ADA TSANG

In May 2021, Ada Tsang, 44 became the fastest woman to climb up Mount Everest with a time of 25 hours 50 minutes, beating the previous record of 39 hours 6 minutes by more than 12 hours. Climbers usually will spend several days in different camps before reaching the 29,031-foot peak to acclimatise themselves with the different altitudes. Tsang left the Everest base camp at 1:20 p.m. and embarked on a non-stop climb, reaching the top at 3:10 p.m. the next day.

Ada achieved this in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic that had affected other teams in their attempts to climb up the world's highest mountain.

After two previous failed attempts in 2014 and 2015 to reach the peak of Mount Everest, Tsang quit her job as a life education teacher at a secondary school in 2017 to pursue the quest to become the first Hong Kong woman to reach the top of Mount Everest. She finally achieved that goal in 2017 with full time training and having to professionally raise funds to support her expedition.

An avid athlete since her school days, Tsang only picked up climbing seriously in 2010. She had set a goal to conquer Mount Everest and she started with no experience in mountain climbing. She had to go through years of high intensity training, climbing ice and rock. She also started running long distances to increase her fitness level. Despite the setbacks from her earlier attempts, she never gave up on her goal and took lessons from the failed attempts to help her achieve her goals.