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How a 74-y.o Athlete-In-Training Approaches Training and Mountain Goals
1.1k Plays4 years ago
In this episode Scott Johnston is joined by Art Muir. Art is a seventy-four year old mountain enthusiast who has worked with Uphill Athlete for several years. As an urban dweller in Chicago, Art discusses how he trains for his mountain goals and ambitions in the flat lands, as well as how he has approached his training and goals through time.
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Transcript
Introduction & Resources
00:00:01
Speaker
Welcome to the Uphill Athlete Podcast. These programs are just one of several free services we provide to disseminate information about training for mountain sports. If you like what you hear and want more, please check out our website, uphillathlete.com, where you'll find many articles and our extensive video library on all aspects of training for and accomplishing a variety of mountain goals. You'll also find our forum, where you can ask questions of our experts and the community at large.
00:00:30
Speaker
Our email is coach at uphillathlete.com and we'd love to hear from you. Welcome to another episode of the uphill athlete podcast.
Meet Art Muir
00:00:40
Speaker
I'm your host Scott Johnston and today I have the pleasure of talking with Art Muir. Art has been coached by us for, I don't know, several years now at least. He's been working with Seth Kena. I end up with myself kind of time.
00:00:56
Speaker
And I think art has a great story that will resonate with a lot of the audience. As you can tell, Art's no spring chicken. He's someone I look up to in terms of, I hope I can be doing the things he's doing when I'm 74 years old. But that's only seven years away. So I'm trying to hang in there, Art. I want to be Art when I'm 74. So thanks for taking the time to chat with me today.
00:01:26
Speaker
It's a great pleasure to be here, you know, Scott. And I'm at the point now where we'll talk about a little bit where I like to be me too. So it's been pretty good.
00:01:36
Speaker
Good, good. I know you've struggled with a few setbacks and injuries and things like that. And we, you know, at our age, that kind of comes with the territory. And I think we'll want to dig into that a bit, you know, to talk about that to help people think being able to navigate aging is a is there's no roadmap for it.
00:01:57
Speaker
But I do think we can give people some some tips on, you know, here's how we've managed or especially you've managed some of these obstacles and setbacks.
Active Lifestyle & Adventures
00:02:06
Speaker
But let me set the stage a little bit. So art lives in Chicago.
00:02:11
Speaker
So not exactly in the mountains, but has managed to be really active over a large part of his adult life with mountain sports, especially mountaineering and ski mountaineering.
00:02:31
Speaker
And in fact, you were here in my neighborhood in the North Cascades Last February as I recall doing a heli assisted ski touring, right? Yeah Who is your guide for that? We know it's North Cascades heli skiing, but who was the guy? The person that I've met
00:03:22
Speaker
of folks that have done that with me whom I've met, you know, partly from doing that, partly from other trips. And they've been really wonderful trips and fascinating places, you know, very, very adventurous and very much fun. And I've been able to kind of build this cohort of friends that I now consider to be really good friends. And we, you know, we're always planning the next trip this year, of course,
00:03:49
Speaker
COVID has been a lot different and it's made a big difference and we don't have anything planned, but we're always looking forward to it. So we get done with one, we're looking forward to the next one. And so I'm not sure how long I can do it, but I'm not ready to quit yet. That's for sure. He's been great. He's a wonderful guy. He's an IFMGA guide and he's just a terrific person as well as being a fantastic guide.
00:04:13
Speaker
Yeah, well, we have some great guides that I know personally around here. So yeah, if it's that mold for sure. Well, then I do want to say one thing about that. So for people who haven't tried it, this is seen in the east side of the Cascades with a North Cascades heli ski, I think is the name of our deck name. That's close enough. You can find it. And it is something you really should try. They have very powerful Bell star helicopters.
00:04:40
Speaker
They only take four people at a time plus the pilot. And they put you on top of places that are very intimidating as you fly into them. It's one of my favorite videos.
00:04:57
Speaker
check out. Being in the US, it's really fantastic. It's the largest permitted heli-ski operation in the lower 48, which is pretty unique. My experience, I've done a little bit of work with them, but they're
00:05:15
Speaker
they are one helicopter operation. And we have this phenomenal terrain around here. So I feel pretty lucky to have that in my backyard. The locals all have snowmobile access. It's a little unfair, I don't know. Yeah. But you must be the oldest guy in that group, right, that you normally ski with?
00:05:41
Speaker
Yeah, that's true. That's true. But the other thing, we can talk about this a little bit. Those backcountry skiing trips, I got into this recently. Most of the stuff I got into, I guess I call it in a serious way, doing some of these bigger trips and more distant trips, fairly recently. But not only there, but in some of the climbing trips I've had the pleasure and the privilege of participating in,
00:06:10
Speaker
People have been just fantastic, you know, in kind of welcoming me into the group, being solicitous, being sympathetic and understanding when it comes to, you know, expectations. You know, some of these groups have really talented people. I mean, they're led by professionals and they have many people participating in them who are
00:06:34
Speaker
For instance, expert skiers, they've done stuff all over the place. Expert climbers have done a lot of things. I've been on runs with people who are completing their seven summit climbs and grand slams and things like that. And to a person, to a person that they are always engaging, sensitive, and thoughtful about,
00:06:59
Speaker
from what I can do, not just the guides, but the people. So it's a great experience. And I think in some ways, I bring a different kind of perspective sometimes to the group. And I think that's also enjoyable for other people.
