonkagua and basically the rest of my my time as a student was trying to do some exams a couple of months a year and then trying to to finance all this gradually more and more extreme expeditions on the side.
gavin (17:08.8)
you've spent a lot of time above seven thousand meters, a lot of time in the death zone, a lot of time in you know, in mountaineering. I don't what the statistics are, but it's not
i it's gotta be similar to paragliding maybe you know but it's it this is not a safe sport either it takes out a lot of people how does your background in the mountains inform how you process risk, how you handle risk, how you approach what is now your passion or maybe another passion, that is also very risky.
Thomas Lone (17:43.404)
Yeah, yeah. yeah, I feel at least it's very similar. I don't know exactly the statistics either. but for some reason I just have like after being in a paragliding community, it feels like paragliding is more dangerous. but I think paragliders talk about accidents all the time. It's like risk is all almost everything we talk about sometimes I feel. whereas in the mountains,
gavin (18:08.129)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (18:12.577)
People just go there, is my feeling. Like they they just accept the risk and they just go there and they just when they are there, they don't necessarily focus enough on the risk. So kind of my my feeling always in the mountain has been to accept the risk that I have to take. There are of course some objective risks that you can't really remove. but my objective has always been to minimize the risk, always. And
I guess my mindset is I try to kind of earn it, you know. I I say to myself, instead of just going on the expedition, even though I have the the money and the time, I really have to earn it by doing the homework. So I have to justify making the expedition by really lowering the risk because there are so many actions, just like in paralleliting, so many things you can do with proper acclimatization, of course,
training your body enough, learn about the avalanche risk, really understanding the weather and the snowpack and so yeah, do your homework. That's kind of the philosophy I felt like I tried to bring into paragliding. And even though like everybody I've had some gnarly experiences with with my paraglider, it has for sure helped. and the more mature I get into paragliding, it's I feel it's helping me just more and more to
to balance the risk reward thing. Especially when the reward is low. I sometimes just I don't fly at all because it's really not worth it. I wanna do this until I'm I'm eighty, you know. So yeah.
gavin (19:49.497)
No.
And you've got a new addition to the family that's probably changed the arc here a little bit as well. We'll talk about that in in a bit. But do you find yourself when you're in those gnarly situations flying your paraglider, do you find that your time that you've spent in the mountains helps you in any way mentally? And it does does it help you stay calm? Does it help you are do you do you find yourself going back to things that you maybe used in terms of mantras or breathing or anything that
Thomas Lone (19:57.122)
Yeah.
gavin (20:20.63)
you that happens maybe more automatically than it would for somebody that doesn't have that kind of background.
Thomas Lone (20:27.565)
Yeah, I think for sure it helps with really building that building a good intuition for knowing when to turn back and actually having the discipline to turn back is really important. And I've had to do that sometimes in the mountains, for example on Broad Peak, which which was overall a very successful expedition, great experience, and
gavin (20:41.303)
Mm.
Thomas Lone (20:54.903)
We did it on skis, so we managed to carry the skis and ski it down, but we never made the actual summit. So we made it above 8,000 meters into the death zone, and then there's like a long ridge, that's why it's called the broad peak until the actual summit. And the weather was turning bad, and we were feeling very weak after spending way too many nights above 7,000 meters. So even with that much prep work and money and being on the
for two and a half months we decided let's just go home and be safe. and that was a big it's it's it's really difficult to make that kind of call when you have so much skin in the game and everything you want to do is just reach reach your goal. so to be able to walk away from something like that has for sure helped me in in paralleling to kind of understand choosing the days, you know the
The more mature I get into the sport, I feel like the kind of maybe the biggest part of the safety work actually is just choosing the days and and choosing some days away, you know. so that's important for sure.
gavin (22:06.168)
It sounds like maybe, you know, rather than building so much intuition, which it did, but it also maybe instilled in you to be really aware of acutely aware of what can go wrong. What can go wrong in the mountains.
Thomas Lone (22:17.931)
Yeah. Exactly. And and do that on your own time. Like, even though we we of course know about all the hazards of paralyzing, from talking to other pile pilots and and from the cores and from the books and everything, but to actually create what if scenarios. That was something that started also in the army. The army loves to do this, of course. You know, you you make a plan to solve the mission in the team and then as a leader it's your responsibility to
to really focus on all the what if scenarios and have kind of a plan B and a plan C and go immediately to that step if suddenly you're ambushed or something. so that was that has also been a big part of paragliding. and asking then a ton of questions to really to kind of understand all these what if scenarios. You you need a lot of knowledge that maybe your average pilot doesn't necessarily
gavin (22:45.4)
Thanks, Ken.
Thomas Lone (23:12.665)
crave that kind of knowledge. You know, you really have to dig deep down to understand what could go wrong and what's the chance of it going wrong. Because if you don't have those two things, you can't really have proper risk management, right? I mean if you if you're ignorant to the risks then you can't balance it with the reward to a certain extent.
gavin (23:32.142)
Yeah, what we don't what we what we know we don't know, what you know don't know what's the saying? You know, when you're what it's it's that's that's always the tricky part is you know, when you're when you're early, if you don't get those cheap mistakes, you just don't know what you don't know yet. And it's you know, this background, I feel like the background of kiting and mountains is almost the kind of the perfect
Thomas Lone (23:48.533)
Exactly.
gavin (23:55.67)
opposite of a storm for you. It was it was it really laid a great foundation. And Will Gadd's always talking about that there are some sports, particularly flow sports, which climbing is not. I mean it's obviously you can get into flow in your mind, but it's not, it's, it's, it's not a gravity sport, you know, like skiing or snowboarding or mountain biking. but, you know, it it always makes him really nervous when he sees people coming into the sport that don't come from, you know, gravity flow sports, because you just
don't have that foundation. you know, but you had you had climbing, which is not, but you also had kiting, which really is, and it's a it's an interesting mix.
