New Math

I took a run the other day near our house in the mountains.  It looked like this:














Now running a half dozen miles in an hour isn't anything spectacular, even for a late blooming runner like me.  The interesting part is taking that same run in the mountains with elevations above 9,000ft on dirt roads with grades above 10%.  Now your talking about some effort. 

I find that a big part of training for an expedition has to do with practicing what will be experienced during the climb.  So for example, simply carrying a heavy pack up a steep hill at the highest elevation available is good direct practice for the actual climb.  So too is basic suffering in whatever forms you care to inflict on yourself.  Personally I like this form of training because I think more than half of the effort needed to climb a big mountain is mental.  Whether the suffering is listening to the tent flap in high winds all night long while camping on a Colorado 14er in winter, struggling with the day's load carrying because you're low on calories through effort and staying warm or pushing yourself on an hour-long run, it's all good training.

This brings us back to the run.  Usually when suffering I like to let my mind wander.  Like anyone who daydreams, I think it's fun to see where the mind goes.  Sometimes we're surprised at the thoughts we have and other times we may be inspired with creativity.  My favorite is when a big chunk of time goes by and I really wasn't thinking of anything in particular.  These are the times when the rhythm of the task at hand leads to a release of the type A conscious mind and allows us to simply live in the moment.  I've had the best experiences when climbing in the snow tethered by a rope to my teammates during the small hours of the morning.  I simply call this situation "kicking steps" and it's something I long for starting about six months after my last expedition.

But "kicking steps" isn't at all what I was doing on the morning of that run.  I was in full engineer brain mode solving many of the world's problems and generating a few new ones of my own.  then I started to think about the different types of training I was doing and how different the effort felt between one task and the other.  Is running fast on hills for an hour more difficult than carrying a heavy pack up a mountain?  Is carrying a heavy pack on a treadmill for 45 minutes at a 10% grade at a 3.5-4.0 mph speed (my morning workout) easier than carrying the same pack at a normal pace for 3 hours?

I thought, surely there must be formulas, equations, constants and factors in the engineering world to describe the effort and boil it down to numbers which can be compared, cataloged and tallied.  Well of course there are, with units like ft-lbs, Newtons, Joules, etc.  But these units are boring and don't capture the real essence of what's involved, at least for me. What I decided was that the world needed a new unit of measure that would truly capture the value of effort put forth in mountaineering type activities.  This new unit would be a measure of the load carried with how much elevation gain over what distance.  Formula looks like:

Mountaineering Work = (Pounds Carried) x (Elevation Gain in Feet) x (Distance Traveled in Miles)

...Pounds x Feet x Miles...  I'll call the new unit PFM!

What a revelation I thought!  Here was something truly exceptional and I'm surely the first person to invent the unit PFM.  Let's try a few examples:

If David were to run for 6 miles with no backpack and achieve a total elevation gain of 1,000 ft, how much PFM would that be?  The weakness of my formula was exposed immediately.  I wasn't carrying any weight so the answer would be (0) x (1,000) x (6) = 0.  Total waste of time.  This conclusion occurred descending the last hill and thinking about the lung searing ascent that was to follow.  I needed to find a solution fast in order to feel good about the morning efforts.

Aha I thought, the reason running is difficult is because we have self-weight.  So, the person's weight needs to be part of the equation also.  Let's try again:  David weighs 175 lb and runs for 6 miles with no backpack and gains 1,000 ft in elevation.  (175) x (1,000) x (6) = 1,050,000 PFM! 

It's interesting to do mental math while running fast on a dirt road.  As the numbers get bigger, your (my) concentration on the math needs to increase which takes focus from the placement of your (my) feet on the road and the constant avoidance of rocks and potholes.  Thankfully I didn't fall completely on my face and only the birds flying overhead noticed the stumble, arm flail and subsequent recovery...

Well, very impressive, over 1 million PFM's for an hour run.  This is kind of like going to a third world country and exchanging 10 bucks for a million of their money only to realize that a million of their "bucks" only gets you a sandwich.  Too many zeros!  I was falsely rich in PFM's and needed another adjustment.

By then I was heading back up the last hill and needed to finish the equation.  It became obvious that weight needed to be more of a factor of one's own weight and not just a sum.  What if I weighed 350 pounds instead of 175?  Would it be twice as hard to cross the room?  Yes, at least twice as hard. So let's take the person's body weight plus the weight they're carrying and divide that sum by their body weight.  This seemed like a better equalizer and would keep the numbers down to something reasonable.

the first example now became rounded off in my head because my lungs were dry and legs almost burned out but I knew this was the solution!  For completeness, here it is:

[(175+0)/175] x (1,000) x (6) = 6,000 PFM

Okay, this is a reasonable number.  Lets try another example:

David and his wife Kriss climbed Mt. Bancroft.  It looked like this:



According to the GPS, the climb was 4.28 miles with 2,491 ft of elevation gain and I was carrying a reasonable 45 pound pack.