00:07:17
Speaker
I mean, age has its cost, but it also brings certain benefits of wisdom. I mean, there's certainly that age-old saying, like, I wish I had knew all this stuff when I was 30 years old. And I'm sure that my experience has been very much the same with the mountain community that I've been involved with my entire life.
00:07:39
Speaker
very lucky, you know, when I was a kid to be, you know, being, having been sort of taken up with some older mentor types that helped me along, kind of kept me from killing myself, in fact. And I was, but I always found the group that this community be pretty embracing and, you know, there's obviously the odd jerk out there. But I think the overall, the community is,
00:08:06
Speaker
is very welcoming and very willing to kind of help and reach out and show somebody else the ropes or in your case, say, okay, look at, like you've mentioned this to me before, maybe you sit out a lap when you're doing, you know, some ski touring. I'm gonna sit here and have a snack and wait for you guys after this run, we'll catch back up.
00:08:26
Speaker
And I think that the willingness of people to do that is very refreshing and it's not a competitive atmosphere. And I've seen it everything well. And I'm finding myself in this position now, to some extent, most of my
00:08:42
Speaker
outdoor partners are half my age and you know I don't climb as hard as I used to climb and I can't skin uphill nearly as fast as I used to do it and so but I've found them to be you know like you said they are
00:08:58
Speaker
they were certainly willing to kind of hold back on my behalf or to accommodate what I, you know, we go to a crag and there's some, you know, there's some really hard climbs. Well, I'll believe them on those and they can blame me on something easier without any sort of, you know, there's no real, uh,
00:09:16
Speaker
stigma attached to the fact that,
Maintaining Adventure in Aging
00:09:19
Speaker
you know, I'm not at that level anymore. And I think that's a tough thing for a lot of us to negotiate is because as at our age, we're beginning to lose, not beginning, we have lost a great deal of that youthful vigor we once had. Yeah, you know, it's, it's, that's absolutely the case. And that's what I found. But you know, the other thing that happens as you get older, you start, hopefully, I think if you come to terms with your age,
00:09:47
Speaker
sometimes you know it's you feel a lot you know different ages on different days but but um the other thing that I think happens is um you know we we tend to lose our sense of adventure and so I find myself kind of forcing myself not so much to do that once I got involved in this but you know I'm getting into things maybe the work I'm getting things a little bit over my head you know and but then the difference though is
00:10:15
Speaker
that, from my standpoint, the climbing is a better example. To me, if I go on one of these trips and get to the top, that's great. I mean, it's not like I don't want to get to the top. But the reality is, I'm just there to see what the mountain or the trip is going to give me. And so I think that's part of the process that comes as you get older. You tend to realize that
00:10:42
Speaker
stand on top of the rock is a really good thing. And to be able to say you did that and feel like you've accomplished it. But it's not really all about that. And it kind of fades as the dynamics of the group, the interactions, the friendships that you form, the mistakes that you make and you learn from it.
00:11:08
Speaker
I don't want to have it anymore. But I think it's a big difference. And I think I would have felt a lot differently when I was younger. It was much more about all about the top and all about the accomplishment, kind of losing sight of the process and the experience. It's a little bit like you spend your life
00:11:31
Speaker
You know, going to, and I was a, you know, I was a typical kind of a working guy and, you know, you can talk about that a little bit. I had a regular career and came to this later. And, you know, one of the things you do in your life is, you know, you have your family and you might take care of your family and then you start accumulating stuff. You start buying things, you know, you go places and you buy stuff and you have furnished houses. And, you know, for people who might be listening or younger, you're going to find out that later on you have to get rid of all that stuff.
00:12:01
Speaker
reality is nobody wants it. In the old days, I think the kids, you know, we got some stuff from Leslie, my wife and I have some stuff from our parents, you know, we still have furniture and things like that. Our kids don't want any of that. And so, you know, we got this odd process where we spent our whole life, you know, filling up the house with stuff and now we have to find something to do with it. And what becomes much more important and you realize it's much more important is
00:12:38
Speaker
And that's why this has been so, it just expanded my horizons and my circle, my friendships so much. It's just been delightful. Not all the training has been delightful, okay? And not all the climbing and the uphill has been delightful, but the ability to reflect and recollect and think back about these adventures that I've had, you know, when I'm not doing them.
00:13:13
Speaker
the anticipation and you signed up for something and you're all excited about it and you have the participation where you're actually doing the event and then finally you have the recollection. Yeah. And it used to be that I was, I used to think that the anticipation kind of was the most compelling part
00:13:42
Speaker
on these. It brings a lot of satisfaction enjoyment, you know, in the anticipation is great. And so the participation is because it's kind of narrow is in there but my recollection is what kind of carries me on it and actually helps
00:14:07
Speaker
uphill athlete. No, it can be a real grind. I mean, it's really hard. And I'm really fortunate because I've retired just I think this is my amount five years now. But for those who are still working, you know, trying to take care of kids, trying to run down jobs, training to be ready to do some of these trips is a major commitment, but it can be done. The good news is, if you get to the point like me where you're retired, then it's a great
00:14:39
Speaker
your training and take your nap. It's really good. It works out really well. Yeah, it does. Well, I've had a similar trajectory. I've been at this a lot longer. I started climbing when I was in high school, and it's been a major factor in my life from now for what's that. I have to say that's over 50 years that I've been
00:15:02
Speaker
Trying to do this and are doing it, you know, and trying is more probably more accurate I mean, I'm always looking to see if I can be better than I was yesterday now it's a case of trying to slow the decline a little bit but But I like you You in my youth and and I mean I was probably as driven as almost any climber I've ever known you know, it was it I had I had something to prove and
00:15:28
Speaker
And it was either proving that to myself or to my compatriots or to the world in general. And that was a huge part of the motivation for me. And, you know, I'm lucky that I lived through a lot of situations that I literally maybe shouldn't have lived through.