Thomas Lone (24:37.281)
Yeah, I it's for sure. I mean all kind of experience in nature I feel help. Just like even basic understanding of the weather and you see a thundercloud and you get some instinct from that. So it's it's for sure for sure helping. so assessing the risk is of course a big part, but then you also have the other aspect which is like I remember you have talked about in the podcast before as well, how you actually respond to
to things going bad, to the what if scenarios. and that I feel I've had quite some practice on in the mountains. suddenly we have a an avalanche close by or when when something goes wrong, you get kind of you get practiced on reacting to it in a rational way and don't let all the emotions and adrenaline fire you up too much. and that has luckily transferred into perilding so
so now that, you know, the last year I've been enjoying my time on the Enzo and it's you know, it's something else than than an A Wing for sure. So so when things hit when shit hits the fan there, I feel like I can react to it in a in a fairly calm way, you know. I I can manage to think and my legs come in automatically and I can kind of deal with it, assess my height. so as long as I have two reserves I'm not really that that skeptical, you know.
As long as I'm not soaring on some reach on full bar. Try to to not do that too much, but yeah.
gavin (26:09.239)
Thomas, in 23, you and your buddy Andreas climbed the it's the high the highest unclimbed peak at the time. How do you say this mountain? Muchu Chish?
Thomas Lone (26:22.069)
Yeah, Mochu Chish, exactly. we did we didn't make the summit though, we we attempted to climb it. Yeah.
gavin (26:24.633)
and then you did okay, gotcha. And then you did a speed ride and descent. So this is your you know you're you're flying now. what do you what do you think it is that draws you to this type of adventure?
Thomas Lone (26:43.199)
I've always liked to
gavin (26:44.311)
Yeah, what what what you know, that kind of objective is that's a big objective. There's a reason that the unclimbed peaks have not been climbed.
Thomas Lone (26:52.009)
Yeah, exactly. But I I think if it's all about exploration, right? To experience something new feels more unique. So then I'm more drawn towards it in a sense. you can just imagine for yourself the feeling of of stepping your foot on on a piece of rock which is above seven thousand meters and nobody has ever, ever in the history of of humanity been on there.
gavin (27:18.615)
Yeah, crazy.
Thomas Lone (27:19.657)
So so it's a cool objective for that reason. And also, of course, it's you know it's an ambitious project because nobody has been there. So that was also kind of a big attraction, because many teams had attempted and of course when we got back home we understood why why nobody had made it as well. It was simple tricky mountain. but and I guess a lot of the same attraction is what brought me into speed riding and paragliding as well, because it's
It's not unique in the sense that I mean, of course there are a bunch of other pilots around the globe, but it's I've always liked these niche kind of sports because it's a very unique experience. So it feels more at least to me, it feels more valuable while I'm doing it. whereas football, for example, you know, I've I've never really enjoyed playing football because it's just too too kind of mainstream. It feels like, you know, everybody could could buy a a rubber ball and and go to a football field, but to actually
learn how to fly a paraglider, you to spend years attaining all the knowledge and experience and then you can go and combine it with the mountaineering in the Himalayas and do do a speed glider glide ascent. That's to me it's so unique. It's totally amazing.
gavin (28:34.105)
What turned you guys around? Was it the weather or was this thing just obnoxiously hard?
Thomas Lone (28:38.579)
It was a combination of too hard and too I would say too risky. we were traversing a phase that was it was like sixty five degrees. It was super steep. so we couldn't really walk it. You know, we we were discussing like if we were crazy risk willing, we could in theory just like two ice tools and just, you know, walk it up with no rope. That would have saved so much time that it
could be attainable to reach the summit. Whereas we we didn't feel it. So we were we were walking up there, roping up, just the two of us, and you know, we had to stop every ten, twenty meters to to put in in some some anchors and then make a new new place to gather up the rope and start for a new section and it just it took so long that when we did the math working on seven thousand meters for so long we would never have made it.
So we did one attempt and and eventually we just had to turn back, like s still far away from the summit, like seven, eight hundred meters of elevation gained from the from the summit. Yeah.
gavin (29:48.312)
If you ever thought in all these adventures you've had, have you ever thought n I'm this is it, I'm done, I'm not gonna get through this? You've ever been in a situation that's really been I I think I'm gonna die.
Thomas Lone (29:57.133)
Thomas Lone (30:02.541)
One time yes. on on your peak, I was gonna say. Like on the gnarly, on the American peak. Yeah, that was that was gnarly for me. I was there with another friend, another Norwegian, Didrik. And we were unlucky with the weather, so when we when we came in it was like probably the worst timing you could choose that season. this was two thousand eighteen. And
gavin (30:09.443)
okay.
