When Carolinian put out a call for “fearless Gamecocks” a few months ago, we received some great stories and photographs.

We heard from Carolina alumni whose thirst for extreme challenge takes them up mountains, around racetracks, and into the wild blue yonder. Some of them wheel across tennis courts and slalom across the water. These brave adventurers include a nursing professor who scales the world’s tallest peaks and raises scholarship funds every step of the way; a professional racecar driver who teaches highway safety; and a lifelong athlete who studies to become a counselor and coach to young athletes.

In short, we heard from men and women who wholeheartedly subscribe to the adage, “If you’re not living on the edge, you’re taking up too much space.”

Here are nine Gamecocks who regularly gather up enough Carolina courage to live on the edge.

Patrick Hickey, M.S. health education 2000, Dr.P.H. public health 2004, MSN 2006; nursing professor, USC.

Patrick Hickey carried Cocky to the bottom of the world. Now he’ll take him to the top.

Since 2001, Hickey has been on a personal quest to climb the highest mountain on each of the seven continents, known among mountaineers as the Seven Summits, in seven years. He’s topped six summits, having conquered Antarctica’s Mount Vinson three days before Christmas 2006 with Cocky in his pack.

With six summits behind him, Hickey is just one peak away from the high of a lifetime. If he’s successful, he will complete the Seven Summits—his seven in seven—with Mount Everest in late May 2007. He plans to have his picture made with Cocky there, too.

“The Seven Summits of the world are kind of like the holy grail of mountaineering,” said Hickey, a clinical assistant professor in Carolina’s College of Nursing. Hickey received his master’s of science and doctor of public health degrees from the University’s Arnold School of Public Health and, in December 2006, graduated with his master’s in nursing from the College of Nursing. “When I started researching the possibility of climbing the Seven Summits I found that there were fewer than 100 people in the world who have done it.”

Although Hickey isn’t the first to climb the Seven Summits, his accomplishment will be a solo achievement in one way. After having climbed Mount Everest, Hickey will be the first registered nurse to conquer the Seven Summits, and he is using that distinction to bring attention to the nation’s shortage of nurses and the shortage of nursing faculty to teach them.

“The S.C. Hospital Association reports the current vacancy rate for registered nurses to be as high as 18 percent in South Carolina, and some reports estimate that the Palmetto State has to recruit 40 percent of our nurses from out of state,” said Hickey, who just marked his 30th year as a nurse. “Every year, nursing programs in the United States turn away more than 26,000 aspiring nursing students because of a lack of faculty and funding for students who don’t have the financial means to reach their goal.”

But, as Hickey reaches his goal, more nurses in South Carolina will be able to reach theirs, too. In collaboration with the College of Nursing, Hickey has initiated a scholarship, aptly named the Summit Scholarship, for nursing students at USC (www.sc.edu/nursing/SummitScholarship.html).

Peggy Hewlett, dean of the College of Nursing, said the college has set a modest goal of $29,035, or $1 for every foot of Mount Everest. A native of Canada, Hickey, 51, had never climbed a mountain until 1993 when he and his wife, Carol, were backpacking through Latin America. They were in Banos, Ecuador, when he ran into a group of Israeli tourists in an outdoors shop.

“One of the gentlemen turned to me and said, ‘Hey, you, you want to go climb a mountain?’ I looked at my wife. I had never considered anything like that before in my life, and I said, ‘Sure, why not?’” Hickey said. “Five days later, I was summiting a 20,000 foot mountain, my first experience ever. I had no training at all, but I was hooked—the thrill, the excitement, the pushing myself to the limit.”

When he returned home, Hickey began challenging himself with 14,000-foot peaks in Colorado. “When I started looking into climbing higher mountains, I heard about the Seven Summits,” he said.

Hickey began with Mount Aconcagua (elevation 22,841 feet) in Argentina in 2001. In 2002, he and his wife summited Mount Kilimanjaro (elevation 19,340 feet) in Africa. In 2003, he topped Mount McKinley (elevation 20,320 feet) in Alaska.

In 2004, Hickey climbed Mount Elbrus (elevation 18,510 feet) in Russia. In 2005, he and two other climbers became the first in three years to climb Carstensz Pyramid (elevation 16,023 feet) in Indonesia, just north of Australia. The mountain had been closed to climbers because of political unrest.

“It was an Indiana Jones adventure from day one,” Hickey said.

A helicopter dropped the climbers at the base of the mountain but, socked in by weather, never returned with their support team and provisions.

“So there we were with no communications, no walkie-talkies, and no food. We took inventory, and among us, we had three or four power bars,” Hickey said. “We determined we were going to have to summit the next night.”