00:15:46
Speaker
But what's happened with age, like you, with you, is that now it's, you know, I don't have anything to prove. I am never going to climb as hard or as dangerous and do all that stuff that I did, you know, 35 years ago. It's just never going to happen again. And so for me now, it's the experience. Who am I with? How enjoyable these things are?
00:16:10
Speaker
And then like you said the recollection, you know, I mean I have a lifetime of memories of these kinds of things and then as you pointed out earlier, I think one of the
00:16:21
Speaker
You have an incredible bond with people that you have been through some of these type of adverse situations. I mean, if you've had to sit on a chopped out ledge on an icy mountain overnight with no bivvy gear with a person, you become joined at the hip with that person for life. I mean, you've lived through something that brings you very, very close. I'm sure, I don't have no experience with this, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's pretty similar to what it's like to live through combat with a person.
00:16:51
Speaker
And so I think that depth of connection is something that we often struggle to find in our everyday life because things are so fast paced and it's so easy for us to just move on to the next thing. And when we get out in the mountains and we're no longer dictating
00:17:09
Speaker
the schedule the weather we're not calling the shots anymore we're we're there at the mercy of those mountains and it's a matter of you know are we prepared to handle what the mountain is throwing at us and so I found that you know certainly I learned all this while I mean I didn't I didn't know this when I was 25 years old that's for sure um but I have figured it out over the years that that's really what matters you know when I meet
00:17:34
Speaker
Friends of mine the ones that are still alive that have you know a lot that I climbed with when I was in my 20s and 30s It's a very rewarding, you know, it's like it's like a family reunion over again I'm sure you have similar experiences with folks you've been on these trips with Yeah, it's almost you know, and I haven't you know
00:18:00
Speaker
No, I haven't had to do that. I can probably read about that as opposed to having experienced it. But I have had some experiences that I know exactly what you're talking about. And it's this powerful internal bond that you create with people. And then when you reconnect with them, it's this very warm kind of embracing reconnection. And that's why this group,
00:18:25
Speaker
There are always new people on these trips, and it's always fun, and they tend to be, you know, you always kind of wonder, they almost always turn out to be good people. But then this core of folks that I know now, we've become really close because of this. Yeah, and I think that that's, you know, it's when you're young, you just don't kind of realize that when you're my age, the other thing that starts to happen is you start to lose friends. Now, I don't lose friends because they're climbing or skiing. You know, I lose friends because, you know, they can't dodge,
00:18:57
Speaker
a cancer, not so much with accidents, but it makes you, as the old saying goes, you're aware of your own mortality. Start to think about that a little bit because these were people you knew well, really good people. Part of what happened to me actually is I was an attorney and working in a large firm and putting in the hours and doing that sort of thing.
00:19:26
Speaker
I don't know, maybe seven or eight years ago, a little bit before I retired, just decided that, you know, I'd been sitting in the chair a lot. I wasn't in terrible shape. I mean, I was in okay shape, hadn't done anything, you know, since back in the 90s, pretty much. And I walked into the gym that happened to be in our building, just by coincidence, you know, asked for a trainer that really
00:19:57
Speaker
Beth Flores, who was actually really great. But it was the first kind of consistent exercise I started doing. It wasn't training.
Journey Back to Exercise
00:20:04
Speaker
I wouldn't say it was training, but I was doing some exercise. And something I realized that, you know, I needed to do that to be able to live my life in a way that was not filled with, you know, just aches and pains and the inability to do
00:20:26
Speaker
felt like it was becoming a limiter and I wanted to do some more things. I've always been interested in climbing, done a little bit of it in the past, not a lot, but I wanted to do that. I was very fortunate to have a friend of mine, we can talk about that a little bit, who kind of encouraged me to do a trip down to Ecuador.
00:20:52
Speaker
The point was that I just knew that I wasn't getting any younger, and I was kind of looking for a way to get back in the game. I knew I'd have some more time. As I was getting closer to retirement, I'd prefer a firm was really a wonderful place for McGuire Woods. It's headquartered in Richmond, but has offices around the country and other places in the world. And they were really terrific about this and allowing me to have some more time off as I kind of got closer to retirement. So I had the time to do some things and take some trips.
00:21:23
Speaker
I do this because I can take the trips, but I also think about the fact that the training and being in good, relatively good shape and keeping yourself as strong as you can, if you can avoid the big killers like heart disease and cancer, allow you to do things around the house.
00:21:44
Speaker
that I think about is every time I have to move the grandkids car seat, you know, out of the car, put it back on the shelf. I mean, somebody designed that thing to be as clumsy and awkward and difficult to move around as possible. I don't think I'm the only one that's had this issue. I think parents of kids know what I'm talking about. And there are just things, you know, in daily life that even if you're training to go, you know, up a mountain,
00:22:13
Speaker
If you're training, even though you're doing that, you're just better off being able to get around and do things. We had to move a flower pot in from outside. Now that sounds kind of silly, but it was a pretty big flower pot the other day, and it was terracotta, so it's porous and it rained a bunch.