Thomas Lone (30:30.709)
And yeah, basically we we had to struggle with a lot of harsh weather just to make it to camp four. Have you have you been on the Nolly climbing it? Or no?
gavin (30:37.409)
Mm-mm, I just I flew by it. I did the way more reasonable thing. Now we never got that tall. When we when Dave and I went by
Thomas Lone (30:41.429)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. No planning is is easier, you know. But you should go there sometime.
gavin (30:49.869)
Denali, the day we did it, you know, because there's the Denali National Park is 200k wide, you know. So we had to, I don't know if you've seen the film, but it was, you know, we we basically were we stopped right at the edge of the park and and we had eight days of really bad weather, just mostly snowing the whole time. And then when so it finally we finally got a day to potentially pull it off, because they had given us permission to land, which you don't usually have, you know, you but you can always declare an emergency landing. So they just, you know, they had our trackers and stuff. They were watching us. So
I'm talking about the Force Service. And so they they just said, okay, you could land but you can't relaunch. And so we really wanted to attempt to fly the whole thing, which you definitely could do. We didn't. We we got shut down with bad weather. But you know, I think that day, there's actually a scene in the movie where I I I
Thomas Lone (31:24.578)
Yeah.
gavin (31:35.641)
mistakenly punch up into this cloud and I'm covered in rhyme ice and the whole wing's covered and everything. But I we only got to maybe eleven, eleven five, I'm talking feet, eleven thousand five hundred feet. I mean we had but so the peak was way, way, way above us.
Thomas Lone (31:41.325)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (31:49.963)
Yeah, how how high is it in in feet? Like twenty something or
gavin (31:52.537)
twenty twenty three or twenty twenty two something, I think it is. and you know, I don't I don't know that you could ever get that high there flying. I d you know, they don't have bases like that in Alaska. I mean, maybe in a really exceptional day, but you know, after Dave left, when I was on my own, I I got I think I got to and this was when
Thomas Lone (31:55.596)
Yeah. Yeah. Six thousand and one hundred and ninety meters. You know, they don't have basins like that in Alaska or maybe on really an exceptional day, but you know, after Dave left
gavin (32:13.752)
You know, the ground was zero. I mean, I was I was basically at sea level when I was walking, i I got to fifteen thousand, you know, which was was insane to be that high above the ground. It was incredible. I mean, that's kind of the stuff we get in Idaho, but yeah, I don't know that you could I don't know that you could ever topland an Ollie. I mean it would obviously be an extraordinarily day without the wind, but I don't know if you get bases up there that high.
Thomas Lone (32:16.726)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (32:25.075)
Yeah. Amazing.
Thomas Lone (32:36.781)
Exactly.
No, that's the that's the thing, you know, it's c close to the coast and all that, so yeah, and i and the the the climate there is just harsh, you know. it's just you know, you could have bad good weather there as well. there is a bunch of stories of climbers, they come in pre acclimatized and you could you know, climbing wise you could easily do it in in three, four days, you know. It's not really the distance but
gavin (32:43.566)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (33:04.873)
And it's not really too technical either, but we had like on the first three weeks on the peak, and we wanted to just spend three weeks climbing the whole thing. We had spent sixteen days inside the tent, totally shut down by weather. We couldn't go outside the bloody tent, you know. So we just fought everything we had so hard just to get to to camp four, and then finally the weather cleared cleared a little bit, and we had this one day we pushed up to camp five. And
Talking about risk, the problem then we were kind of so hungry for the summit and we were so ready to to push up, so willing to take extra risk that we couldn't really have a a rational relationship with the weather forecast anymore. So even though the forecast said it was not really optimal, you know, there's gonna come in a lot of wind and snow for two days, but then it's hopefully and probably gonna open up.
So we did this horrible judgment poll, me and my friend, these two two young Norwegians up there, that we were gonna stay in camp five alone and wait for the weather to clear out. Everybody else, it was like ten other expeditions up there, they rappelled down to safety in camp four, or and some of them even went all the way down to camp three. So we had two horrible, horrible days up there. with, you know, wins that I've never later in my life
experience it's like 40 meter per second wind and it was around minus forty Celsius and after the two days because we had food for exactly two days you know the the the gamble was full on for this weather to clear it just got worse and worse and worse and to make a long story short everything turned into one big kind of those cyclone things you know around the whole Alaskan range and eventually we actually spent eight
gavin (34:30.702)
Jeez.
gavin (34:36.858)
god, that sounds horrible.
Thomas Lone (34:57.629)
days in that tent in the wind and and that's the only point in on a on a peak I I really thought I might not make it back because we we were so weak at the end you know losing body weight like crazy and the thing was that the tent the the fly of the tent was the wind was so strong that the even the the inner cloth of the tent was hitting us in the face even though we were lying super
close to each other in the middle of the tent. And we really realized if with only out ice on the ground outside the tent, if if one of the poles break now, it's like talking about the what if scenarios, like how could we actually survive it? It was no shelter, no no no place to go and we would just simply freeze to death, right? So so that was an intense. That was intense for sure.
gavin (35:46.394)
That's a great commercial for that tent company because it's it it made it
Thomas Lone (35:52.078)
Yeah, it was that's the problem. We were students, so it was luckily it was a good model. It was one of those North Face VE twenty fives, they've been used a bunch on Everest and stuff. But it was really old, you know, the fly was the the you know the it's super crispy and you were just like you were ready for it to to tear tear up in any any minute.
gavin (36:03.298)
Yeah, the orange one.
gavin (36:14.99)
Have you had anything? Have you had anything that people always talk about Denali? It's always the cold. I the when when we were up there, we didn't have internet, of course. We didn't have cell service the whole time. So we you had we had our in reaches and Bruce, who was my supporter of my first two ex-alps, is really good at weather. And so I would ping him and he would he would ping me back and you know, hey, the here's what's going on with the weather. And it became this joke because whatever he said was completely wrong.
