I don't really get summit fever.

Two of the people I have been hiking with recently talked about how they each get summit fever, and it scares me. I told both of them, "Don't attempt Everest yet, please." I really don't get summit fever much any more. I did, when I was somewhat new and felt I needed to get the summit to build up my climbing resume. But after enough bad weather days and a couple close calls high in the mountains, and reading enough accident reports, I don't really care about making the summit like I used to.

I like mountaineering, climbing, hiking, skiing, and being out in the mountains on difficult terrain in general. The summit is just a pile of rocks and snow, and they all basically look the same. The main difference is the size of the Longs Peak or Devil's Tower summit plateau vs a much smaller one like Crestone Needle or Mt. Everest, the same way some parking lots are larger than other parking lots.

It's interesting, the number of times in the last few years when I've been within about 500 vertical feet of the summit and been ambivalent about making it to the top. I would not have guessed this is a mental state of a climber. I used to think everyone wanted to get to the summit on every attempt. But now I realize that the process, the climbing itself is most of the fun. I've been on the top of well over 100 mountains above treeline, and while I will keep going after summits, I have no problem turning around near the top if conditions aren't right.

People will keep dying on Mt. Everest.

It's in the news again, people are dying on Mt. Everest. I'm not surprised. The photo that is being circulated this year (https://www.outsideonline.com/2397164/everest-summit-traffic-jam) of the summit ridge traffic jam is pretty crazy. For perspective, when I summited at 4:35 AM on May 21st, 2016, there were three mini groups of 2-3 people each ahead of my Sherpa Tshering and I. In other words, my ascent was totally unencumbered by traffic. I have always had more traffic on the Casual Route on Long Peaks than I did ascending Everest. However, on the way down we passed the approximately 35-40 other people who summited Everest from the south side May 21st, and 40 is a very manageable reasonable number. Even 50 or 60 is probably no big deal, but when I see 80+ doing it on the same day, that's just too many.

Because Everest is the tallest, it's going to keep attracting people with the time and the money... and not necessarily the experience. I don't have a lot of sympathy for most of the people that die on Everest, the way I do for starving people in South Sudan, disabled veterans, Ebola victims, victims of gun violence and car accidents. When you go to an 8000 meter peak, you need (in my opinion) to think about all of the different ways you could die, and how that would affect people you are leaving behind, and then either go or don't go. Maybe 5-10 percent of the people that show up at Everest basecamp every season leave and go home when the full reality of the possible consequences (their death) hit them. I respect that. It's better to realize that when you are within a half mile of camp two or in the Khumbu ice fall than on the summit ridge.

That harsh attitude being said, there are some accidents, such as people who die alone in their tent of a heart attack or a pulmonary embolism, that do make me feel sympathetic. Especially since last year, when I had a pulmonary embolism, what if I had another one on an ordinary day at base camp? You can't predict that.

What are some possible solutions to reduce crowding and deaths?

• Extend the season. With better weather forecasting, instead of waiting only for the eight perfect days a year we need to start using those days, and then the next best eight days, and probably extend the season into June a week or two.
• Limit the number of climbers each day. It would not be that hard to put a human check point 200 yards outside of camp four where the fixed ropes for the summit start, and limit it to 60 or so people per day. Since you don't want to start a fist fight, people (Sherpas and Nepalis included) would be banned for life from getting a permit if they went past the check point after 60 people. (While it can be confusing to identify people in down suits, it's not that hard.) I realize this sounds nearly impossible to have a staff of say four people at the south col for a month, but with increasing helicopter technology it would not be impossible to drop off oxygen bottles. Plus, there are plenty of loose rocks at the south col, a makeshift stone hut could be built to protect a little area from the wind. Difficult? Yes. The potential to save lives? Yes. The possibility to do fascinating human research? Yes, definitely.
• Start fixed ropes on another route, probably the west ridge. Actually, you could avoid the deadly Khumbu ice fall by going straight up to the ridge from base camp. I guarantee that announcing fixed ropes on the west ridge would attract a higher caliber of climber, because it will be hard, it's steep above 7000 meters. At this point, anything that takes the pressure off the south col route would be good.

Risk and Failure

I've been thinking about risks lately and failure. What is the risk to test X in Y environment? What is the risk of taking job A? What is the risk of climbing mountain B? What is the risk of not climbing mountain B?

It is interesting how my perspective on risk has changed as I have grown older. For starters, I'm more aware of the risks, across the board. On a mountain I now realize the many ways I could fall that I might not have appreciated before. At a race I realize the worst that could happen is roughly what happened to me at the 2015 24 hour world championships. I can't imagine it being any worse than that, at least in a road race or track race. So why not swing for the fences? Worst that happens I flop and spent the last six months "wasting" my training cycle. Yet, the truth is, by staying in shape, I'm not wasting a training cycle, even if I "waste" the race. It's more experience and I can come back and try again.

Similarly, 2010 was a pretty rough year for me, and after it was over I sought the safety and security of a big stable pay check, and a pension. Now that that has been achieved I'm curious what options might be out there with more upside, even if there is substantially more downside. Like the questions of climbing the mountain above, it's a risk to do it, and a risk not to do it. I don't have an answer to which is the better risk to take, and I don't have any secret announcement to reveal, I'm just saying I am curious in a way I was not over the past six and half years now.

People seem to regret the things they did not do, rather than the things they did do. Psychology Today seems to write about regret every other month. In other words, it feels strange sometimes to talk about the risk of not climbing Mt. Everest, or the risk of not running 24 hour races, but those are legitimate risks that I will regret if I did not do them.

On the topic of failure, it is so much dependent on how you view it! I will be honest, I'm not always the most optimistic about my failures, but on the other hand, based on the feedback I get, I'm more positive than a lot of people. After I returned from Everest in 2014, many people viewed that as a failure for me. I did not get above basecamp, at least on the actual route. Yet for me, a situation like that happening, while unexpected, was a possibility. The best 8000 meter mountaineers seem to average about one summit for every three 8000 meter attempts, so showing up at basecamp, and not getting a shot at the summit, that happens, a large percentage of the time. At least, it used to happen more frequently when weather forecasting was not as good, equipment was not as good, and people were not as skilled.

Similarly, when Janzen Gear failed in 2010, it hurt, and I don't like talking about it, but I learned a lot from the experience and it helped me to realize that even if I fail, life is not over, there will be other jobs. I've said in the past, and it's a constantly changing number, but I am comfortable with about a 30% success rate, but as I realized recently, it depends on what we are talking about. Despite what people may think, because I don't talk about it as much outside of work, I put way more energy into my engineering than I do my running and mountain climbing, and I would really like a higher rate of success in that part of my life. Similarly, I like to have more success in running than mountain climbing (as measured by achieving my race goal time or distance, and summiting the mountain) because I run maybe two big races a year, yet I can climb seven 14ers in seven days, and the consequences of a potential failure (death) on a mountain are more significant than in a race.

