A 21-year-old Norwegian woman has become the youngest person to reach the South Pole on skis, her team says.

A 21-year-old Norwegian has become the youngest person to reach the South Pole on skis alone and without assistance, her team told AFP on Tuesday.

Karen Kelso achieved this feat overnight between Monday and Tuesday, 114 years after her fellow Norwegian and polar explorer Roald Amundsen became the first person to reach the South Pole.

Keliso, who was born on May 9, 2003, covered 702 miles in less than 54 days.

“It is a written page in polar history,” her guide, Norwegian adventurer Lars Ibbesen, told AFP.

Keliso posted pictures on Instagram showing her arrival at the South Pole.

He thus dethroned the young Scandinavian, Pierre Hedin of France, who, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, holds the record for being the youngest person to reach the South Pole, solo and unaided, at the age of 26.

The record was set on January 7, 2024.

Keliso, who stands just 5 feet tall and weighs 106 pounds, pulled a sled weighing 100 kilograms, twice her weight, in her attempt to reach the pole.

In a November interview With the Shackleton Adventure Company, Keliso said “one of the hardest parts was gaining weight.”

“Since I am smaller than the average man doing this, I need the extra weight and strength to pull the same load,” she said, adding that she had increased her body weight by 10% before the expedition.

Kelso arrived late Monday night in temperatures of around -25 degrees Celsius (-13 degrees Fahrenheit).

She is already the youngest girl to cross Greenland on skis, completing the feat at the age of 15, in 2018.

“No sooner had I arrived (in Greenland) than she asked me, ‘Do you think I could also go to Antarctica?’” Ebbesen recalls.

Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Sture praised the young adventurer on Tuesday, saying she was “following in the footsteps of Norwegian polar heroes.”

On December 14, 1911, Roald Amundsen became the first person to reach the geographic South Pole, as part of a tragic race against Briton Robert Scott, who died of exhaustion and cold on the return trip with his four companions.

Keliso’s achievement comes only a few years later Preet Chandy skied solo to the South PoleBecoming the first woman of color to achieve this achievement. “I want to encourage people to be proud of the color of their skin and proud of where they come from,” the Briton told CBS News. “It took me a long time to be proud of that.”