00:22:35
Speaker
So it was empty. I picked this thing up. I was going to carry it in the garage. It weighs like, I don't know, like 40 pounds or something like that. I can't remember, but you know, trying to carry that thing out in front of you. That was, that was not easy. So it's been tremendously advantageous and just kind of for me, and I think it would be for other people to, you know, kind of what I can do, how I feel that feeling when, you know, when you're, when you're feeling good as opposed to feeling
00:23:02
Speaker
I don't know, tired, you know, you haven't had enough exercise, your body isn't working very well. So it's been, you know, it's been terrific for that, not just because it opens chapters, but because it allows me to live my life on a daily basis in a more enjoyable way.
00:23:20
Speaker
I couldn't agree more. Like I mentioned earlier, in my youth, it was all about high performance. How fast could I run? How hard could I climb? How quickly could I get up and down these mountains and all that sort of thing. And now, while I still love those types of things, it's shifted much more to how can I keep at least a foot in that door and keep doing those kinds of things, even at a reduced level.
00:23:50
Speaker
And I've said this, I think in public quite a few times, I don't train anymore. When I was young, I trained and I trained really hard for a lot of years. Now I'm much more of an exerciser and that's to fit into my life structure and all that. And I've got enough experience to kind of, I can manage my exercise level as if it were training, but it's not, I mean, I don't write out a training plan for myself anymore, that kind of stuff.
00:24:15
Speaker
I think part of it was from being in a highly structured program for a good chunk of my life where training was such a key thing. It's like, okay, I don't have the energy for that anymore. I did that for 20 years. But I agree with you completely, and I think that's just a great message that the
00:24:35
Speaker
as we age and our shift becomes shifts from our mentality shifts from high performance to just, you know, keeping you keep moving, you know, getting up out of the bed every day and not going, Oh my God, what's happening today? And that's almost inevitable. Something's going to be out of whack most of the time.
00:24:58
Speaker
But having this consistent program, and I think you and I have enough history now, that this was a little bit of a struggle for you when we first got started. And I said, hey, Art, you've told me what you want to do, which when you came to us was I want to climb Mount Everest. And I said, well, then here's how you need to go about that. And I think you were a little taken aback by a couple of those conversations. We had a couple of come to Jesus
00:25:26
Speaker
conversation about that stuff. Yeah. That's exactly right. And I remember them very well and I still have the emails, the conversations and emails. And what you, and I came from it from the other perspective, right? I hadn't really done very much of this. Again, I had some experiences where I had done kind of a trek to Everest Base Camp on the north side back in 1990. That was an expedition led by Jim Whitaker. And
00:26:01
Speaker
It said they were taking trekkers if you made a contribution. I think it was like contributing $10,000 to the expedition, which was pretty clever on Whitaker's Park. They would bring you along and there was a big group of turnepi
00:26:20
Speaker
I actually, some others got up to the advanced base camp and I remember I was in the tent, the wind was pulling and howling and Whitaker was in there, Jim Whitaker was in there and he was with two guys, Robert Link and Jeff Gall from Aspen, I think, giving them instructions. And what happened is that was supposed to be international peace climbing. He's going to have a Chinese climber, a Russian climber, an American climber going teams at three, but the Berlin Wall came down
00:26:50
Speaker
was a guy that promoted the idea originally kind of associated with Earth Day back then of cleaning up the mountain. So that was a wonderful experience and I ended up going with a couple guys I met the next year at Finale. But they hadn't done anything really at all until I started to
00:27:10
Speaker
kind of come to this stuff later on. And one of the things that happened was I jumped into this with a lot of enthusiasm and I've been doing some exercise with some trainers, some of whom really are very talented, but the program and the difference on
00:27:32
Speaker
your training program worked. In there, what you were doing is I was going into a gym, basically a facility with trainers who were particularly well adapted to training real high level athletes. They were high school, college, and many professional athletes here in Chicago. Chicago Bears and other mostly football players, but they had a few baseball players.
00:28:05
Speaker
You know, some structure for people like me that were coming in and they're really good. But the difference was that it was A couple hours a week. I think I don't know if I ever did three hours a week and then two sessions a week. And so when you go in and you go and it was very intense. It was about, you know, moving things around and lifting heavy things and you know
00:28:32
Speaker
know what they're doing. These are very accomplished trainers with very accomplished athletes. And what I found was hurt all the time. I was just, my body just couldn't take that kind of intense effort. I mean, I was
00:28:57
Speaker
You know, it's not as protective as it was. So when it came to uphill athlete and what had happened is Steve was working with one of the guys that I had become a friend of, Wolf Riley, because Wolf was training to do the Iger. And so Steve was developing a program with Wolf. And so we were talking about that. And I, you know, I've seen, I've actually bought the book independently, training from the new optimism.
00:29:25
Speaker
this was starting to resonate with me kind of understanding kind of process and thinking about the program and how you have to have a process and you know and be persistent and and that leads to progress. Anyway I came and I remember that you know we had a conversation and you kind of talked about this and I was
00:29:54
Speaker
messing around with the small fish. And so I started doing this and I remember we started the program and I then wrote to you and talked about how I wanted to play some golf, how that's working with it. I wanted to play platform tennis, which is one of the things we do here in the Midwest to get outside. And you wrote back and you basically said, look, you don't get it, okay? You don't get it. At your age, you can't do this program and do all of these other things.