Similarly, Ed Viesturs said that the statistics of 8000 meter mountaineering deaths didn't apply to him, and I get what he means, so many people die from inexperience (or overconfidence) that if you can rule that out, the statistics are much different.

Risks are all around us, and we all fail regularly, it's just a question of which risks will you take and what failures are you okay with?

Ueli Steck Died

Here is the story from Alan Arnette, the best Everest season coverage.

Ueli was in Pakistan in 2009, as I was. He drove up the Karakorum, because we saw his name on log books as we drove up it. In 2016 late May, I believe he stayed at the Yak and Yeti when I was, ate breakfast just 25 feet away from me, alone. I never walked up to him because I was partly starstruck, didn't want to be that fan guy, and third, wasn't 100% sure it was him. Everyone at these mountain climbing things look about the same, fit, a little disheveled, wearing plaid name brand button up shirts, white, male, and mid 30s. Believe me, I wish there were more women in the sport.

After the fact I learned we had a mutual friend, so I sent our friend an email telling Ueli (although I misspelled it Uli) I would love to climb something with him. She forwarded it to him, unsurprisingly, I never heard back. The pool of people in the world who want to go fast on 8000 meter peaks without oxygen is small.

He was the best. The Swiss Machine as people called him. And now he is dead. He died the #1 most common way to die in the mountains, falling while climbing unroped. Everyone does it to some extent, and it's as risky as risk comes. Every year there is some famous or semi famous climber that dies while soloing, and despite what the best climbers say (including myself, definitely not a great climber, but not exactly an average one either) about soloing, it's dangerous!

I'll leave you with this video below of a speed record he set on a famous face, the north face of the Eiger. My thought is that he probably slipped and fell on something like the steep, but not really steep, section shown near the end of the video. Maybe a rock hit him. Maybe the snow was soft. Maybe there was some verglas.

He is survived by his wife. He had no kids, was 10 years older than me, and was a professional. Events like this make it easier to focus on running instead of climbing mountains.

A Comeback

Tuesday night, yesterday, I ran a 6k tempo on the track, and it took me 22:12, which is 5:57 pace per mile. It's pretty exciting to be doing a workout at sub 6 minute pace, but it's also a long way from the 20:12 6k tempos that I ran back in 2011 and 2012.

I don't know what is next for me. In many respects I've accomplished what I set out to, I was on Team USA, and I climbed Mt. Everest. The motivation changes as I age. Yes, part of me knows that what I have done is not enough, not as much as is possible for me, and racing faster and climbing more challenging routes still call, and are very possible for me, but then again the couch also calls after work some days when I just don't feel like exercising.

Perhaps this is my seven year sabbatical from difficult physical sports? In 2010, being unemployed, I played a fair amount of video games, ran in the middle of the day, and read quite a lot. While I didn't like it at the time, applying for every available job I could find, in hind sight it was nice to have that break, at least for the first two months.

In the moment, it's hard to really know the extent that something has an effect on you. It's also terribly hard to identify having peaked. Meb Keflezighi ran his fastest race and won the Boston Marathon at age 38 in 2014. When I saw him at the 2007 Olympic Marathon Trials in New York struggle to the finish in 8th, I thought at age 32 his career might be over. A win in New York and Boston, and fourth place at the London Olympics later... I was obviously wrong.

If I wrote a book about mountaineering, would you be interested enough to buy it?

The question is in the title. "If I wrote a book about mountaineering, would you be interested enough to buy it?"

It's something I've wanted to do for a long time, but I haven't because I've written books before and while one had over 100 reads, nobody paid for it. So I spend all this time writing and what I have to show for it might as well be a blog post when I am done. In other words, good editing costs money, and so does good formatting. I'm okay at both but certainly not good at either. Aside from editing and formatting, I don't want to write it if no one is going to read it. Blogging is one thing, I just jot down my thoughts, have the time to organize them a little and hit "publish" and I'm done. A book has to flow and you can't just simplify it into a series of 700 word segments, which strangely is something I am finding in many of the newer books I am reading. I mean, it's fine you can do that, but it's the easy way out and some issues don't lend themselves to simply a series of blog posts.

Khumbu Icefall and I

For those people that don't know me well enough to make a recommendation here is some background. I grew up in the relatively flat midwest, got started backpacking in high school and progressed to rock and ice climbing and mountaineering in college. From there I went to Pakistan, Yosemite Valley, and just about everything else in the lower 48 States you've heard of, and then Nepal twice, culminating with my summit of Everest in May. However, about 5000 people have done the same, so why is my story any different? Well, I more or less taught myself, and prepared very well for my Everest expeditions. You can ask anyone on my Everest expeditions and I am relatively confident they would all say that I was well prepared. In other words, if everyone prepared and climbed like I do there would be significantly fewer deaths on Everest and other 8000 meter peaks. And the best way I know of to share that is through a book.

Camp 3 on Everest South Side

Nolan's 14 2016 Trip Report

At 4:17 AM on Sunday, July 3rd I was shivering in a moderate snow storm on the top of Mount Huron. It was my fourth 14,000 foot mountain in 20 hours, and fourth time I had precipitation above 14,000 feet in the last 20 hours. I think I am going to take up scuba diving in the Caribbean.

Summit of Mount Huron

The story on my Nolan's 14 attempt this year starts well before 4:17 AM July 3rd. For starters, I ran part of the route back in 2014 as a reconnaissance for an attempt. Unfortunately a key bridge was out, and I ended up with a very different route than I intended. Still, it was a really good experience and I made three summits I had not done prior.

Fast forward two years, to the completion of my second Everest expedition, and summiting Everest. Hiking from 10,000 feet up to 14,000 and running back down just to repeat it all, requires that a person is acclimated. Hence, not living at altitude the best time for me to attempt this route is in the two months after an 8000 meter expedition, while I still have some of the extra red blood cells in my body. Another consideration is that I have very little vacation until March of 2017, thanks again to using 10 of my 13 days on Everest. (And six weeks of unpaid leave of absence...) So the long July 4th weekend in 2014 and 2016 have been prime time to go. Plus, being so near to the summer solstice means having a lot of light and not as much dark, which is a huge plus when tackling off trail routes.