It was just totally wrong. And I mean, at at every level, you know, tomorrow you're gonna get sun, it'd be snowing. You know, it was just and what we learned was well I don't know how much we learned. We didn't learn that much. What we basically learned was that we couldn't figure it out at all and and nothing made sense. And I think it was just that range is so big and it's so close to the ocean, and then on the north side there's flat land, there's a l you know, it's a plane that goes all the way to
Thomas Lone (36:46.785)
Ha ha.
Thomas Lone (36:54.141)
Just what?
gavin (37:14.958)
The other o ocean, it was I I think it just creates it totally creates its own weather. And so, you know, the meteor, what little there is, and the you know, the forecasting was totally useless. It didn't help us at all. It actually hurt us. So prominent.
Thomas Lone (37:28.781)
So it's so prominent, you know. It's I think it's the most prominent peak on the planet. It's like the like you said, if you go around the range, everything is just flat lands around zero meters above sea level, and then you have this six thousand two hundred meter peak in the middle of there. So yeah, it's create it creates a lot of weather, that's for sure. Jesus.
gavin (37:51.631)
What's the coolest place you've been? I d you know, when you think about when you're lying in bed at night and you think about your mountaineering I'm talking about your mountaineering experiences, not your flying right now, but what's what's the one that you think, man, if I could go back, that that'd be the one?
Thomas Lone (38:06.175)
Yeah, that's actually easy. It must be Antarctica for sure. That was that was so unique, yeah. Stepping stepping my foot outside the the airplane, and climbing this Mount Vincent, it's called the the the highest peak in Antarctica. It was just like being on a different planet. It was so, so unique. Like nothing lives in there. Like we're talking interior Antarctica, right? You're you're as close to the pole, to the south pole as you are to the ocean.
gavin (38:09.891)
Really?
gavin (38:19.364)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (38:33.813)
And I don't know if even bacteria lives there. It's just like you're on this Star Wars ice planet kind of thing. and I love glaciers. and what I associate with glaciers is you would have this mountain range and then like in the Himalayas, you see the glaciers kind of they dribble down from the peaks, right? They they lay on top of the peaks like cloth. Whereas in in Antarctica everything is is upside down. It's it's the other way around. It's like
The continent by default is one giant glacier and only the strongest alp most alpine peaks are able to kind of penetrate the eyes. So you get these tiny black pinnacles that come up from the glacier. It's just so beautiful. It's insane.
gavin (39:10.148)
Gab through.
gavin (39:16.275)
Wow. Did did you how much time did you spend on the shelf?
Thomas Lone (39:23.53)
three weeks in Antarctica. Yeah.
gavin (39:24.74)
Three weeks. Okay. what was the hardest of all these? Was it Denali 'cause of the weather?
Thomas Lone (39:31.073)
Yeah, I'd say so. we were not too experienced at that time, plus it was an extreme year on on the mountain for sure. So yeah, Denali was was by far the the hardest one.
gavin (39:32.759)
Okay.
gavin (39:42.862)
What did you do isn't there this whole thing, is it Casyasco in in Australia or is it the one in Papua New Guinea? Isn't isn't there isn't the s
Thomas Lone (39:48.748)
Yeah. Yeah. I mean you actually it's it's a little bit strange that system because you have kind of of the seven summits you have kind of two lists. So you could do either one. We wanted to do the highest one and planned everything. We were actually w we had our transfer in Bali and we were gonna fly out to Papua New Guinea and suddenly a civil war broke out. So we had to change all the plans and we flew down to Australia instead and did Kosciasco. Yeah.
gavin (40:15.963)
Which is paved. I've done that one. Just it's
Thomas Lone (40:19.573)
Yeah, yeah. That was well it was right after I came back from Everest, so it's a super funny contrast. You know, I I spent ninety days of my life, so hard work to get to the top of Everest, and then I ran Mount Kosciosco ninety minutes from the parking lot up, you know. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
gavin (40:35.107)
Yes. Yeah. With it with another thousand tourists. It's a very, very different experience.
Thomas Lone (40:42.931)
Hilarious, yeah. But it was great. I mean, to see a kangaroos and do some surfing and we went to New Zealand and it was it was all great, yeah.
gavin (40:50.585)
Well tell me about being on Everest. Is you know, it we it just looks like such a shit show these days with just so many people on it. Is it is it still incredibly rewarding? Is it awesome or is it you just gotta do it 'cause you gotta take it off.
Thomas Lone (40:56.524)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (41:04.109)
I guess it's of course it it is a shit show to a certain extent. it's I I have to say I think the regulation is is really horrible and that's the main issue. Like it it needs to be regulated much more. It's the wild west, you can just you know if you have enough money you can you can buy kind of a setup. But I but from my subjective point of view being there
gavin (41:27.482)
Mm-hmm.