Exhausted, the three climbed a 3,000-foot rock face all night and made it to the summit, but “it took forever to get down and back to our base camp,” he said. “We slept as best we could.”

The next day the group returned to where they thought a helicopter would pick them up, but it never came. They started hiking down the mountain through the highest mine in the world.

“We were about half an hour on the mine property when we were arrested by the military at gunpoint for trespassing,” Hickey said. “We spent the day in the barracks. Initially, it was kind of nerve-wracking because nobody could speak English, and we couldn’t speak their language.

“Our guide wasn’t there with us. He’d been taken someplace else. Finally he showed up with this military commander and a bunch of boxes of food, and they threw them at us. We hadn’t eaten in like three or four days. Knives and forks aside, we just ripped into the chicken and rice.

“That broke the ice, and then all the military guys were friendly with us. We have pictures of them with their arms around us. Their pictures of us are probably posted somewhere in their barracks now—crazy Americans. But we successfully summited and made a lot of headlines at the time because we opened the summit for the world. That was very exciting.”

After traveling in December to Antarctica—where he summited Mount Vinson (elevation 16,050 feet) in temperatures that dropped to 40 below zero—Hickey is preparing for Mount Everest (elevation 29,028 feet). He developed his own training regimen, climbing the stadium steps of both the upper and lower decks of Willams-Brice, taking the stairs instead of the elevator, running regularly, working out on the stair and rowing machines at the Blatt P.E. Center, and consulting with a USC nutrition professor on diet.

He left for Kathmandu, Nepal, in early April. Then he flew into Lukla (elevation 9,000 feet) and began a 10-day hike to the Everest base camp at 17,600 feet for about two month’s of preparation and acclimatization before his ascent up the south side of the mountain.

Hickey will continue his push to promote the Summit Scholarship and to make people aware of the critical shortage of nurses. “I cannot imagine a world without nurses,” he said. “I’m climbing to the top of the world in honor of the profession that has meant so much to me and gives so much to others.”

DeAna Shealy, Spanish, ’72; ESIS/ACE USA, Lake Lanier, Ga.

Thinking that competing would ruin the fun of water skiing, DeAna Shealy didn’t enter a tournament until she was 49 years old. But when the Columbia native broke the Georgia state record for the slalom event—skiing around six buoys at 34 mph—she got charged up. Within five years she became a national champion in her age bracket; two years after that she was a world champion.

“I won the gold medal in Women’s Slalom at the 2006 World Senior Trophy in Durban, South Africa. Representing the USA in this competition had a very special meaning to me. My father, ‘Babe’ Shealy, passed away when I was 13 years old. He died on active duty in the U.S. Army after having served for close to 25 years. While standing on the podium receiving the gold medal, I kissed the American flag I was holding and said out loud, ‘This is for you, Babe Shealy!’ I was proud to be his daughter, proud to be an American, and proud to be a skier associated with a team of outstanding athletes. Thanks to all of them for sharing the thrill of a lifetime with me.”

Elizabeth Isherwood Johnson, journalism, ’77; Pilates studio owner, graduate student, Charlotte, N.C.

A former USC tennis player and radio talk show host, Liz Johnson competes nationally and internationally in track and field, swimming, and beach volleyball. She has more than 50 U.S. and world titles—a goal she completed in eight years and a week before her 50th birthday. She played strong safety for the Carolina Spartans professional football team for two years, and was the first woman to complete a decathlon in the U.S. Masters Decathlon Championships.

“As a child, I was very fortunate to participate in organized sports like field hockey, gymnastics, and lacrosse. I still haven’t found anything more fun than putting myself on the line. Right now I’m in graduate school, pursuing a second master’s degree in counseling at UNC Charlotte. I’m studying ethics and would like to use my degree to become a sports ethicist. I’d like to help athletes discover how they can gain more enjoyment out of training and competing, how they can lose better, how they can win more. Competition makes you more virtuous and adds to the richness of your life; it teaches life lessons in a well-defined sports framework.”

Edward M. Henderson Jr., civil engineering, ’64; State highway department materials lab, Seattle, Wash.

Ed Henderson’s excellent adventures began when he saw a television show on mountaineering. Henderson now has climbed over 100 peaks in the U.S. and Europe, including Mt. Rainier, Wash.; Mount Hood, Org.; and the Matterhorn, Switzerland. His service activities include being president of the Mountaineers, the third largest outdoor recreation and conservation organization in the country.