00:30:24
Speaker
It just doesn't, your body just isn't going to let you do it. You won't be ready. I mean, that's really what you said. And then you said, no, no, no, but then you wrote back and you said, in fact, you don't understand. You can die. Okay. This is not, you're not, this is not, this is not a golf match. This is not a paddle game. You could die. And if you're not ready, and we talked about that. And so I got the message. I actually, um,
00:30:54
Speaker
But the other thing that happened was, you warned me about this too, is that it was hard, but my body also didn't just accept it and slowly get stronger. I think as you described it, you're going to feel like you have the flu. Remember, you're going to feel sick.
00:31:25
Speaker
complicated, let everything recover. Your body's going to have some inflammation and other types of things, I don't understand. But I do remember, I didn't feel very good. But I was tired and it took a long time to work through that. And so there are times when you kind of wonder about how you're doing. And it's the stair step approach where you kind of move up and then you kind of fall back. But the thing about it, Scott, is that
Adapting to Training at Any Age
00:31:57
Speaker
somewhere along that line and I've had some you know major relapses too along the way and other kinds of things but now what happens is working with Seth Keene more than directly with you we have a challenging program one that I think is you know that I really like there's plenty of intensity there not too much but I don't
00:32:26
Speaker
some issues and things go wrong, but that general kind of malaise and that flu. The point is, though, that it took a while to get there. So if you start when you're 72 or whatever it was at the time, it's going to take you longer than if you start when you're 62 or if you start when you're 52. You're still going to get there, but you have to be realistic about how long it's going to take and what you can achieve.
00:32:53
Speaker
And it hasn't been, you know, this hasn't been without setbacks along the way, which is, you know, something people have to be prepared for. That's just the way life is. That's just the way our bodies work.
00:33:06
Speaker
Yeah, and having coached everything from people in our generation, our age, all the way down to juniors. I've coached, I think people know some of my background. I mean, I coached a very successful junior program for a number of years with cross-country skiers where we actually put a number of kids, went on to ski in the Olympics and perform really high, at a very high level in the World Cup.
00:33:32
Speaker
And so I've had that experience, kind of the whole gamut of age. And I can say that it's incredibly gratifying to work with these kids because you feel like you must be the smartest coach in the world because they adapt so quickly.
00:33:49
Speaker
And you're just thinking, oh man, I know all this stuff and I'm just incredible. Because they go from being these lumps of flesh to these incredible athletes in just no time at all. You can see the changes from almost day to day or week to week.
00:34:06
Speaker
Anyway, I think that what I learned, the bulk of my personal experience had been when I was young, and I saw how quickly I adapted to the training, and then working with dozens and dozens of kids over seven or eight years, I saw how quickly that worked. And until you lived through those experiences and then started to work with myself in middle age and now older,
00:34:34
Speaker
And then working with other athletes in the same age cohort, I went, oh, we don't respond nearly as quickly as those kids do. And so we have to take that into consideration and it changes the rate at which we can ramp up the training load.
00:34:52
Speaker
means more recovery time, which is something we've written about a lot in our books and on the website. But until you've actually had experience with it, it's like with you, it sort of took some time and it kind of comes as a shock because in our minds, I'm sure you would agree with me, you're still 35 years old. You feel like, well, I did these things when I was 35. I should be able to do them now.
00:35:17
Speaker
And it's hard to reckon with the fact that, okay, you maybe think you're 35 years old, but now the metabolic processes are slightly different. Mitochondria isn't as efficient as it once was. That's something that people, I think, don't recognize. Mitochondria, of course, has its own DNA.
00:35:38
Speaker
mitochondria, I'm going to go down a little rabbit hole here, but I think for the aging population, this is kind of to understand aging is an important thing. And one of the principal things that happen as we age is because mitochondria, a generation of mitochondria only lives several days.
00:35:54
Speaker
And so a new generation is coming along every few days, and the chromosomes are splitting and replicating and all that. And with them, with each one of those generations, it's possible that you're passing on some kind of defective DNA. And these defects can become multiplied over all the years that we're alive so that mitochondria
00:36:19
Speaker
that you have now are not capable of producing the energy that they were 30 some years ago because now the the mitochondria the DNA is slightly defective and of course in severe cases what they call mitochondrial disorder I mean you can you know it can become extremely life-threatening even.
00:36:37
Speaker
but even just a normal person aging that's one of the reasons we don't have the energy we do is one of the reason are we get wrinkles because in the mitochondria are the other in every single cell in our body and they're there providing the energy that keeps the cells alive and.
00:36:52
Speaker
But until you've experienced it firsthand, it's kind of hard to really understand that and come to grips with it. But I think this is kind of why I'm enjoying trying to figure out how to navigate this whole aging thing and still remain pretty active for someone else. And you too, as active as you, I think most certainly
00:37:18
Speaker
You're way more and you're in the top one percentile. I'm sure of 74 year olds in terms of activity level Well, you know, it's it's so interesting. It's true You know, I look in the mirror and I sometimes wonder who this who this guy is This old guy is looking back at me. We can't do much about you know, our face Especially I grew up in Colorado is outside a lot before we knew, you know, you got to be careful about that sort of thing But here's the thing that's really on the on the flip side of that
00:37:46
Speaker
It's actually, I'm still stunned by this, but given the time and the right stimulus, our bodies, even for an old guy like me, will respond. That is actually incredible. It's amazing that we evolved to live until our teeth wore out and we started to death. I don't know, 25, 30 years at the most. And here we are.