Thomas Lone (41:32.12)
For me it was an amazing experience. And I think a lot of this the idea that you can just go there with money and just pay your way up and you don't really need to be fit, you don't really need to plan and prep, I I don't find that to be true. at least not if you wanna have you know, respectable amount of risk. If if you go there with no experience, it doesn't matter how much money you have, you will your risk will go through the roof. And I
You know, I've seen with my naked eyes on that. I've only been climbing it one time when I made the summit, but I've been to the base camp like four four different seasons, and I've seen with my naked eye these kind of of clients, you know, with with just too much money and two sherpas, I've seen them them die up there. so it's all about like the mountain is the mountain, it's still as beautiful as
as it it has ever been. So if you can dodge the crowds, if you can choose a day with with worse weather but almost no people, like more and more experienced climbers are now starting to do, I would say you still get a very, very beautiful experience on Everest. but of course you cannot l no longer do I'm I'm born too late to really experience the the purity of it, you know?
If you really want to do that, you you would have to go there in in the seventies and the eighties, or of course before then as a pioneer. because then you could still do it alpine style even. now you couldn't technically even do it alpine style because some parts of the route you can't really just go ten meters to the side and climb it. You would have to be exactly on the the very narrow ridge where you would have footprints, you know, you would have
gavin (43:16.283)
They already fixed and
Thomas Lone (43:27.661)
footprints you wouldn't have pr perhaps a rope, so it would be very difficult for you to argue that you didn't use the already set up rope as as assistance, etc. So so in that respect, yeah, it's it's for sure a shit show. But but media is well the only thing I want to say to defend Everest a little bit is media is exaggerating th things extremely, you know like you would walk across hundreds of dead people and there is a ton of garbage on the mountain. I don't find this
gavin (43:27.749)
Yeah.
gavin (43:34.521)
Yeah, sure.
Thomas Lone (43:57.368)
to be true. I find it to be comparable to many other famous mountains around the globe. but Everest is a tiny bit worse because it's the regulation is really not good. That's that's it for me, yeah.
gavin (44:10.597)
W what is what does flying give you that mountaineering didn't?
Thomas Lone (44:17.521)
completely different perspective on everything I guess. again back to the the urge to explore. Nothing compares to a paraglider. I mean nothing. Because because you you can you can you can map so much terrain in such a short period of time. You could get so many unique experiences in nature in just one flight.
gavin (44:23.874)
Aesthetic.
Thomas Lone (44:45.631)
in one day that you would you would have to climb so many more mountains and do so many more expeditions to get kind of the same do open mid rush. Yeah, holy moly, yeah. It's just it's just insane.
gavin (44:53.983)
god, exhibit A, Antoine Gerard's 400 FAI, right? Holy smokes. I mean, the things he saw that day you couldn't do in a lifetime of mountaineering. That was incredible. Huh.
Thomas Lone (45:04.541)
Exactly. So even even after all the hard work when you reach the top, I mean the view is of course amazing, but but you can easily attain the same kind of views under a canopy. So it's yeah, it's just extraordinary. I I'm still totally amazed with with kind of how how much you can actually explore explore and the feeling of freedom that this sports really gives us. And the fact that you could do it in this pure way. I know I started with skydiving and
after a short while I hated being dependent on the plane and and the crew and all that. Just go with your backpack, hike and flies, run up in the mountains and go go for the day, you know, fly eight, nine, ten hours. it's just totally, totally amazing. Yeah.
gavin (45:51.42)
let's talk about your little one. You just you got a l little one on board. Wait, eight months? Is that what you said? Eight weeks? Whoa, you've properly got a little little one. Wow. Congratulations.
Thomas Lone (45:56.759)
Yeah, eight weeks actually. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. So I'm right in the bubble. Yeah. My wife Yannick will come home with him him after the podcast so then it's back to changing diapers and everything, yeah.
gavin (46:09.455)
I was gonna say you look pretty fresh, man. You might you guys must be getting some sleep.
Thomas Lone (46:13.505)
Thanks. Yeah, I did I have a good tip for you there. It's like a life hack. So if you if you have another kid, you should first buy two dogs and then you should sleep with both the dogs in your bed. Which I've done since we got there for two years. So they you know, my wife is like way on the side of the bed and I'm I'm there with the two big dogs, one in in each of my arms. Because then when you get the kid, the dogs have to go out of the bedroom, right?
They can't sleep as close to the babies. It's dangerous for the baby. So now suddenly you simply have to take the guest room and sleep alone with the the dogs, you know. So I've been sleeping there in the guest room now for a little over a month with the dogs and my recovery is actually quite good. It's not too bad.
gavin (47:04.047)
You're gonna pay the price for that with the wife, I promise you.
Thomas Lone (47:07.125)
Yeah, I know. No, I'm I'm joking a little bit. we did it for a couple of weeks and then now I moved back in in to the bedroom because now finally the dogs understand they have to be alone in the house during nighttime, so it's all good.
gavin (47:18.253)
I I really found this is an advice or anything, it's just w my experience. I really found that you know the first couple years, they really need, you know, we're we're just hanging on on the side over here. We're not really doing that much. I mean, you're changing diapers, that kind of thing, but they really need mom. They want mom, they need mom. You just you're peripheral. You're you're you're not that critical to the whole operation yet. That comes in later.
Thomas Lone (47:41.964)
It's yeah but it's true. I I guess it's true and and at some point, you know, I I I wanna just bring him along for all the kind of adventures I do, you know, and do all these low low key things in the we have a forest behind our house and just go five hundred meters into the woods and make a bonfire and make some food and go fishing in the river and, you know, do that kind of stuff. So and and tandem flying of course. I have all these fantasies about
gavin (47:51.173)
Sure.
gavin (48:05.092)
Yeah. Yeah. Awesome.