“Mountain climbing is an adrenalin rush. It’s the camaraderie, the shared experience that I enjoy. The unsuccessful trips are more memorable. On a successful trip, you get to the top, see a beautiful view, then leave. On an unsuccessful trip, you get lost in the woods or slip on a rock face—that’s more interesting. My favorite climb is probably the South Early Winter’s Spire in the Washington Pass area of the North Cascades in Washington State.”

Burke Fitzpatrick, master’s, criminal justice, ’79; Office of Justice Programs, S.C. Department of Public Safety, Columbia, S.C.

Burke Fitzpatrick began skydiving as a graduate student at Carolina. He has more than 5,029 jumps to his credit now and flies high performance ram-air parachutes. On the weekends, when his Carolina Skydiving Team isn’t doing an exhibition jump, he is a tandem instructor at the Skydive Carolina! Parachute Center in Chester.

“My small claim to fame is that my team was the first to skydive into Williams-Brice Stadium, and I’ve jumped into the stadium for football games more than anyone. My last jump there was in 2001 when I piloted a tandem rig and brought in Cocky, with one of my teammates in the costume. For some reason, every time my team has jumped into a USC football game, the Gamecocks have won. Coincidence? I’m not so sure.”

Brian Smith, mechanical engineering, ’89; owner, Full-Lock Industries, Simpsonville, S.C.

A high-performance car testing job with Michelin Tire Corp. put engineer Brian Smith on the road to racing. Now he owns his own company and drives and tests racecars and production cars, drives professionally for various teams, coaches entry-level racers, and instructs clients on highway safety. He also organizes corporate day entertainment events, such as several recent South American ride-and-drive events for BMW. In any given year, Smith will race in Canada and numerous states across the U.S. The job requires a lot of travel, but he finds other adventures while he’s on the job.

“I like to parasail, water ski, snowmobile. When I was in New Zealand doing some snow testing for a tire company, I was in the area where bungee jumping originated. I wanted to try it. They were having a winter special: two jumps for the price of one. So I took two 160-foot jumps off a bridge. The second jump was kind of boring. I’ve since found out about a 440-foot jump. That’ll be next.”

Bob Masella, ’95 law; Masella Law Firm, Columbia, S.C.

A car accident left Bob Masella, an All-American soccer player, in a wheelchair. Not willing to give up sports, he looked around for another passion and found tennis. Masella recently won singles and doubles competitions in an International Tennis Federation wheelchair championship on Hilton Head Island. His able-bodied teams have won numerous titles in the past eight years, including three appearances in the U.S. Tennis Association’s National Championship finals. He’s also involved in the Association’s goal of integrating more wheelchair players in able-bodied league tennis.

“As far as I know, I’m the only guy in a chair who plays able-bodied tennis at the championship level. I enjoy the social aspect of tennis because it gives me the opportunity to be with friends and family while enjoying athletic competition. My wife and our two daughters also play.”

Cynthia M. Flating, criminal justice, ’78 master’s; U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Department of Homeland Security, Honolulu, Hawaii

Cindi Flating can’t help but be a stickler for rules and regulations. After all, she worked in law enforcement with the Tampa Police Department and now is a financial officer with U.S. Customs and Border Security in Honolulu. So before climbing into the passenger seat of an acrobatic plane in 2005, she donned the necessary equipment: parachute, headphone, and USC T-shirt.

“We took off over the Kailua beach coast and the Koolau Mountain Range for about 45 minutes total. The plane takes you vertical and then 360 degrees. You dive-bomb down; you do positive G maneuvers, barrel rolls, hammerhead stalls, lazy eight loops. I’m kind of crazy in some ways. I’ve tried parasailing, whitewater rafting, and scuba diving. I’m a runner and a volunteer trainer for the Great Aloha Run every year. But the most intoxicating adventure has to be that plane ride.”

Ray Krolewicz, education, ’79 master’s; S.C. Department of Juvenile Justice, Columbia, S.C.

Winning isn’t enough for Ray Krolewicz, wearing number 16 at left. He likes to set records and beat everyone who ever ran the race. He has had considerable success as a runner of ultramarathons—races longer than a standard 26.2-mile marathon. When he isn’t teaching at the Department of Juvenile Justice, he competes in races in the United States and Europe. He has run as many as 21 ultramarathons in one year, and has some 80 marathon wins. He writes a blog called “Running Around” for The Columbia Record Web site and, for more than 20 years, he has written a column in Running Journal magazine. As for training, well, he just goes out and runs.

“When I coach other runners, I tell them, ‘Don’t do what I do.’ I run 40 to 240 miles a week, no weight training, no special diet. People ask me if I want to win the master’s races. While that would be OK, I just want to win. Period. ”