I mentioned attempting this a few times to my sister and parents. After my last attempt, I learned carrying all of my food and equipment for two days was very heavy and slowed me down. Being required to purify all of my water was inconvenient too. Having a support crew would solve many of my challenges. It would allow me to change clothing if (when) I got wet, take only the equipment and food I would need until the next "aid station", and not have to purify water most of the time. Plus, a crew allows for the X-factor. For example, I was hungry for some hot food and ordered Chinese food Saturday night for when I arrived at Winfield. Which is a long way of saying, this is now the third time my sister has crewed at an ultra for me and the second time my mom has crewed at an ultra, although my mom has taken care of me before and after a number of road races and track races in the past. My family is awesome! They may not think they are a great crew, and we all certainly have more to learn about ultra running, but I would say they are excellent support crew!

So I suppose I need to actually talk about the attempt. I left work just after 3 PM on Thursday and drove to Denver. Note: not a whole lot of coffee shops are open between here and Denver after 5 PM on a Thursday, but Wichita and Salina do have Starbucks open until at least 6 PM. The drive was uneventful. It was really nice, under 9 hours of driving, but closer to 10 hours with stops. That's a welcome change from the 13-14+ hours from Dubuque to Denver. I arrived after midnight to my dad's cousin's condo and after some short greetings and some conversation, fell asleep.

The next morning we woke up and had breakfast with the relatives, who just insisted on cooking for us. Yeah, I'm definitely staying at their place again! Eventually we made our way to the airport and picked up my sister. Them my mom, my sister and I headed to REI for a huge purchase of gear and food. I bought a new sleeping bag and a pair of rock climbing shoes. Neither of which I used on this trip, although I was prepared to use the sleeping bag if necessary.

After Everest, after actually climbing to the top of Mt. Everest, there is a certain element of not waiting to live my life any more. I delayed purchases, neglected to keep up with the Jones, and lived a spartan life to be able to afford the adventure of Mt. Everest. Now that it's over there is a question of what am I saving for? Thus the hundreds of dollars I spent at REI in less than an hour.

We headed up I-70 around noon, and since none of us were particularly hungry, we ate snacks in the car, stopped at Walmart in Evergreen for water and potato chips, and drove to Leadville. We checked into the Motel 8 and then headed off to check out trailheads. My mom and sister were not the most confident in their navigating skills. Fortunately my dad created a folder with detailed driving instructions from trailhead to trailhead and I circled all of the road crossings, or "aid stations" on a topo map as a back up. I've learned from previous experience that trying to meet up can be a huge challenge as schedules change or there are multiple trailheads, or trailheads are hidden from the road. So we scouted several road aid stations under overcast skies.

View of Mt. Massive from Leadville on Friday.

Dinner at Qunicy's, of course. Seriously, for the price, it's hard to get a meal that good. I had the prime rib... delicious. By the time we finished eating, it had been a long day and we headed to the hotel and went to bed.

5 AM came plenty quick on Saturday morning. Getting ready was pretty standard. Sometimes I am nervous before what is certainly going to be a long day, but I wasn't really. We had coffee and pastries at the only place open at 6 AM in Leadville and then were off to the Fish Hatchery!

Getting started I floundered around getting onto the Highline Trail. There are so many trails around the Fish Hatchery that it can be a bit confusing trying to take the shortest route. Eventually I got onto the right trail, and then the Colorado Trail and then the Mt. Massive trail and I just cruised up it.

My sister asked a great question, "How do you pace for an event this long?" Well, I just try to keep it slow enough, a low enough effort, that I can keep going. If I overexert for a time, then I try and slow down. I think I was pushing a little too hard up Massive, I was breathing pretty hard on the ascent. Certainly that's part caffeine and part adrenaline but a little overconfidence too. I felt so prepared for this attempt, I thought it was going to be a breeze. That's an understatement of course, but I did think it would not be too hard.

Mt. Massive was easy, even though it was raining lightly most of the time I was above 13,000 feet. I even descended the south face really fast despite not trying. Around 13,500 feet I tripped and fell and whacked my left knee and skinned my hands. Tripping while running down a mountain is a huge risk. I was well enough that I returned to running, but my left knee did begin to swell up.

At the halfmoon trailhead I met my mom and sister to restock my food and refill my water bottles. I ended up only eating 100 calories in the 4 hours it took me to go up and over Massive, which is not much, but eating is always hardest at the beginning, and it was cool and rainy, which also doesn't encourage hunger. For example I wore tights and long sleeve the entire first four hours. It was a cloudy, cool and wet day.

After an excellent transition I headed up Elbert, and I nailed it. In 2014 I headed up the ridge on the right, and you need to head up the ridge on the left to avoid a few minutes of back tracking. When I made the top around 1 PM I was the only person on top, with clouds and rain but no lightning. That's the second time I've been on top of that mountain in the afternoon alone in stormy weather. Yet it always works out well for me.

Descending Mt. Elbert

I headed down the ridge and that is distinctly an unpleasant little jaunt at a decent altitude, despite my smile above. Especially when it is misting. However I headed south enough and met up directly with the Golden Fleece Mine, which again saved me some time over my 2014 run. Once picking up the trail it's a solid trail down that is very runable.

My mom and sister were cruising up and down highway 82 because the trail I came out of was branched off a driveway and they didn't find it. So when they came past I handed them my backpack and I jogged to the La Plata trailhead. After a quick restocking I was off again. I was pretty excited at this point because it was still early afternoon and I had done the two highest mountains and I felt good, although my knee was still bothering me a little.

The hike up La Plata was uneventful, until about 13,500 when the clouds rolled in and there was a little mist and light rain, for the third time that day. Fortunately this whole part was on a nice trail. It was my first time summiting La Plata, despite four summits of Elbert just to the north. I was on the top around 7 PM I believe. I headed down the south ridge and again there was a faint trail not well marked but certainly easy to follow. Around 13,000 feet it solidified and was quite clear all the way down to Winfield.

View of La Plata Descent

The down hills were hurting my knee more than the uphills and I was starting to struggle. On the way down La Plata around 12,000 feet you go through a very wet section around a lake, a bog sort of, with chest height bushes. It was draining, it almost sucked my shoes off a couple times, fortunately it did not. Once down into the tree the trail was better, and then it turned into a road and I ran down into Winfield, making it there near the end of twilight, using my iphone as a flashlight. I struggled to find my mom and sister, eventually finding them on the south side of the creek near a campground. I had texted them from La Plata to get me some Lo Mein if possible, and they totally came through! I sat there, shoes covered in mud, knee hurting, tired, and oh it tasted so good.