Thomas Lone (48:11.159)
You know, in in Norway we we have the trolls. trolls in nature is like a big part of our culture. So we're gonna go with the paraglider and search for the trolls in the mountains and then we can tough land and and stay in the tent and everything, yeah. So that's gonna be good. Exactly. Exactly.
gavin (48:15.174)
Yeah.
gavin (48:23.796)
Awesome. Taste the clouds. Have some cotton candy up in the sky. it's probably too early to ask you this question about well anyway. Is there has there been any shift in you've got this new responsibility, this new little bundle of joy sometimes? but you know, very reliant on you and mom.
Thomas Lone (48:43.829)
Yeah.
gavin (48:48.932)
Has has there been a shift in you know, I know for example, some ex house pilots that I competed with, you know, they would have a little picture of their kid on their flight deck just as a reminder of you do. Okay.
Thomas Lone (48:52.269)
For example,
Thomas Lone (48:59.275)
Yeah. I have that. I have that actually. Yeah, alright. Yeah. yeah, for sure. to a certain extent, yes. Like the I guess when I assess risk now, the if you say the risk is is probability times consequence, right? So the consequence is obviously higher because now it will not just be a consequence for me or my wife, but
But the future of little William as well. But on the other hand, I think that if you if your whole kind of if your whole flying style changes because you have a kid, for me that doesn't that doesn't really tell me that you now be became safe enough. It just means that you did a lot of stupid shit before you got a kid. Does that make sense? So ever since I started, know, I I
gavin (49:53.52)
Yes.
Thomas Lone (49:57.814)
Of course some sometimes you do mistakes, we're we're human beings, but for the four years I've been flying, I have never had at least a mindset of of doing decision making that I could not also justify to myself with a kid, if that makes sense. Like like I said, you know, I I wanna do this sustainably for a very long time and and that mindset has not really changed. So I I don't feel like I have to be suddenly become so much more
conservative in my style after becoming a father, if that makes sense actually.
gavin (50:33.274)
Yeah, I I found so Fallon was born right after the twenty seventeen race. And it was actually we had this whole
Thomas Lone (50:36.541)
It's
Thomas Lone (50:41.717)
It's
gavin (50:44.912)
thing that if Maddie went into labor early, you know, what would we tell Gavin? It was it was kind of a funny thing with the team. but you know, so she was born right after and so and then she was actually at the start of 20 the 2019 race. And I I didn't feel like things shifted for me that much. Certainly, you know, when I was in the air and this wasn't just in the race, it was just just in general, I would think about her and you know and process it. But I I haven't I didn't
Thomas Lone (50:50.391)
Yeah.
gavin (51:14.896)
feel real shift in risk. I feel like the shift in risk has happened more just maturing but also age. You know, and and I've been at it a long time. You know, I've seen I've seen I've seen a lot. And so I feel like that has been a bigger impact. But I know for many it's that it's you know having a child is it really alters how you approach risk. And I haven't I haven't found for me it's been that much different.
Thomas Lone (51:29.047)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (51:45.026)
No, same same for me as well, and and I totally agree. I I I just wanna make the point also that I was doing for sure a bunch of mistakes as as a b when I was a total beginner, right? And I did some some gnarly moves that that could have been really dangerous. so but the shift has not really come now from being a father. It's for sh it's by far come from a little bit from maturing, but most of all just really understanding
consequences and everything we talked about with the what ifs and your your ability to actually assess the real the hundred percent real risk because when I've done my mistakes I didn't do them willingly so to speak because I was just ignorant to how big the consequences could have become. I th I always thought I was on the right side of margins and then suddenly you realize you're on very much the wrong end of things and that's when things goes bad. So
gavin (52:16.592)
No.
gavin (52:30.202)
Mm-hmm.
Thomas Lone (52:43.625)
so I guess the more experience I gain, it doesn't mean that I'm safe in any way, you know, everybody can have an injury, but for sure, personally, I think that my likelihood of having a big incident now is so much lower than the first two years I flew, for example. Because of knowledge and experience. That's my kind of my main thing there. and skills.
gavin (53:05.958)
What yeah, I know you're I I think I know you're gaming for the Exalps is in your in your future. Is that still on the cards? Does the Okay, I read that somewhere and I think you and I talked about that. But align that with risk. y y you know you're going to be I mean, the last two have been extraordinarily good weather. you know.
Thomas Lone (53:14.731)
Hundred percent. That's the goal. That's the dream. Yep.
gavin (53:33.957)
have that bad fern day day two in this last one but you know compare I you know well back in my day but you know comparatively I think historically they've been in incredibly good the last the last two. So maybe yeah there hasn't been the weather factors that there has been in in many. But
How do you maintain that margin when you're racing and you're gunning for it and there's you know, the pressure is we put on ourselves, but it's hard to avoid. You know, you you I I I don't align with this whole thing that the pressure comes for you know being a gladiator. That's just poor shit. but it's but I I do I do think that, you know, it's just you're in the race environment. And I I've talked about this a ton on the podcast, but you
become different when you're racing and it's it's a it's a mindset that I wish I could find when I was just flying. And I you know the day before the race starts and the day after it ends, I can't be in that mindset. I the it the the confidence level is incredible and I and I'm not unique in this. I I think most people get into that mindset that you're just you're almost invincible, which sounds stupid and scary, but it's in some ways it's really good. You know have being that confident is is also
Thomas Lone (54:54.269)
Hundred percent. Yeah, and I guess I haven't really figured that out yet. It's it's just super difficult, I think, to be honest, to find that kind of balance. it's the same in the mountains, you know you to to be able to reach a very ambitious l goal in mountaineering, if you want to climb Broad Peak with no supplemental oxygen and you carry your skis all the way to the summit, you have to prep your mind to be able to go through hell and fire.