00:38:12
Speaker
you know, two, three times that age expectancy, still vibrant and able to do things. And I'm not alone. I'm no special person. I wasn't an athlete. I mean, I just worked through high school
00:38:41
Speaker
You know, if you can avoid debilitating diseases and, you know, put it in the work, take care of yourself, you know, eat decently. And I'm not a great eater, you know, if I can get rid of cookies and ice cream, I'd be a lot healthier. I'd put that. But, you know, eat decently, get on a program. Your body will respond. That is what I think is just remarkable. It takes time, though. When we started, when you and I started, I think I did an aerobic threshold test.
00:39:14
Speaker
was 110, something like that. That's where we started. Yeah, so I was kind of in the 110 and we push it to 115 and 120. And over time, that's moved up. And so Seth and I now work with my aerobic threshold at 130. And, you know, that's nothing compared to somebody who's 45, you know, or 25 or 35. And what there is are, but it gives me a huge, the improved
00:39:41
Speaker
capability when I'm trying to move up a mountain or back to pre-ski or even ski in a resort. I mean, I like skiing in a resort, but I found that, you know, one of the things I found is that I feel like sometimes it's a merry-go-round. You know, you ride the lift up, you ski all the way down, you ride the lift up, you ski all the way down. It used to be, you know, take some breathers and take some rest stops and stuff. So backcountry skiing is so wonderful because of the rhythm. There's that rhythm you have of, you know, the long ascent
00:40:11
Speaker
you know, 58 minutes up and two minutes down or something like that. But there's still a rhythm to it that allows you to kind of move through the wilderness and appreciate it and think about it, you know, because we live in a, you know, I live in a community with thousands of millions of other people here in the suburb of Chicago. And being outside, you know, the opportunity to see that and
00:40:39
Speaker
gives me and it is true for others. Like I said, I'm not alone and it works. I think that's what's so great. And I think the other thing too is that I become much more kind of aware of my own strengths and weaknesses, I guess I'd call it. And one of the things that the program has done is the aches and pains don't go away. The things that happen
00:41:07
Speaker
As you know, I've had an IT band issue that's really a limiting factor. And we've worked really hard on that. I thought it was past it. It was actually a few weeks ago. It was actually running. I don't mean jogging. I mean running. And that flared up again. So the ability that just for somebody my age to be outside and actually running was really special. I have to tell you that was really special. But then other things, I ended up with this thing called the neuroma. We don't need all the details, but it's
00:41:38
Speaker
on one of your toes. And it's like really, it's really a drag because it's like Chinese water torture and it kind of builds up over time and becomes really uncomfortable when you're doing something like hiking or skiing. But then the other hand, when I came to you, I had some issues. For instance, I had a really sore ankle. I think it was arthritis maybe in one of the ankles. So when I was trying to, you know,
00:42:07
Speaker
And I'm working with crampons and trying to, you know, you're doing, you know, a canard, you know, kind of that duck step of a thing where you have to bend the ankles. That really hurt in one of my ankles. And I had a thing where on airplanes or driving, I get a big
00:42:22
Speaker
big pointer in my, in my glute, you know, if I sat for too long. And there's, there are other things I don't really remember when I go through my journals that kind of reminds me of all these things. I don't handle this anymore. And I know this because of this exercise program, kind of the strengthening and the stretching and some of the mobility work and just letting the, you know, the tendons and the ligaments kind of join up with, um,
00:42:47
Speaker
some of the muscular improvements. And it doesn't mean you get away from it. There's some things you can't fix. But I have many fewer issues, frankly. I just feel better. I don't mean just stronger. But I just feel better. There are fewer inherent issues. And that's a really good way to live your life and enjoy your day.
00:43:13
Speaker
Yeah, it sure is. And I think that, you know, first I want to point out that, you know, you are quite typical. I mean, not if you're age. I would say you're probably, you know, on the upper end of the spectrum of the folks that we coach. But one of the points you made earlier is, you know, yeah, I'm not special. I've never been a big athlete and probably don't have any special genetic gifts. And I think one of the misconceptions that's out there is that uphill athlete is for elite athletes.
00:43:42
Speaker
And I can tell you that less than 5% of the people that we work with, I would consider elite or professional. And you are much more in line with the typical uphill athlete, customer, client, a coached athlete.
00:43:59
Speaker
And I think that what we have really tried to do with the books and the website and everything else is to show people, okay, yes, you may not, you might be 60 years old and you may not have been a lifetime athlete and you may have crappy genetics. We don't know.
00:44:18
Speaker
But if you do the, if you follow these ideas that elite athletes do use, yes, you might not be training like Kylian Jornet and you know, training 40 hours a week. I mean, that's probably not going to happen for most of us. Even ones that are same age as him. But if you think about the way he trains or the way Steve House trained when he was younger, kind of the things we advocate for, you can apply those principles at any age and they will work.
00:44:46
Speaker
And they may not work as fast. And yes, you probably are never going to become Killian Jornet or Steve House. But what we're trying to do is bring these well-tested elite training ideas that work at the highest levels and make them accessible to the average athlete and the amateurs, the recreational people. That's really been our goal since day one.
00:45:13
Speaker
And it's sometimes, I think, misunderstood by the public that we come across, because we do work with a few elite, for sure. And we, from time to time, publish stories or podcasts with some high-level people in our hopes is that those would be kind of inspirational, not intimidating. But I do know there is some of that out there that people feel like, oh my gosh, I'm not good enough to work without the laughing. And you just said that a few moments ago, where you said, I couldn't believe you'd work with me.