I had not made concrete plans ahead of time about my schedule, like when to sleep and where. The reason being, it is a hard call, and I still don't know what is best, even writing this three months later. Winfield is the perfect place to camp, because it's accessible by any vehicle. Also, there are seven mountains between it, and the next two wheel drive accessible "aid station". So using a minivan as the support vehicle the options are basically, plush camp at Winfield early in the 14 mountain adventure, plush camping at Avalanche Gulch after 10 mountains, which seems extremely difficult, or hike into Rockdale, which if (or when) I try this again, I think I will push for that. However, while I appreciated my family hiking into the Halfmoon trailhead, but that was during daylight, without camping supplies, and Rockdale would be in the dark with camping supplies, unless you had all wheel drive then you could drive in.

Point being, after eating I decided to sleep for a little over 3 hours and wake up at midnight or 12:30 AM. I took an ibuprofen and after a few hours of sleep my knee felt much better. A few minutes after I left my headlamp battery died, because I hadn't changed it from my Everest summit push, so I had to turn around and get new batteries. Then I was off, passing all of the people sleeping in their vehicles on the road to Huron. The ascent of Huron went well, but again, about the time I made it to 13,700 feet it started snowing. I was wearing everything I had with me, and I was shivering. My shoes were slipping a little on the rocks and again, I had never climbed Huron, so route finding took a little longer than it might for someone who had been there. Eventually at 4:17 AM I made it to the summit. After a scant couple minutes I headed down the hardest part of the route so far. A roughly third class descent on either an unmarked trail or extremely poorly marked trail. I don't really know because the fresh snow and darkness was obscuring everything. It was not a fun descent. But, it doesn't have to be fun to be fun!

Summit of Huron

Eventually the sun came up and I made my way across an unstable boulder field (not fun or fast) and then down an old mining or deer trail (again, not fast because the trail kept ending and restarting) and then I made it to the river crossing, which did not have a bridge. I had still not warmed up from the snow storm, and this river was significant enough I didn't want to wade through it, even though that's what I ended up doing. It only came up to my knees, but it was enough I stopped and wrung out my socks after crossing.

I made my way east, wandering through a couple empty campsites before picking up the trail. The trail up the west side of Missouri was really good. After the nightmare adventure of the east descent of Huron I was tickled to have a trail not marked on maps to take me up Missouri. However, at this point I was quite tired. I had been moving slowly for hours due to the technical nature of the last couple miles and as I ascended Missouri the thought of doing six more mountains until the next "aid station" was overwhelming. At the top of Missouri, or perhaps a little before I decided that would be all for me today. It didn't help that it was misting while I was on top of Missouri, making it five precipitation events and five times above 14,000 feet. It wore me down. I did Oxford and Belford in 2014, so I knew that part of the route, doing those two mountains, to say I made it half way was not that interesting.

The sun came out and my mom and sister hiked up to meet me and the three of us hiked back out to the Missouri Gulch trailhead. I changed in the bathroom and we headed back to Leadville for a late lunch, and then down into Denver for the night. Everyone else stayed up to watch fireworks, but I went to bed. I covered right around 50 miles, and that's what it felt like, a 50 mile race. I was very sore, but I could walk.

GPS track of my Nolan's 14 2016 Attempt

What lessons were learned?

• Weather doesn't need to be great, but it needs to be better than snowing. I had precipitation on every summit, and mentally that was not easy, physically it didn't help shivering either.
• My family is really good at crewing, better than they think they are. They can also navigate just fine, despite what they think. 
• I need to do every step of the route before I do it all in one go. I had no idea the descent of Huron would be that hard. Which means, I'm going to have to do a few one or two day runs out there, I can do solo and unsupported for those, to research the route better. I know this route can be done in under 48 hours, there just isn't time to be wasted figuring out a descent.
• La Plata is easy, except for the muddy patch, the descent on Huron is hard, but the ascent is easy, and Missouri is easy. All three of those mountains were first time summits for me.
• While I doubt anyone would want to climb a mountain in the dark with me, that's where I could use some company. I rarely run in the dark and that's because I end up hiking a little more defensively, worrying about bumping into a big unhappy animal, rather than the offensive speed which I move with during the daylight. Someone who could simply follow me in the dark would be a huge help. 
• Hydration and nutrition went just fine. I typically carried two 20 oz. bottles on my chest and a 16 or 20 oz. bottle in my backpack for each mountain. So about 2 liters per 3.5-5 hours and one mountain. 

Selfie between Huron and Missouri (Just kidding, I wasn't feeling that good between Huron and Missouri, this is the South Col on Everest on May 20th, 2016.)

The View Descending into Winfield (Just kidding again, that's Lhotse, Camp 4, and the South Col on Everest May 21st, 2016.)

Thanks for reading! There are some videos too, but I'm not sure when I will take the time to edit those into one video.

I need a rest. I need a break.

If there is something I learned this weekend, it is that I am tired from the last six months. Right about mile 87, 14 hours into the race, as I was struggling there, running with a broken hand, I'm thinking that maybe I pushed myself too hard and this what I get. Of course in the same moment I'm also berating myself for being weak and trying to channel my inner "beyond running" (which is a Yiannis Kouros quote).

One of the inserting things about bones is they will steal calcium from other bones if needed. It has scared me for years how Bill Rogers broke his leg going from the asphalt to the grass, perhaps a small vertical step. Which kind of scared me when I broke my hand, falling off the bike at three miles an hour?!

I don't know how our bodies distribute minerals. I know that our body prioritizes oxygen at altitude to our brains, heart and lungs with our fingers and toes being last on the list. I assume that just about everything in our body is prioritized, from the oxygen to the calcium to the water. It's quite interesting, and because I don't understand it I probably don't learn as much from my injuries and set backs as I should.

As I started running this summer I found I was weaker than I expected, Everest took something out of me, including up to 10 pounds. And perhaps racing 50 miles the day before I flew out to Nepal wasn't the best idea.

With the weather clearing on Nolan's 14 this summer I called it quits because I was tired.

Struggling desperately on a 5.9 at 13,000 feet with a backpack, I again called it quits because I wasn't up to task.

Because I wasn't feeling excited by my training I did a triathlon. What could possibly go wrong?

So when the wheels started to come off in the second half of the 24 hour run this weekend, it really should not have been a surprise.

The point is, I've been asking a lot from my body for a long time and I sit here with sore legs, chaffed everything, and a broken hand. I need a break. I need to really truly recover and build up those mineral stores in my body, or I am bound to repeat the same mistakes.

A Real Mountaineer

I brought a file to Nepal to sharpen my crampons at Everest base camp before the summit push. Crampons get dull when you walk over rocks, which isn't is a huge part of mountaineering, maybe 2-3% of the mileage on Mt. Everest, while you are wearing crampons. It's the kind of thing that builds up over time. Usually I use my crampons one day here, two days there, maybe three days in a week in Colorado. An expedition however involves a lot of days on the mountain, I spent 19 days, at least part of the day, above base camp on Everest 2016. Three of those were rest days at camp two, so not using crampons, but the other 16 had crampons, and I walked over rocks on every one of those days. Point being, bring a file because in that many days your crampons can get dull.