Get there, right? So you're you're building this insane confidence and killer instinct to just go through everything. And at the same time you have to be able to still take a reality check and pull back when you need to pull back. so you gotta find kind of the balance between those two things and and
Especially for Excel's like I feel now that I the last year I've come more and more into comp flying, I feel like you could aim to be top ten in the PWC without taking a fraction of the risk you need to take if you want to win the Excel. but again you don't necessarily need to have a goal of winning the Excelps. You could also have a goal of participating and and enjoying the adventure and
You are a father and pulling back. If, for example, you have crazy fern on one day, you know. we had this Norwegian guy, Al, who did the Excel's now the last edition, and on that crazy fern day, he he pulled back a little bit and he's strong on the ground, did a lot of work on the ground, and he still ended up doing an amazing Excel edition, made it to goal and and was super happy. So
So yeah, I I guess for me it's a kind of it's a little bit different if you want to really be kind of top ten in the or top five in the Excelps. It's a different risk management game for sure than that if you just want to participate. And and I guess I'm more in the latter. doesn't mean I'm not competitive. I I guess I have a lot of competitive instinct as well, but
Thomas Lone (57:07.725)
but I'm not my level is not up there either. So so the main objective objective I will try to to have it stay safe and enjoy the adventure. And I think with that mindset you can you can find that balance where you're on the the right side of of the margins, most of the time at least. Yeah.
gavin (57:28.451)
You had this great story about Denali and, you know, the that margin shrinking to nothing in a sense. have you had that experience in in paragliding? Have you had a you know, one of those a moment where you really got that margin wrong or you just found yourself in a place that is really instructive, you know, only talk about these cheap mistakes, but can you share one when you think back on your last four years of whoa, better lucky than good
Thomas Lone (57:55.212)
Yeah. Only only one time. Only one time. And that's the time I I basically spent all my beginners luck. And I'm forever grateful to the weather gods. so this is like now probably yeah, it's two two summers ago and I had a summer in the Alps with my with my wife.
gavin (57:59.239)
gavin (58:04.463)
Okay, let's hear it.
Thomas Lone (58:19.573)
just driving around a camper van, flying as much as I could and doing all these hike and fly races. I did I did seven hike and fly races that summer so so it's like really building up to to applying for the Excel. A lot of fun. And because I wanted to get to the Excel because of that goal when there was a big cloud yes I would have the instinct to go down and land.
gavin (58:30.269)
Wow.
Thomas Lone (58:44.661)
shy away from it but also I would have you probably know that feeling you you have some urge you have some stupid incentive to train you know it sounds so stupid but you kind of have to you you have a desire to find out where where the margins are and where is the limit and all that so so I had this giant cloud this is close to Bruneck if you know where this is yeah so I was flying in the valley
gavin (58:49.233)
Gotta train.
gavin (59:05.189)
Yeah, yeah.
Thomas Lone (59:10.509)
Thermaling, a weak thermal. There was a lot of sun to the north, and I had this enormous overdeveloped cloud to my south. It was fairly far away, like you know, 20 miles away or something. So I thought this is this is gonna be fine for now. And another stupid incentive, my car was there, you know, at the at the parking lot under Brunek. So I had this extra stupid incentive to go back and land where where Yannike was, and we would make some dinner. so I was flying.
Towards the cloud and suddenly the cloud started to drop rain. But it was in the next kind of side valley. So I thought the rain would not directly affect the airflow in the valley system I was in. I mean I'm just talking about a tiny little side valley here, but in my mind it looked like a a wall in between. And I also had practiced
gavin (59:55.943)
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (01:00:02.719)
a bunch of spirals. So I knew I could do I was on my seal light, I could do a 50 meter per second spiral to the ground if I had to and land in two minutes. I was maybe a thousand meters above the the ground. And suddenly it just yeah it just changed so fast. It was like suddenly everything started to lift. Not strong but like 0.5 and you know I was flying on speed bar around and then the gas front is coming and I didn't really know what it was.
gavin (01:00:26.993)
The gas front is coming.
Yeah.
Thomas Lone (01:00:33.107)
So after a couple of minutes with all that lift, I got scared and I started to spiral down. And I exited the spiral maybe really low, like literally 30 meters above the deck. And I I could see my wife Yannick. She was right below me on the main landing. I was the only guy in the air, of course. There were there was nobody else for many hours. I was pushing pushing the limits a little bit. I knew that. And then suddenly I could see.
500 meters upwind, I could suddenly just see the trees bending to the ground. It was like I will never forget this horrific image in my head. It was insane. so all the trees bent over and I just went on full speed doing my wing overs on my bees, trying to push it closer to the ground. And when I was maybe 15, 10, 15 meters above the ground, I just got nuked backwards. And we're not talking about normal
backing up. We're talking about like, you know, I I flew 200 meters backward in a couple of it felt like five, ten seconds. It was just totally insane. and I think the only margin that saved me that day was the the luck that I had no like major, major obstacles behind me. No big buildings, no power lines, not even trees. I had fields for maybe a kilometer. And
just trying to focus on keeping my glider open. That was that was the the hardest keeping my glider open training I've ever had and eventually I crashed into like one of those big corn fields with the two meter high corn things and luckily managed to kill the glider. It it started to rain a little bit. I I estimate the wind must have been twenty meter per second around there. and gathered the glider and just
gavin (01:02:14.922)
perfect.
