Polar team enjoy Canary Wharf ice rink training

The team managed to get in a few hours practice pulling tyres round the rink last Thursday night

Tyre pulling is an accepted training technique for polar explorers, simulating the effort of pulling a fully-laden sled through the Arctic wastes. Normally it's restricted to paths, so the team were delighted to be offered the chance to use the rink by owner Brian Jokat.

Charlotte said: "It was really helpful because you don't often get the chance to train on ice. We weighed the tyres down with water to make them a bit heavier and it was interesting to learn a bit more about the techniques we'll need to get across the Polar ice.

"Unfortunately we were told to stop by Canary Wharf security at 1am, when we had hoped to do a few more hours, but it was still a useful workout. We'd like to say a big thank you to Brian and the Canary Wharf Ice Rink guys."

Team Icelated have solved one problem since they were last featured in The Wharf, having added a third member, Annelie Simmons, to their ranks. She had a run out with the team around the rink, and more than pulled her weight.

Charlotte said: "Annelie's a great girl. She's raring to go and luckily she's already pretty fit as we've only got a few weeks until the race. She completed the Mongol Derby last year, which is a 1,000km horse race across the Mongolian wilderness, so she's pretty tough."

With the final team member in place the focus now, apart from continued training, is to raise the cash to make sure they will be on the start line in Canada in April.

Charlotte said: "We do still need to raise a fair bit and we'll be going all out to do it. We met a lot of people in Canary Wharf before we went on the rink last week and they were really generous. We raised a couple of hundred quid just by taking a bucket round. It's a start, although we do need a lot more.

"We're going to be doing some sponsored tyre pulls and other fundraising but what we really need is for a Wharf company to come on board and support us.

"It's guaranteed publicity for them as we will be getting a lot of media coverage, and there would also be the satisfaction of helping us beat the Norwegian and American teams we'll be up against in the race."

If you think you can help contact Charlotte at icelated@13thflaw.com.