Ep. 1214: Mountaineering in the Gap Years with Tom French
Adventure Sports Podcast
Curt Linville
4.6 • 579 Ratings
🗓️ 22 May 2026
⏱️ 58 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Cross-Country Skiing: A former competitive skier's return to the sport after a 33-year business career proves it is never too late to reclaim the outdoor passions that define you.
Tom French is a seasoned adventurer and former competitive cross-country skier who dedicated 33 years to his business career before deciding to pursue his lifelong passions in retirement. His journey back to these activities not only reignited his love for the outdoors but also provided valuable insights into the benefits of pursuing your passions at any age. After spending years focused on a career, many people find themselves craving the activities that once brought them joy. Tom’s story illustrates the power of taking a step back and reevaluating what truly matters.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You're listening to the Adventure Sports Podcast. |
| 0:11.0 | We talk with adventures from around the globe to give you the inspiration you need to get started in the outdoors, |
| 0:17.0 | or keep moving if you're already there. |
| 0:20.0 | Hi friends, welcome today to the Adventure Sports podcast again. I'm so thankful that you're here. |
| 0:26.2 | I'm going to enjoy this conversation a lot. I just met Tom French, who is our guest today. |
| 0:32.2 | And Tom was in business for 33 years and decided to retire, but he had this idea of returning to the things |
| 0:39.9 | that he had loved doing years and years and years and focusing on it in a way that he called |
| 0:45.6 | The Gap Year. And we're talking about things like Everest and Shalazzi and cross-country ski |
| 0:53.1 | racing. We're going to talk about all this kind of stuff, |
| 0:55.8 | but what it's like to return to, |
| 0:58.3 | I don't know if I should call it the first love, |
| 1:00.3 | the early love after retirement. |
| 1:03.0 | Tom, welcome to the Adventure Sports Podcast. |
| 1:05.6 | Thanks, Kurt. Great to be here. |
| 1:07.5 | Tom, I just told you before I hit record |
| 1:10.0 | that this sounds fantastic. I want to do it. |
| 1:13.9 | To say, you know what, it's time to get back into the things that I love. But let's rewind a little |
| 1:20.7 | bit because you were doing the ski racing and mountaineering for a long time. So what's the backstory on that? |
| 1:29.5 | Yeah, the backstory is I grew up in a community of people who were big into mountaineering |
| 1:35.9 | and the outdoors and cross-country skiing. My father, in fact, owned and ran an outdoor sports |
| 1:42.0 | shop staffed full of climbers and full of cross-country |
| 1:45.7 | skiers and all that. So I kind of inhaled all of that in my early youth, ended up doing a lot |
... |
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