Thomas Lone (01:02:28.925)
One minute later, it rained like I was in a shower. It it was the the strongest rain I have ever experienced in my life and it happened on that day, flying my parent ladder. So my wife was running over and now even today, you know, that that's the I walked away, no injury, but the the worst part is that she still have some trauma left when I approach landing. It it could be I mean she she doesn't mind
gavin (01:02:40.935)
Yeah.
gavin (01:02:52.335)
watching it. Yeah.
Thomas Lone (01:02:56.407)
Flying tandems, looking at me flying, or she's not afraid of me flying, but if she is down on the ground looking at me landing, that's like a a trigger still because of that incident. so that was that was just insane. And of course, I have to add to the story that when the rain started to to calm down after 10 minutes, we we heard sirens all around Brunek. So you know what I felt like
Yes, I did a horrible judgment call, but I also had kind of bad luck on top of it because this was apparently it was like an extraordinary overdeveloping day. where, you know, trees had been breaking down and cutting power lines and houses were destroyed. It was kind of insane to be in it. But that's not a day you wanna fly a private liner, that's for sure. Jesus.
gavin (01:03:42.373)
Mm.
gavin (01:03:46.483)
These these kinds of storms that I I had an experience flying from Fiche to Davos, you know, up over the Firca Pass and and and down the Pascour and you know, there was this cell that had been brewing way to our south. I mean w down in the s southern dolomites. I you could see but you could see this thing
long ways away and it had just been building and building and building. It was that same thing. Once we got into the Davos Valley, this thing dumped. And you know, I I later learned that there was a Swiss League thing going on and at least two people died in that storm flying. And and it was one of those kind of things where we should land. We should land.
We should land. You know, I was with my buddy Bruce, who was my ex-off supporter. And, you know, just one more valley. Do we could get one, you it was one of those just cumulonimbus that just kept getting this anvil kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And just thought, it it's so far away, there's no way that can reach us. And when that thing dumped, man, it went so far. It came to us from forever. And
Thomas Lone (01:04:54.379)
Yeah. And this is also something I've realized like this is a a typical maturing thing that
back in the you know two years ago I would just see a cell and think about the distance I had to it and stuff, but now I think more okay, there's a cell far away to the east and there's one to the west, so it tells me that the the air mass is fucked, you know, that the air mass is just gonna go haywire any second now. So there is really no way to hide, and especially if you're not racing to to win the exalts or some stuff, what's your incentive not to land? You know, you you could take an extra bus for one.
gavin (01:05:15.315)
Yeah.
gavin (01:05:29.032)
Yeah, yeah.
Thomas Lone (01:05:30.915)
hour to get back home, especially flying here in Norway, there can be some long retrieves, but it's better to do some extra long retrieves than to than to have an incident like that, you know.
gavin (01:05:40.571)
Yeah, it's just it's we're just not smart enough to know how how far you can push that line. If 'cause i you know, and if but that's the problem, when you're in the race, you're gonna push it. It's just it's just a it's just part of it. You know, even if you you go into it with all these rules
Thomas Lone (01:05:46.443)
Exactly.
Thomas Lone (01:05:50.859)
Yeah. Yeah.
Thomas Lone (01:05:55.979)
Yes. And I tried to stay humble to that, so
gavin (01:05:56.039)
You're gonna break them, you know. And there's that whole thing is you can walk, I could fly that 20k in so little time or I can walk it. I might just a little bit further. But I don't know how many there were so many times where it was I would land one time I landed, I think this was in the 2021 race, which the weather that year was horrible the whole way, but I landed and it rained so hard seconds after I landed that it washed a road out. I mean it was j my team couldn't even get to me because it was that was a little tight. I could have given that 10.
Thomas Lone (01:06:04.489)
Yeah. But of course you then
Thomas Lone (01:06:20.639)
Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, and that's the ironic when why with the incident I just told you about as well, you know, if I landed five minutes before that
gavin (01:06:25.952)
Ten minutes, you know, not thirty seconds, but
Thomas Lone (01:06:36.213)
I would never have been flushed back the 200 meters and I would have a completely different experience of everything. So that's also something I try to do to really like if you have a a near incident, you should be as strict with yourself. You should you should apply as many new actions or you know, because you really have to be as angry at yourself when it could have gone wrong as when it goes wrong, for sure. I think you will live longer that way.
gavin (01:06:53.244)
Yeah, for sure.
gavin (01:07:03.236)
Excellent. I think so. Thomas,
Thomas Lone (01:07:06.069)
Ha ha ha.
gavin (01:07:08.654)
What a cool talk, man. I really appreciate it. This has been a load of fun. We could go for a couple more hours, but as I told you before we started, I I've got to run of this thing. But thanks so much, man. Thanks for sharing all this. It is the application period for the for the for the big race. I'm sure you've already applied, so good luck. And our timing couldn't be better. So you've got some get some heavy training ahead here and it'd be fun to be fun to see you at the at the start next June. But Thomas, thanks a lot, man.
