It’s not every day the CEO of a corporate multinational hauls a bright red mini-trailer — harnessed to himself — solo along the Alaska Highway.

But Monday morning, drivers on the corridor between Two Mile Hill and Erik Nielsen Whitehorse International Airport saw just that.

Mike DeNoma, 58, plans to pull his brand new carbon fibre carriage on foot, as he was yesterday, from Eagle Plains to Tuktoyaktuk, N.W.T., this weekend in one of the toughest foot races in the world.

“If the snow’s any deeper than an inch, the skis come into play,” he told the Star, pointing to the three runners attached to the conveyance.

DeNoma will not only be his own beast of burden in this weekend’s Arctic Circle ultra-marathon, towing a modern, miniature Conestoga wagon; he’ll be sleeping in it.

Competitors in the 370-kilometre Likeys 6633 Ultra 2015, which will launch Friday, shed the kind of luxury accommodations common to the three dozen hotels under DeNoma’s supervision at GLH Hotels Management, based in London.

They bring their own food, clothing and sleeping kit for use along the Dempster Highway en route to the Beaufort Sea.

Two drop bags for “limited essential gear” are allowed at Fort McPherson and Inuvik, according to the Likeys website.

“Hot water and shelter are the only things guaranteed at the checkpoints,” it says.

DeNoma, sponsored by his own hotel group, first leapt into endurance running eight years ago.

“I started on my 50th birthday.”

He was in Nairobi, Kenya, and volunteered to stay behind a blind man throughout the race to help guide him and make sure competitors steered clear.

“I thought if he could overcome blindness, I could overcome laziness,” DeNoma said.

The former banking executive went on to compete in ultra-marathons in Brazil, California’s Death Valley, and the Athens-to-Sparta Spartathalon in Greece.

The gruelling foot treks range between 215 and 250 kilometres.

DeNoma – a U.S. citizen who lives in London – continued to sponsor the runner from Nairobi in marathons in Singapore and Hong Kong, seeing the athlete achieve the remarkable time of two hours, 32 seconds.

The money raised on DeNoma’s own runs will go toward a children’s cancer foundation.

Over the past decade, he has raised roughly $1 million, he said.

DeNoma also heads the International Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

How does a hotel chain CEO, charity director, husband and father of six have time for ultra-marathons?

“Get up at 3 in the morning.”

As for his transportation device, the unique sled boasts cold-resistant bearings and kevlar-lined tires.

It’s big enough for DeNoma to hop in and lie down, which he did in a demonstration Monday.

The vehicle’s wheels go through the skis, which have large slits in them, to allow the sled to travel over snow without removing any parts.

Designed and built in Derbyshire, U.K., the wagon uses materials, like carbon fibre, more often seen on space shuttles, plus a built-in stove and razor-thin insulation.

DeNoma seems to have incorporated carbon fibre into his life model: “Strong as steel, lighter than plastic.”