A Garfield Ridge native just did something that even a robot couldn't handle: she ran an ultra-marathon across the ice of East Antarctica in temperatures plunging to roughly 32 degrees below Fahrenheit, and she beat a humanoid machine entered in the race. Nicole Las crossed the finish line in a little over seven hours, while her mechanical competitor, a humanoid robot named Qestr, tapped out after covering just under two miles when its battery gave out in the extreme cold.
Las completed the race on Sunday at Ultima Air Force Base in East Antarctica, according to NBC Chicago. “It was about 35 below Celsius which is 32 below Fahrenheit,” she said, describing the conditions she pushed through for the duration of the race. “It took me a little over seven hours to finish,” Las told the station, a finish time that put her well ahead of the robot she was technically racing against.
A Battery No Match for the Ice
Qestr didn't make it far. The humanoid robot retired after covering just under two miles once its battery gave out in the punishing cold, per the station's report. A separate account from CNBC TV18 describes Qestr running alongside 24 human participants before its battery ran out after roughly 3 kilometers. CNBC TV18 explains the mechanical culprit: in freezing conditions, the chemical reactions inside lithium-ion batteries slow down, which increases internal resistance and reduces the energy available to power a device.
Las, for her part, came prepared for exactly that kind of cold with layers of clothing, while Qestr wore a specially designed thermal jacket. She wore three layers on top, including base layers, fleece, and a windproof shell, along with a base layer and windproof, waterproof pants, multiple layers of socks, and gloves and mittens. “I had three layers on top,” she said of her setup, a strategy that kept her moving long after Qestr's systems failed.
A Growing Résumé of Extreme Races
This wasn't Las's first brush with brutal-weather distance running. She previously finished the 2025 North Pole Marathon in 10 hours, 12 minutes and 53 seconds, according to her athlete profile on Qestr's website. Speaking with CBS News Chicago about that race, Las said, “I've done 11 of them, I believe this was number 12,” referring to her overall marathon count.
Back home, Las built her endurance base on more temperate ground. She has competed in five Bank of America Chicago Marathons, last running the race in 2018, the station's report notes. Next year she's trading the extreme cold for a far milder course, with plans to run a marathon in Sydney, Australia.
Beyond the Local Finish Line
Antarctic ultra-distance racing has drawn a small but fierce field of competitors in recent years. At one such event, only four of the eight runners who started a 100-mile race actually crossed the finish line, according to BBC Sport, which described a course built from dozens of loops around a short circuit in the Schirmacher Oasis of Queen Maud Land. Records from that circuit show runner Yusheng Ni completing 100 miles in just over 17 hours, improving his own previous mark by more than five hours, while Stephanie Case became the first woman to finish the 100-mile distance nonstop, setting a time of 17 hours, 31 minutes and 39 seconds.
For Las, the appeal of pushing her body through conditions that can disable a robot comes down to something simpler than records or rankings. “It's part of the spice of life,” she said of taking on extreme physical challenges, a philosophy that has now carried her from the Chicago lakefront to the North Pole and across the Antarctic ice.
