Did my first climb ever today. 4
buildings in Desmoines. I meant several climbers and the support and overall
amount of nice people was great. The volunteers were pretty awesome too. I
couldn't help but give them a little smile when they cheered me on and it
picked me up.
So I had a goal of doing the
climb in 13 minutes or even faster if I could sprint the last 5 stories of each
building. I had calculated what time I should be at on certain floors of each
building. My day did not start out good
at all. I was super nervous and after we
took two flights up just to get our timing chips I couldn’t breath and got
really dizzy. I didn’t feel nervous once we started moving so I’m not sure if I
just was not breathing right because of nerves or was having asthma which I
sometimes get when exercising but we were literally walking super slow.
I took a puff of my inhaler and calmed
down. 3 stories into the first
building I was struggling to get my breath and I said to myself so much for
those goals lol. The steps were very steep compared to what I train on and
really zapped me quick plus I started too quick but slowed down to the others
pace that were in front of me which was a nice pace but not what I originally
planned for pace. The first building was
15 stories 371 steps
The tallest building, I trained in was 15
stories and the second building was 22 stories 464 stairs. After the second
building I was not feeling great. I have vertigo and it was bothering me alot
although it didn't slow me down just unpleasant. The 3rd building was 16
stories 324 stairs and I was so spent once I made it to the top. I felt I had
nothing left. Even the experienced in way better shape runners were gasping for
air. I was shocked to see that because I know how many steps and how hard those
guys train. The walk to the 4th and biggest building was mentally taxing. I was
thinking you can't do this, you got nothing left, just quit. Then it went to
you are going to do this even if it takes 20 minutes for the last building.
The last building was 32
stories 637 stairs. I stopped 3 times for about 5 to 7 seconds. The only thing
that kept me moving honestly was I could hear somebody coming up behind me, I
was like no way I'm getting passed. This was on the 8th floor of 32. I somehow
ran up 4 of the last 7 stories but when I got to the top I was close to passing
out. Everything was spinning and starting to go dark and I almost lost my
morning breakfast which was very light. Apparently it was obvious as a
volunteer said hey take a seat and when I was going to get up a few minutes
later said I'd wait a little longer for you to catch your breath. Good call.
I learned alot. Most
important thing I learned is just finishing a race is something to be proud of.
I still want to win and/or place in the future but fighting through the pain
and talking to the other runners is what really matters. I got 15.05 finishing
50th out of 950 people. It really stunk that I didn’t perform my
best. I thought after breaking all my previous personal best in all my cardio exercises that I’d easily hit 14 and
probably 13-time mark. Honestly once
that breathing issue hit me before I even started my desire to push myself as
hard as I did in training didn’t happen. Now in the last building I can say I
pushed really hard but still could have given it a little more with a better
mental state. Funny enough I'm most proud of fighting through all the demons
and making it to the top of that last building.
I am going to take a few days
off of training and continue to get in better shape. Next race I’m going to do some warmup stairs
in the building to make sure my lungs feel good. Or if no stairs will do jumping jacks or
something. I don’t think I will enter
another race until January or February as the next closest race is willis tower
in November and at this time I don’t want to go up 103 stories. Maybe I will change my mind once my overall
cardio is better. I suppose not bad for
3 months of training but I have high standards for my body and mind. Next year I really want to give the top guys
a run for their money in Desmoines. Guess I will see how fast I progress and at
least I will have a few smaller 40 story climbs in the books before that race
and feel more confident and comfortable in my abilities J