00:45:42
Speaker
And I heard that from other people. But you know, I talk to, I don't know, a couple dozen people a week who, you know, whether it's by email, but I'm gonna do a lot of phone calls with folks. And that's a common theme right here is that like, well, do you think I could do up the programs you guys have? And then of course you could. I mean, it may be have to be scaled, it's going to be scaled appropriately for each person's level.
00:46:10
Speaker
um and as yours was and and it and for many people it's going to be kind of a paradigm shift in the way they you know they view their bodies and their exercise and um but in the long run as you just spend some time saying is you know that's that has paid off in a big way for you now and and i think that it's um
00:46:30
Speaker
It's allowing you, and I'm sure it will for years to come, to live quite an active lifestyle. Whether it's picking up the baby seat, car seat, or going back to Mount Everest. I feel like sometimes, again, perspective, I feel like Indiana Jones, those movies where he's trapped in the temple, and the giant stone door is coming down, and he barely has time. My window is a little different.
00:47:03
Speaker
One of the things that I do think people need to bring, they don't have to be elite athletes. They don't have to have a long history. They do need to have a desire, obviously, to do the program. Oh, look at that. Look at your shirt. Look at your shirt. It does. I had this shirt, you can't coach desire. I think about that a lot, Scott. I think about that a lot.
00:47:29
Speaker
And down below it, down below it at the bottom where you can't see this, of course, as you know, it's this summit team. And what I like about that is it elevates the desire and the commitment above the concept of the summit. And it's exactly what I was saying before. It's about the process and the journey. But I think what's interesting
00:47:48
Speaker
And it just, you know, I just am so, I guess just so gratified that I found uphill athlete and had a chance to work with you and Seth and meet some others from other members of the team. It's such an outstanding operation and it's still blown away by the amount of information and
00:48:07
Speaker
on the website. I think it's just remarkable. It says something about the motivation for you and what you're thinking about how you're trying to help. I mean, you're trying to make this a business, of course, but you're trying to really share the information. It's very gratifying to see that. But I would say you got to bring that. You got to bring that kind of skills, but you got to bring that kind of
00:48:33
Speaker
to adhere to the program. You know, if you've said in the books and as you've said in many other cases, life has a way of getting in the way. You know, things happen, you know, injury, sickness, divorce, you know, weddings, birthdays, trips. I mean, all things. I was, we went to eat and we were on one of the trips I take with my wife and some friends.
00:48:59
Speaker
I don't know, maybe there were 20, 25 rooms in there, passengers. Fantastic, Egypt is a place people should visit. You have to have the chance. But they had like a little workout room to make sure there was a workout thing before we signed up. What that consisted of was a treadmill stuck in a closet in the bottom of the boat. So for four or five days, I was down there with a pack on this treadmill. And by that time, I was kind of acclimated
Importance of Coaching & Motivation
00:49:28
Speaker
You know, I think that they're typically, I look at the world and very simplified over some way. There are a couple kinds of people in my view, my experience. There are self-starters and entrepreneurs, people that can take information and run with it. And then there are people who like me, I'm a framework guy. I like the framework. And even though you have so much information out there, not only your book on your website, in terms of plans and
00:50:04
Speaker
a lot of others. I can read that and I can understand what it's saying, but I can't make off, you know, I can't bring myself to actually commit to it. But when I have a coach, every single day, every single day, I do my exercise or my training session.
00:50:27
Speaker
And then I get a response. So I communicate more with my coaches than I do with Leslie. It's amazing. Every single day, there's a communication. And I think that is hugely important. Sometimes those messages are reinforcements. Sometimes they're encouraging. Sometimes they're warnings. Sometimes they're questions. Sometimes there are suggestions about issues that come up. I mean, they run the gamut.
00:51:00
Speaker
even a trainer who's a you know really helping you say in a gym situation twice a week once a week maybe even three times a week or where you're going to the gym and you're not doing it by yourself here under the program you know I have many programs but you know we communicate every single day and that communication is a
00:51:27
Speaker
And that's hugely helpful in terms of keeping that stochae. I mean, it's important because there are days out there, and I now train. The other thing you told me early on was, and I know your book emphasizes, you can't just go from sitting in a desk, talking on the phone, working on the computer for eight, nine, 10, 11 hours a day after doing that for 30 or 35 years, and suddenly start training 700 hours a year. It just doesn't happen that way. It just doesn't happen.
00:51:56
Speaker
But, you know, again, gradually over time, we've kind of gotten to the point with the exception of some setbacks of getting to that point where it's, you know, between 11 and maybe 12 hours a week of the actual work, not just, you know, plus there's the prep, the warmup and the, you know, the foam rolling and massage and stretching and all that kind of stuff. So that takes time to build that up. You just don't do that suddenly. But the program,
00:52:31
Speaker
really so grateful that I found this and it's allowed me to open up all these chapters, allowed me to take all these wonderful adventures, meet all these wonderful people. It's just the best. Well, I'm gonna have to up your commission. I can see. I told you that. Wait, I told you you weren't charging enough. No, but I mean, I'm gonna have to pay you more for these endorsements, I guess, huh? Those are just the facts. Just the facts.
00:52:58
Speaker
We'd like to hear that, of course, and we hear it from lots of folks that this has transformed their lives and made a big difference. But as you started this part of the conversation, that desire, you have to want to change. You have to want to do something, whether it's climb a mountain, run a race, go on a ski trip, or whatever it is.