Jeans, Running Shoes, and a Down Jacket

So before the summit push, my first one, I got the file out and sharpened my rather dull crampons. I think I was the only person on our expedition that brought a file. Two people borrowed it to sharpen their crampons, and two others used it to take pictures, as if they were sharpening their almost new crampons. Several of my teammates, people who would be summiting Everest in a week and a half commented that I was "a real mountaineer" and I didn't know how to respond to that. It's Mt. Everest, the tallest mountain in the world. 1-2% of people that attempt it die. You had better know your gear and be prepared.

So I guess I'm a real mountaineer now. I suppose that means I can put red laces on my mountaineering boots now. Or perhaps it means I am doomed to be single for a long time. Or perhaps it means Mt. Everest was the 9th hardest thing I have ever done, we may never know.

I'm Taking a Rest Day

I came home from work today, Monday, and started eating, and an hour later, on my fourth snack food, decided I wasn't going to run today. Tiredness is a funny thing or an interesting thing. When I made it over 13,000 feet on Mt. Rainier Saturday I was tired. Not the tired from having just done six miles and 8000 vertical feet of elevation gain, but a deeper tired, similar to when I have been training (running) a large volume for weeks or months. It's like my body wants to eat and sleep, and that's about it.

Some people are probably laughing or crying right now reading this. As if climbing a mountain, the weekend after a successful 8000 meter mountain expedition, wasn't enough, that's when I realize I am tired. So I'm taking a rest day. My coach hasn't sent me a schedule yet so I don't have any workouts to miss yet. It's a good reminder that we need recovery, despite how I may act and describe the ninth hardest experience in my life, that's still pretty hard.

Crevasse crossing in the Khumbu ice fall.

More Everest Videos

I'm running out of blog titles for events that seem pretty minor for me. This first video was taken on the south col May 13th just before we headed down and my teammates were on their way to the summit. I really need to talk about this first summit push more, but there are a lot of emotions in it and I don't want to say something in frustration So I need more time to calm down before writing about it.

This second video was taken at camp 2 in the cook tent. I spent a fair amount of time in the camp 2 cook tent because it was usually warmer, there were always people there, and the cooks woke up earlier than everyone else, as I sometimes did.

On a separate note, I'm leaving Paradise super early tomorrow morning to do a one day solo climb of Mt. Rainier. Fun fact, only 20-25 people solo Rainier every year. I didn't think it was that rare. Doing it in one day is more common with many people just resting at camp Muir for a few hours. I feel a little embarrassed doing this. I mean, I just climbed Mt. Everest, and it's not enough? I have to go find another mountain to do, almost immediately? So we'll see, the weather forecast is great for tomorrow! The climbers parking lot is full, so it may be a little crowded, but that's okay with me because it's a lot easier to pass people on the Disappointment Cleaver route than on the fixed lines on Everest. Plus, if I run into any issues, more people are around to help.

View from South Summit and Back Home

The video today is from near the south summit of Mt. Everest, I'm not sure on the exact time or elevation, but it had to be above 28,000 feet, probably around 28,500. This is the best video image quality I have from high on the mountain. Again it's short, but that's just because Tshering Sherpa was stopped to talk to one of Asian Trekking's other Sherpas on the way up so I just had a brief minute to take a video.

Well, I'm back in the USA! My parents picked me up in Chicago yesterday, we drove back to Sheboygan Falls and had lunch along the way, then I promptly went to bed, for about 16 hours. I didn't really get any sleep on the flights, but the good news is I think I am all caught up and will not have major jet lag the next week. 

View from Camp 3 on Lhotse Face

I heard people liked the picture I posted last week of me descending the ice fall, well, here is one taken before Andy zoomed the camera in to show where I was in more context.

Zoomed Out View Descending the Khumbu Ice Fall

Finally, I don't think I said anything during the expedition, but after my first rotation on the mountain I had some moderately serious blisters on my shins from my 8000 meter boots. The problem was I wore tights under my socks and they overlapped with the tongue on my boots and rubbed quite a bit. The solution was to just leave the tights unzipped on my lower shins and then just bunched up above the top of the boot. I never had a problem getting cold or anything despite how shoddy it looked when I would get dressed.

My legs after the first rotation on the mountain.

For the second rotation I taped my legs and for the third and fourth (my two summit pushes) I didn't need to cover up or care for my legs with anything, although I still have a faint mark on my right leg from the poor choice of layering.

Can't Stop

Just over a decade ago the Red Hot Chili Peppers came out with a song called "Can't Stop" and I just thought of that because I was laying on my hotel bed, only an hour from leaving my hotel here in Kathmandu, and I want to email the National Park Service for Mt. Rainier National park to see if I can get a solo permit later this week. Yep, I'm thinking of doing a one day speed ascent later this week, but I'm so exhausted from a two hour run this morning I didn't want to get off the bed to send an email, let alone book another plane ticket.

The video today is another one from the south col on May 20th. I've got a few of these, and again, I find them rather entertaining. I took the whole thing so casually, like no big deal, but it's the south col,  it's above where people died this year, it is a serious place. Most people didn't want to come out of their tents because they wanted to save every calorie of energy, and I was just walking around, talking to people, taking videos.

So I went out to Sam's Bar last night, a place that features in books and has many of the mountaineering regulars. It's a tradition to write on the wall if you have a good quote, Alex Gavan has a big one above the stair way, prime real estate. Mine is over by the potted plants along the top of the wall about half way from the bar to the balcony.

I wrote on the wall.

Then continuing the tradition of meeting interesting people we hung out with Amelia Hillary, Edmund Hillary's granddaughter, for an hour. She was quite interesting because she has lived in Kathmandu for several years and again like some other people I have met lately, knows a huge network of people, she even climbs too.

I leave my hotel soon and it looks like I will be in the US Tuesday morning. Until next time Asia, goodbye.

Kathmandu and the Khumbu Ice Fall

Several treats today! I will tell you what, you want to have great experiences, meet the right people. I've had the good fortune in the last few days to bump shoulders with a few people that, at least in my little world, are big stuff. First, let's start with a four minute video featuring what I thought was the most difficult obstacle in the icefall, the three horizontal ladders, which only appeared late in the season, sometime after May 10th. It was difficult because the safety ropes were not totally parallel to the ladders, and there was a ice block halfway through that was pushing you to the left on the way down. It's not that difficult, it took me all of 17 seconds to walk across it, but some part of the ice fall has to be the most difficult.

