How to Train Like Ernest Shackleton
Ernest Shackleton never reached his goal. His ship, the Endurance, was crushed by pack ice before his crew set foot on the Antarctic continent. And yet he is remembered as one of history’s greatest expedition leaders, because he brought every one of his men home alive across some of the harshest conditions on Earth.
Training like Shackleton is not about a single heroic feat. It is about building the deep, durable base that lets you keep going when the plan falls apart. Here is how to build it.
What “training like Shackleton” really means
Shackleton’s survival came down to three trainable qualities, and none of them is raw speed.
- Endurance over months, not minutes. His crew hauled boats, camped on drifting ice, and rowed open water for weeks. The body that does that is built slowly.
- Cold-weather competence. Staying functional in brutal cold is a learned skill layered on top of fitness.
- Steady leadership under stress. Shackleton’s calm was a discipline he practised, not a gift he was born with.
You can train all three. Follow how they map to concrete milestones on the Shackleton route.
Build the endurance engine
Shackleton-style fitness is aerobic and relentless. The goal is to move at a moderate effort for a very long time without falling apart.
Start with time on feet
Forget pace. Build the number of hours you can spend walking, hiking, and rucking each week. Begin with three sessions of 45 to 60 minutes and grow the weekend outing toward three or four hours over a couple of months. Keep the effort conversational so you can recover and repeat.
Add the load
Endurance journeys involve carrying and hauling. Ruck with a loaded pack, starting light at around 8 kilograms and progressing slowly. Once that feels solid, add tyre drags to mimic the boat-hauling and sled-pulling that defined the Endurance escape. Lean forward, drive through the legs, keep the rhythm.
Strengthen the whole chain
Twice a week, train the muscles that protect you over long efforts:
- Hip hinges and deadlifts for the back and posterior chain
- Step-ups and lunges for single-leg strength on uneven ground
- Loaded carries to build grip and a resilient trunk
Train for the cold
Shackleton’s crew survived because they managed cold, wet, and exhaustion at the same time. You build that competence the only way it can be built: outside, in real weather.
Refuse to cancel sessions because of rain or frost. Learn how your layers, gloves, and boots behave when conditions turn. Practise the small tasks that get hard in the cold, like setting up shelter and preparing food with numb hands. And always learn the warning signs of hypothermia and frostnip so your toughness never tips into danger.
The Shackleton mindset
This is the part most training plans skip, and it is the part that made Shackleton legendary.
Train your calm
When the Endurance was lost, Shackleton did not panic. He reset the goal from reaching the pole to getting everyone home, and he kept morale steady through nearly two years of hardship. You practise this by deliberately seeking out hard, uncertain sessions and staying composed when they do not go to plan. A storm on a training hike is a gift: it is a rehearsal.
Protect the team
Shackleton famously watched over the weakest members of his crew, sharing rations and keeping spirits high. If you train with others, make the group’s success your measure, not your own. Adventure is rarely a solo act, and the habit of looking out for others is trained the same as any muscle.
Adapt the goal, keep the standard
The lesson of the Endurance is that the objective can change while your standards do not. When your plan breaks, you do not lower your effort. You find the new path and keep moving. That is a mindset you can rehearse every week.
A sample Shackleton-style week
Once your base is underway, a typical training week might look like this. Adjust the numbers to your level and progress them slowly.
- Two endurance sessions: easy-effort walks or rucks of 60 to 90 minutes, building over time.
- One long session: a weekend hike or ruck of three to four hours, the cornerstone of the week.
- Two strength sessions: hinges, single-leg work, and loaded carries, kept short and consistent.
- One drag or haul session: a tyre drag to train the pulling pattern, building from 20 to 60 minutes.
- One full rest day: non-negotiable, because the base is built during recovery, not just effort.
The point is not any single session. It is the repetition, week after week, in good weather and bad. Shackleton’s crew survived because they had built deep reserves long before they needed them. Your weekly rhythm is where those reserves are made.
Make the journey concrete
Reading about Shackleton is inspiring. Building his base is a different thing, and it is far easier when the path is broken into milestones with dates and a finish line you can see.
That is what Footsteps does. We take Shackleton’s journey and turn it into a training arc, from your first loaded ruck to your first cold overnight to a final challenge that echoes the real thing. Each milestone is a checkpoint that keeps you honest and moving forward.
Begin the Shackleton route, or browse every expedition route to find the explorer whose story fits your year. The Endurance is a century away. Your first hour on feet is today.