Mountaineering Work = [(175+45)/175] Pounds x 2,491 Feet x 4.28 Miles = 13,403 PFM

Now that seems pretty reasonable to me.  The climb took 4-1/2 hours but it was at a reasonable pace with a few breaks for snacks, etc.  Definitely more than twice the overall effort of the run but not 3 or 4 times the effort.  The view from the top looked like this:



This equation will now serve as part of my training log and I'll report on my progress periodically.  Feel free to track your own PFM's and spread the word about our new math.  It's Pure Freakin' Magic!

Mt. Kilimanjaro Was Next

In 2009 after climbing Aconcagua, we set our sights on Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, Africa.  Kili tops out at 19,340 ft and is no stroll in the park.  It was December and we climbed via the Machame route which usually takes 7 days and affords climbers a good variety of terrain as the track winds around the mountain.

Apparently December is the rainy season in Tanzania, at least it was that year.  We got rained on a bit every day and had snow on Christmas which was fun.  Taking weather in stride is part of the deal and we rolled with it for the most part.  The interesting vegetation combined with the volcanic makeup of the mountain created an almost primeval setting for our climb. 

Once we got higher up on Kili, we entered the familiar alpine zone.  Here the air gets quite a bit thinner and sleeping is somewhat tougher.  Maintaining your health is extremely important and it takes diligence, especially in an environment as alien as this one.  Sanitation and protecting your lungs from illness is a priority.

Our "summit day" started at about 11pm and we climbed through the night.  I always find this a magical time where your mind wanders even though your body is focused on the work of climbing higher and higher into the thin air.  There's little talk as we each are lost in our own thoughts and battling our own demons.  At about 2am or so, a tremendous thunderstorm approached the mountain as we climbed higher still.  While it posed no threat to us, the show of lightning was unmatched and left an indelible memory which added to the magic of the night.

With fresh snow to aid our vision during the climb and the thunderstorm to keep us company, we reached the summit in good form and good spirits. 

The trail back down from the summit of Kilimanjaro was direct and uneventful.  As we neared civilization once again after being in such an inhospitable place, I felt a little sad to leave it all behind.  There's a special feeling at the top of a big mountain and I was now sure that I liked it very much.  Of course I was looking forward to a hot shower after being rained on for a week!

After Kilimanjaro we climbed Denali in Alaska (20,320').  That climb in 2010 brought things to a whole new level.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We have many things to be thankful for and our annual American tradition of Thanksgiving reminds us to pause our lives and remember.  Today Kriss and I enjoyed a beautiful blue sky Colorado hike near our home with our longtime adventure buddies Alan and Debby.  The 5 mile trek was relatively tame but considering the average elevation of 9,550 ft and my heavy training pack, it was a decent workout.



It occurred to me as we got close to home that some people might wonder what sorts of items would be contained within a training pack. This is a humorous question to those of us who’ve dragged any number of ridiculous items through the woods and up mountains with the goal of strengthening legs and expanding lungs.  Today’s edition is no less absurd but at 55#, was enough to make me breathe hard climbing the hills.

let's analyze the contents:

The star of the show is our trusty Gregory 95 which has been to many corners of the world with us.  It's not pretty anymore but still hauls like a champ.  Next is a vast selection of clothing including jackets, climbing bibs, Gore-Tex for wind or rain, down pieces and other random layers basically serving as padding.  Throw in two sets of big BD mittens, and a couple pairs of gloves to keep fingers toasty and happy.  Of course water is required so why not 4 water bottles, including my favorite which is labeled "Bacon Powered".  The usual hat, sunscreen, first aid kit, headlamp, line, carabiners, dog water dish and Kahtoola Microspikes which are essential this time of year to keep your feet on the ground and head held high.  That's pretty much it except for exactly 26.1# of high quality Matco wrenches and a sweet set of punches and chisels because you never know when you may need to overhaul a transmission in the middle of the woods.

So there's one example of a well-outfitted training pack.  Anyone looking to put their own together should be creative and include items which reflect their interests, hobbies or obsessions.  Rocks aren't recommended because they can damage your gear but a big bag of dog food is good and of course wrapping up a 25# steel weightlifting plate in a towel and shoving it in works fine although it's not very imaginative.

Happy Thanksgiving!

The Journey Begins

Today I begin the process of describing my journey to climb Mount Everest.  Really, it started in the summer of 2007 when I agreed to climb Mount Rainier with a friend the following summer.  That experience on a glaciated peak in the Pacific Northwest ignited something inside me that I didn't realize was there.  Besides accumulating more gear which is always fun, I accumulated experiences that laid the foundation for subsequent years of expedition climbing.

 

Rainier was followed by Aconcagua in Argentina (22,841ft) during our winter of 2009.  This trip combined a love of mountains with a love of international travel and I was hooked for sure.  It also included my wife Kriss who was game to try a big mountain, neither of us completely realizing the suffering which occurs during a 16-day expedition covering 50 or so miles in a remote part of the world.  We both lost lots of weight on that climb while earning our 8,000 meter boots.

 

 

After Aconcagua was Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, Africa (19,340 ft).  Stay tuned...