Next we had the 9th International Sagarmatha Day this morning, where I gave a speech in front of Nepal's Prime Minister, the Minister of Tourism, and maybe 400 other people including Russell Brice. Ang Tshering, president of the Nepal Mountaineering Association, asked me Friday night if I would please give a speech at the event since I had summited and they wanted an international guest to say something. He also asked that I give a recommendation or suggestion for how to improve Mt. Everest. I was dubious that this would all come together and I would actually give a speech, but I thought about it on Saturday and came up with a few words to say if it actually happened.

We met at 7 AM in front of all the official gear shops like Mountain Hardware and The North Face in Thamel before a short parade over to the Ministry of Tourism. Funny enough, turns out they even had my name in the official program. Yep, looks like I was going to get to speak after all.

Giving a Speech at the 9th International Sagarmatha Day (Sitting behind me right to left: Ang Tshering Sherpa, Kumar Rai, and the Prime Minister of Nepal K.P. Sharma Oli with the black hat.)

I thanked the guests, specifically those sitting on stage by name, and all the people for attending, and I thanked the high altitude workers like Sherpas, guides, cooks, and porters that make this whole industry possible and accessible to individuals. Then I briefly described my summit experience, the feeling that we don't belong at the summit and our time there is temporary, so we need to take care of our home, the places we live because the world is not unlimited. Then I suggested that if the tallest mountain in the world was in the USA the National Park Service would fix the ropes from basecamp to the summit, and perhaps that was something that the SPCC (Sagarmatha Pollution Control Council aka Ice Fall Doctors) could do in the future. In fact, it already happens on the Chinese side of the mountain. Pasang Sherpa, one of the Sherpas that fixed the ropes from camp 4 to the summit gave several suggestions, and that was also one of his suggestions. Good to know we are on the same page.

Next, since not all the fun happens during the day, Saturday night I had dinner with the Iranians, and some Adventure Consultants people including the famous Ang Dorjee. Yes, in the movie Everest,  Guy Cotter is yelling into the radio at Ang Dorjee, that Ang Dorjee.

A Water Bottle (Actually Ang Dorjee signed his name near his father's picture in Doug Scott's Himalayan Climber book, which was a birthday present to Claudia, and that's the man himself all blurry in the background. I am not a photographer. Also, that's Iraj from Iran on his left.)

We made our way to Tom and Jerry's and I asked Ang Dorjee what was the most difficult time he had in the mountains, I mean with 21 Everest expeditions, 18 summits, and just about every other big mountain around the world, he had to have a rough go of it at least once. Turns out he was stuck with Scott Fisher and five other people at camp 3 (7000 meters) on Broad Peak in 1995 for seven days in a terrible storm, so back they could not unzip the tents, and the tents flattened on them many times. They ran out of food. They were low on gas and were measuring out water in a cup so that everyone had the same few ounces. Finally they walked down, with the storm still going, and Ang Dorjee leading the way. He even triggered an avalanche below camp 1. Fortunately, they all survived. It actually provides a little more context to the 1996 incident. He is working on a book and I encouraged him several times to follow through with it. Two years ago I bought Tenzing Norgay's book, yesterday I bought Jamling Norgay's book, maybe in two years I will buy Ang Dorjee's book. Frankly, I can't wait to read about the 1995 Broad Peak storm. Not enough Sherpas write books, I want to hear their side of the story.

Finally, if you are in Kathmandu, and you are a rock climber, you really ought to stop by the Astrek climbing wall in Thamel and take a few laps. I borrowed some shoes from Niraj the manager and Nepali rock climbing champion Saturday afternoon and bouldered until I had a couple blisters on my hands.

I'm going to give up on selfies.

In other news I am coming home a few days earlier than planned and will arrive in Chicago around 10 AM Tuesday, May 31st.

Post Everest Update 3

I took 58 seconds of video on the summit of Mt. Everest. 25 second in the video above on my GoPro and 33 seconds on my primary camera, which I will publish eventually, but it's not as good. Taking a picture or a video is such a challenge in these conditions. For my GoPro the process was to unzip my down suit, take off my gloves, reach into my inner down suit pocket and take out the camera, turn it on, and then start recording. That takes maybe 30 seconds to do all of that, maybe 20 seconds. Then there is the recording time. At which point I realized, and said in the video, that my fingers were getting very cold, and I had to start the reverse process of putting the camera away, another 20-30 seconds. It sounds really short, and it was, but I've spent time in a -40C/F cold room for engineering testing, with fans running, and the cold up at the summit of Everest there was worse.

On the topic of cameras, my primary camera was a Nikon AW120, on a strap around my neck. Great pictures, but when I tried to get it off my neck for some better angles, it got stuck on my hoods, so I gave up and moved on to my iPhone 5S and GoPro Hero 3+. The problem with those two is that trying to use them with my summit gloves was nearly impossible because the risk of dropping either one was too great. So I had to take off my gloves to use them, which means that in the interest of keeping my fingers I took 58 seconds of video and 15 pictures, most of which look like the one below.

Another Summit Selfie, With My Thumb

It's actually kind of funny. I'm going to frame at least one of them, actually hang it on my wall, and title it: "No Frostbite", because I would much rather have my fingers than some picture. Also, shout out to Alan Bean who broke the color video camera on Apollo 12, I get it man.

Also, I'm apparently giving a five minute speech tomorrow at the 9th International Sagarmatha Day at  9 AM, May 29th, at the Nepal Tourism Board. Supposedly there will be 700 people there, and they wanted a westerner to say something. So if anyone is around Bhrikutimandap, Kathmandu in about 22 hours please stop by. I flew back into Kathmandu from Lukla around 11 AM on Friday the 27th, if that wasn't clear.

South Col selfie with Menanie Southworth in the background messing with her satellite phone.

Here is the first of several videos from the south col. I hope you get a laugh out of these as much as I do. That being said, the videos from my first summit push will make you surprised that the other guys went on to summit, it was not good weather.

Other random tidbits:

• Feathered Friends down suit does not have pockets for your hands, it should.
• "Everyone" summited Everest this year.
• No one died above camp 4 this year on Everest, but they died between camp 3 and camp 4, very strange.
• Camp de Base in Namche is my favorite lodge in the Khumbu. It has hot water, towels, big blankets, soap and toilet paper included, plus the food is good. 
• Billi Bierling said last night at Sam's Bar that the "interesting" thing to do, which hasn't been done would be the west ridge of Everest, Lhotse, and Nuptse and down the west ridge of Nuptse all without bottled oxygen. It's not a huge traverse, but it's a lot of time at altitude. Anyone want to try with me? Uli?
• I ran Everest basecamp to Namche Bazaar in 5:42, here is the Strava event. The hard part was carrying about 10 pounds of clothing, gear, food and water. 
• The hard part of Everest summit day is having no sleep when you start hiking, at 8 PM. If we left at midnight, it might be even easier. That being said, I think it's good 48 hour race training to go from camp 3 up to the summit and back to camp 2 all with only a 40 minute nap after the summit on the south col.
• There is less air pollution in Kathmandu now than there was in early April. 
• My friend Dave Ohlson summited from the North Side a few days ago.
• Looks like I will be on Denali next year. No oxygen, no guides, no porters. 
• Again, July 4th weekend, I'm planning to "run" Nolan's 14. I would really like some company, if not on the actual mountains, then at the road crossings would still be great and make my logistics much easier. (I can go sub 48 hours.)

