Holly Budge is a British entrepreneur and adventurist of grand proportions. On October 5 2008, Holly became the first woman to freefall in front of Mount Everest. She exited the Pilatus Porter at 29,500ft, falling at 140mph, in -40C wind chill conditions, before landing on the world’s highest dropzone at 12,350ft.
An experienced equestrian and widely travelled, she had high expectations of the first ever Mongol Derby. In this interview at The Adventurists HQ she explains that the world's toughest horse race lived up to its billing.
The Mongol Derby was beyond my expectations. To be honest we didn't really know what to expect!
There are a few things that in hindsight I'd do differently but considering this was the first Derby, it went amazingly well considering what could have gone wrong!
I think it's a brilliant idea for an adventure and the horses were awesome.
Bunch of Monkeys...
The Mongolians [horsemen] said to us at the end that they were really impressed with all our riding.
They saw us at the beginning and thought we looked like a bunch of monkeys and honestly didn't think we could complete the 1000km.
So when we actually did it (I did it in 9 and the last guys in 11) with no real hiccups they were very impressed. And some of the horses were pretty wild and feisty.
By the end they they were saying wow, these guys can ride....
Semi wild horses – fun to ride?
I had a really good run of horses. I was delighted with them and thought they were really fun to ride.
It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. I definitely could have gone tougher but there were tough times like the day I was on my own in the mountains and I was soaking wet in the rain and very cold too.
That was probably my lowest afternoon with the whole range of swinging emotions but after that I felt really relaxed and loved being filthy dirty! I could have stayed out there longer on the steppe.
Travelling light
I satrted the race with a lot of kit that wasn't needed, and every other rider had this experience. I started the with a stove, food for every day, sleeping bag, and all sorts and by the end of the race I got rid of everything.
I didn't eat lamb at the beginning but I ate loads of mutton and goat by the end because I was hungry and I ditched my food so I ate loads of Mongolian food at the horse stations. Plus we had an occasional entourage of Mongolian horsemen who appeared every now and again and gave us beers.
That was the only thing I found disappointing – if there weren't any beers at the horse station after a long day!
Chaffing and injuries
I got on really well, I didn't have any chaffing, just had a bad ulcerated lip and burnt ears. The reason was that I stood up a lot when I was riding like the Mongolians do. Other people put their weight in the saddle a lot more and they got really bad chaffage!
Will was probably the wortst affected – fair play to him for carrying on. He was really very sore all down the back of both legs but he battled on and just dressed up the affected areas every day and got on with it. Apparently the fact that [censored] had a chaffed testicle got published somewhere so the world knew about that.
Julie got kicked in the knee early on and she had a swollen knee but also carried on, which was impressive as a lot of people would have pulled out if they'd been in a similar position. 
Ready to go solo
There were definitely times when it was a real psychological challenge and more so for some than others but I think what helped us all out a lot was riding together.
Before I arrived I was prepared for riding this race solo and be potentially camping out every night on my own. So when I teamed up with Sas that made it a lot more fun and enjoyable and I think a lot of other people felt the same. A lot of people turned up and didn't plan to ride as teams of people but that's just how it turned out.
A couple of people who spent more time on their own may have had lower moments I think.
Cracking bunch
I think it was such a fantastic bunch of people, everyone really did get on and we're planning reunions already. Everyone felt really close – some more than others by the end of it!
The joint winner
Charles and I were saying at the end that we want to do it again next year.
Winning the race was Charles' goal from the beginning, and he said he was very happy that he won it. He did also say that he didn't experience as much of the Mongolian culture and hospitality of the people along the way because he pretty much rode and slept the whole way.
But because was on such a mission from the outset, he knew what he wanted to do and he did it incredibly well. He really did do brilliantly - everyone wanted him to win and was totally behind him, so when we heard that he'd gone over the finish line we had a sneaky beer!
Highs and lows
Some of the real highlights of the trip were times spent hanging out and eating with the local Mongolians along the route, eating meals together and sleeping in the same gers. Camping out in the mountains was specatacular but temporarily losing my horse wasn't so good.
We had to fit two of us in a one man tent and had no water for a worrying period of time while we waited for some help to arrive. The horses had got themselves loose when we stopped and though we found them again with the help of some of the oragnisers we couldn't catch up with the leading pack again. Before that incident Sas and I were 4th and 5th in the field. [The horses were fine and sustained no injuries during this incident]
One reason it took so long to sort out was because we were tricky to find – we thought we would be really clever and go 'as the crow flies' but really we should have thought about the fact that we were heading for lots of mountains! We ended up right in the hills.
The Bog
On another occasion we tried to go the direct route and got stuck in a bog and my horse started sinking which was pretty scary. Thats when we thought maybe this official route (plotted by the organisers) is set up to take us around things like that bog!
The horse was absolutley OK but that was initially really scary because we ended up right in the middle of it and it could have been really dangerous. Overall the route was really very cool and from then on we followed the plotted route given to us.
“I'd go again...”
A woman in UB after the race said to me 'your face is rather sunburned!' and I replied 'well when you have just ridden 1000km across Mongolia in 9 days that's what you get!' just as the lift 'binged' and I headed out.
What an amazing thing to do. To have ridden 1000km in 9 days is great. But I also think it wasn't quite as hard as people had originally perceived. At my lowest time when I was on my own and felt pretty vulnerable out there in the mountains, even then I had two emergency buttons so you're never totally alone when you have that. When you chat to people like Benedict Allen he was really alone in the middle of nowhere! For us it was more of a mental game.
I think all the support team were brilliant, they were always right there, but not too much. They hung back just enough!
At the finish line if you'd have said, off you go, ride back 1000 km, I would have done it, definitely! And it wasn't just me - there was a few people that said that actually.
To follow Holly's exploits after the Derby and to see if she comes back again next year, check out hollybudge.com