Thank You Climbing Partners!

This article is addressed specifically to the following people, and several others who I may have missed:

Josh Zeigler

Stephen Bonneau

Clay Meier

Shane Ruther

Kyle Erickson

John Haines

Geoff Georges

Randall Crock

Peter Hoffman

John Inman

John MacDonald

Dave Arney

Every failure is an opportunity to learn something. And I like learning vicariously whenever possible. Eric Arnold from the Netherlands died Friday night near the south col, I believe, and I think I walked right past him and talked to him.

You see, you all have been roped to me in precarious situations or at least mildly precarious situations, my life and my safety in your hands. I'm a pretty independent person by nature. I can be bull headed and stubborn and go march off and try to solo The Nose on El Capitan or something ridiculous. I don't like to show when I have a problem, at least I will down play it (because I'm always complaining about some ailment). Point being, sometimes I feel like a rope and a partner is a weakness.

Friday night about 8:30 pm as we started our hike out of the south col, before we made it to the fixed rope, maybe 200 meters out of camp, there were two headlamps, two people, off to the left, off the route and one moving and one not moving. As we neared them I noticed something reflective on the trail at 26,000 feet, perhaps their backpacks. As we got closer I saw it was the "Millet" written on the shins of two One Sport Everest boots. As we were even closer I finally saw it was a man sitting in the snow. 

I think I said, "Are you okay?"

He said, I think I remember, in very good English, "Yes, I must have dozed off."

I don't remember all the details of our 90 second conversation, but he was with Seven Summits. He stood up and was very coherent and resumed walking downhill to look for his tents. I thought he was older, 50s but I can't be sure, he had an oxygen mask on his face.

In parting I remember saying, "Hury up before your oxygen runs out." And just like that we were 10+ meters apart going our separate ways. 

As a note, I yelled to the two headlamps 40 meters off the trail if they needed help, and they didn't respond even though I thought I could hear they were talking. Probably just someone on a bathroom break.

I've spent a lot of time thinking about 8000 meter mountains the last few months. Some people say you are totally on your own up there, a guide can't save you if you have a problem. Some say baloney to that. Having been there now, I say baloney, I tried to pull my friend Anish up a rocky part just below the Hillary Step. I had energy at 8800 meters to pull someone up. Yes, I was on I think 2.5 L/min oxygen at the time, but point being, if someone needs help, it is entirely possible to help them at high altitude. Problem is, no one says he or she need help. I offered help half a dozen times in the past week on the mountain, but no one wanted any. 

That's why partners are awesome, when you know me well enough to know when to push on and when to retreat because of the look on my face. It's a two way street, I'll turn around for you too. The man I passed, the man I woke up, he was alone. I don't know if he was the man that died, but napping 200 nearly flat meters out of camp, descending at 8:30 PM, and from Seven Summits... 

Thank you partners for putting up with me! Thank you for helping me fulfill my wild fantasies. Thank you for sacrificing sleep, vacation and your own health in cold and windy places. Sure I will continue to solo things, like I want to do Nolan's 14 over July 4th weekend, but for serious places, like Mt. Everest, I only want to go if I can go with a trusted partner. This may sound absurd, but I am healthy and alive today so I can say it while Eric can't, I love you man.

I Summited Mt. Everest!

Okay, first I am on my phone, so excuse the brevity of this post, and lack of better pictures from my two other cameras.

First is Tshering Sherpa who climbed with me to the summit. Here he is sitting on it, it was about a 20 foot long by 1 foot wide perch. I took pictures with three cameras, but had a wardrobe malfunction with my main one, so don't hold your breath for any great pictures from me from the summit.

Next is from my first attempt, when I used oxygen and didn't feel like climbing higher than camp four here is me chilling at the south col.

Oxygen at Camp 4

What's been in my mind all day was how hard it was to climb Mt. Everest with bottled oxygen? I can only compare to other experiences so here are the hardest physical days of my life:

1. Italy 2015 24 Hour World Championships - terrible magnesium cramps

2. 2014 North Coast 24 hour run - I seriously could not walk for three hours after it was over

3. 2008 Casual Route on the Diamond on Longs Peak with Clay Meier - 20:15 car to car, super long mountain day, took a 20 foot pendulum fall. 

4. 2002 Mt. Massive and Mt. Elbert in the same day solo - age 16, about 15.5 hours

5. 2009 double marathon (52.4 miles) fun run of Cape Cod May 9th - first ultra run at age 23

6. 2010 Wonderland Trail run solo (93 miles 31:32) - first real trail ultra run

7. 2006 Ellingwood Arête on Crestone Needle with John Inman - first technical mountain route, and first I lead, I have to look up the time but we finished in a hail storm after dark, and I really suffered leading the 5.7 at 14,000 feet.

8. 2013 Chicago Marathon - hit the wall, hard to explain this one, but I've never felt so empty, I felt like a zombie while running.

9. Mt. Everest with oxygen 2016 - obviously more to come about this

10. 2012 Devils Tower with Steve Bonneau and Ryan Stickle - I really struggled on the last pitch, dehydrated, not in great climbing shape.

11. 2009 Longs Peak Kiener's with Josh Zeigler - we took the 5.8 version by accident, ended up starting and finishing in the dark, 15 hours or so, but good weather.

The list gets pretty dense after this with lots of 10+ hour days and painful races. Also, I'm writing this on my phone at Everest basecamp so I might change my mind back at sea level in the states. Worth noting, I have to cry from the pain to make the top five, maybe even top eight but I can't remember for those three. 

Everest May 7th Update

The last rotation I did went really well. This whole expedition the plan was to summit later than everyone, because not using oxygen I will be slower so there is a higher risk that I both create or get in big trouble from from a traffic jam on summit day. However, as I mentioned before this created a feeling in me that I was rushing to catch up. I felt insecure about my plan as others were climbing higher and higher while I seemed to be sick. Well, this rotation was a little different. 

May 3rd we headed up from basecamp to camp 2, which was a very very long day. Only three of us made it to camp 2, a couple others stopped at camp 1 and one turned around with a lung infection. I think tent to tent it was like 11.5 hours, or maybe 10.5 hours. It was 5:15 from the crampon point to camp 1, and just over 4 hours camp 1 to camp 2. We spent about 50 minutes getting to the crampon point and about 40 minutes in camp 1 resting. I was climbing with Alyssia Azar, Carsten Illibad, Sandoop and Pasang. 

I was planning to go up to camp 3 the next day, but I was tired so I took a rest day, which included a little hike on the rock pile behind camp 2. I did take 500 mg of some powerfull ibuprofen type something that David Llano gave to me the first night we were in camp 2. The second night I took a standard 200 mg ibuprofen and I slept well.  It was funny as we are sitting around the dining tent at camp 2 on May 4th debating what to wear for the climb to camp 3, three of our Sherpas walk in wearing their down suits to discuss the plan for tomorrow. It was pretty funny, and everyone with a down suit then planned to wear it. I didn’t have one so I just wore my down jacket and synthetic insulated pants. 

Sandoop, Pasang and I think Tenzing

So Cinco de Mayo comes and we wake up at 5 for a 6 AM departure. We started off across the valley to the start of the Lohtse face. I was with Hazel, potentially first Welsch woman to summit Lohtse, Tenzing, her Sherpa who was short roping her, and Shera Sherpa, who was sort of climbing with me for the day. At the start of the face she had a problem with her mittens so I passed her and Tenzing and went on my own up the face. It was great! I was climbing so well, I was passing everyone else. When I made it to the steep part where there is an ice blue there were some other people coming down, who I assume had spent the night in camp 3. One man, basically clipped into the rope, held on, and then slid down the 60-65 degree ice and snow gully destroying all of the snow steps. He looked in a bad way, and it was really frustrating because I felt fine. His Sherpa and his friend were above him about to start the rappel and I raised my arms in wonder and told them both that I thought their friend needed some help. I mean, it was a bright sunny day with very little wind, it wasn’t a particularly difficult section, and we were at a particularly high altitude. There are two ropes at this section so I was on the ascending rope and he was on the descending rope, but they are only maybe four feet apart and the ice bulge has a little gully maybe two feet deep that kind of forces the two ropes together. Anyway, after that I was basically on my own for the remaining few fixed rope sections to camp 3.

At the bottom of camp 3 I looked around and could not find our tents, so I sat near the top of the lower grouping of tents and waited for Shera to come up. Yes, just to toot my own horn for a minute, I waited at camp 3, at 23,300 feet, for the Sherpa I was climbing with to catch up. He did and our camp was set about 200 vertical feet higher just to the left of the route, actually out of sight of the route. There was no fixed rope for about 30 meters and no one really caries an ice axe on Mt. Everest, mine was left at camp 2, so Shera short roped me across the gap between the fixed rope and our camp. Not difficult, but you certainly don’t want to fall there. It took a little over four hours for me to go from camp 2 to camp 3 without a backpack. Two hours to the start of the face, then a little over two hours up the face to camp 3. We stayed up there maybe 20 minutes or so to eat and drink a little, then it took about an hour to get back to camp 2, it’s much faster to descend at altitude than ascend. Just as we were leaving Hazel and Tenzing showed up.

Camp 3 Selfie with Everest in the Background

I made it back to camp 2 in time to have lunch with everyone who did not make it up to camp 3. Everyone had a different issue from stomach bug to tiredness from two previous days. I slept well that night, I was actually somewhat warm in my soft-shell layer and insulated pants inside my 0F sleeping bag. 

The next morning we woke at 4 AM and were hiking soon after 5 AM. We were all pretty close until the start of the icefall. I had been trailing, not so fast on the way to camp 1, but after the first rappel and I was moving better and was again at the front. I made my way down and soon enough when I stopped to let a Nepalese team come up Shera was right behind me and after they passed we began running down the ice fall. I’m not joking, on the nice like 15-25 degree slopes downhill we were running. We didn’t run the flats, ladders, or uphills, but we were flying. We mad it to the crampon point at 8:11 AM, just under 3 hours from the time we left camp 2. From there it was a 40 minute walk back to our basecamp and I made it in time to have some breakfast and get the 10 minutes of questions from the other 2/3rds of the team about how our rotation went. Overall, quite well. It seems barring a tragedy our team will have lots of summits this year. 

Camp 2 Dining Tent

So I'm not entirely sure why I headed up the mountain on April 26th. I mean, I haven't quit coughing. Anyway, in case my Internet gets cut off again as I write this, I made it to camp 1, and it was tough. It was a long seven hours up through the ice fall.

Then I had a bad Tuesday night. 8:30 PM I woke up with a headache... bad new. At midnight-thirty I went over to Sandoop and Nwang our Sherpas tent and told them I had an issue so they broke a diamox in half and gave it to me. That helped for a few hours until about 3 AM, then I more or less tossed and turned all night until it was time to get up and get going. Also, on the 26th I drank at least six liters of water, that's a lot for me, in fact, I cannot remember drinking more in a day. Perhaps during a 24 hour run, but I'm not sure. 

Anyway I was super strong going to camp 2 on the 27th. I did half of the ascent to camp 2 alone, because I was going fast. Then I did the whole descent to camp 1 alone. The next day I descended to camp 1 alone, almost at Sherpa speed, but not quite.

Dining Tent at Camp 2

Anyway, I have a terrible Internet connection, good night.

Rushing

A couple years ago my employer did Safe Start training. One of the four states of mind that leads to problems is rushing. This hit me like a sack of bricks last week when I spent three unpleasant nights in basecamp. Well, I didn’t realize I was rushing exactly until I descended and felt great. I knew that I ascended fast and that was why I was feeling poorly, but I didn’t think of it as rushing until I knew that it was beyond my limit. It’s one of those things, if it works out, you’re an efficient monster, if it fails, you’re a rushing idiot. 

It is the same way in much of life. We speed in our cars to get to a place one or two minutes earlier, usually with no consequences, until you get into an accident because you were speeding. We rush from one social appointment to another without really listening to what our friend was saying. 

It’s funny, I came here a week later than everyone else because I wanted to trying running a race before going on an expedition, something I had never tried before. Early indications are it worked. I could have probably used another day or two at sea level to recover muscularly but I am fine. However, when I got here I felt like I was playing catch up, even though my plan all along was to summit later in the season after much of the fanfare had worn away and the mountain was a little less crowded. Now I’m here and people are talking about May 5th and May 10th summits, and there is absolutely no way I will be ready to summit by then!

The lesson here is that feeling are not fact, and by rushing from one thing to the next you might not be giving each activity, or more importantly each person, including yourself, the time she or he (or you) deserve.