00:53:19
Speaker
you have to have that desire and that focus because as you pointed out in the process of training, there's going to be some days when it's going to be kind of hard to put your shoes on and get out the door. Like, okay. And having somebody there to give a gentle nudge can be a help. And also somebody to, there's going to be some days when maybe you shouldn't put your shoes on and get out the door and you should be, you know, and it's nice to have a sounding board, you know, kind of an objective outside observer who's going to say,
00:53:48
Speaker
Based on what I'm seeing for the last couple of days in your training log, I think maybe we should have a day off today. A lot of the folks that we work with, I would say that maybe all the folks that end up coaching with us are type A personalities. They've been successful in a lot of parts of their life or they're really driven to succeed in this new sphere or on some climb or whatever it is.
00:54:15
Speaker
And those people don't need a kick in the butt to get out the door in general. It's very rare that we have to motivate people to do that. What they normally need is somebody to restrain them from them overdoing it. And with these type A people, if something's written down in a training program for them and they see, okay, it's Tuesday, I'm supposed to go do these intervals or whatever it is, they will feel guilty.
00:54:42
Speaker
So even if they warm up, they don't feel very good, they think, okay, I'm supposed to do this, so I'm gonna go through with it. When in fact what they should be doing is going, and what a coach will help them do is go, no, no, you're not doing that today. And so the coach can kind of absolve you of that guilt that a normal type A person will feel it because they're not complying with the instructions.
00:55:05
Speaker
And you know, I try to emphasize this many times over. I don't think I can say it enough because we see this routinely. We are not machines, you know, and we are not every day is not going to be the same. And especially as we get older, it's, you know, more account has to be taken of that. I mean, with these kids, like I was talking about a little while ago, and when they're 18 and 19, you can just throw anything at them because they're going to bounce right back. Maybe they'll be a little tired one day, but the next day, boom, they're right there again.
00:55:31
Speaker
and adults, and especially older adults, it's not the same thing. And so I think it's really important for people to keep that in mind. And I'll be doing a podcast on this in the next few days with one of our coaches, Sam Naney, who you know, about this exact thing where we're gonna talk about how important it is to not become a slave to the program, to the plan.
00:55:58
Speaker
And I think that I really want to drive that home because it's something that we, you know, we hear from people. It can result in some terrible outcomes of injury and over-training and that kind of stuff. But so that's something that, that's something that certainly, you know, Seth can help you navigate from day to day.
00:56:14
Speaker
But it's also something that we've tried to impart in the books and on the website is how to monitor and control that training so that you don't end up in the ditch with all four tires flat. Once you're there, it can be pretty hard to get restarted.
00:56:34
Speaker
Yeah, but it's, it's, it's true. And I made that mistake. I made that mistake with you. Um, and again, you know, I hadn't done any exercise for a long time and I remember one of the things we were doing were walk jog intervals and I was out in an area here. It was the summer. It was a really nice day and I was kind of going along and I was doing my walking. I can't remember if it was a three minute, two minute or, you know, two minute, four minute, but it doesn't really matter. So I wasn't really running. I was walking and then jogging and then
00:57:05
Speaker
like it wasn't like I was sprinting or anything like that. You know, and my knee started to hurt and it hurt. I mean, it was like, you know, something down there. And this was just pure stupidity on my part. I just kept going to do the session in the 45 minutes or whatever it was. And it turned out it was an IT band issue and people who had that know what that's like, that needle you get there in your knee. And that was really
00:57:34
Speaker
time to kind of recover. But on the other hand, you know, what I like about the program and working with a coach is the other side of that is things like that are going to happen, you're gonna have to recover and the coach helps you adapt. But I've had, I've been like a lot of people my age, I've been through, you know, some operations, I think I've had three arthroscopic procedures on my knees. I mean, they're not terrible, but they're not great.
00:58:00
Speaker
I've had both rotator cuff surgeries, and one of them I had last summer. So this was a really, I delayed it. I have a comment on that, by the way. I delayed it, and at last, at the end of July, from a fabulous surgeon who did the work. He's done a lot of work on me. In fact, I think I put one of his kids through school, by actually, Mark Bolan here. He's a wonderful, wonderful surgeon, orthopedic surgeon. Anyway,
00:58:29
Speaker
By the time he got in there, the rotator cuff is normally reattaching a supraspinatus tendon, you know, back to the bone because it usually gets torn. Well, mine was gone and it retracted and was gone, so it had to do kind of an interim thing with infraspinatus. But the point was it took a long time to rehab that. I'm still actually rehabbing it, so it's been a year since I got out of the sling. And three times a week,
00:59:02
Speaker
and it was strength and conditioning stuff. But the point of this, and now it's really coming along. I mean, I'm starting to really do some stuff that, you know, I don't feel the limitation of it like I did before, but it's been an entire year of that. That's a lot of sessions. But the point of this story is that Seth has helped me incorporate that into the schedule and work around that.
00:59:31
Speaker
I need to do that. So we've talked about that. And we have the ability and the flexibility to work in different things to accommodate that. So that's really important. And the takeaway here is not only that the program is adaptable, but the other thing is when you get to be, I think it's probably true for maybe even your age, Scott, but certainly at my age. Yeah. But the point is, don't put off
01:00:01
Speaker
looked at and fixed. It sounds so silly. This neuroma, which is an inflammation of a small joint, a nerve cell, one small joint and the toe is pretty common actually for older people. And it's really dug uncomfortable if you have it. So I finally went in to see a guy and I ended up with a cortisone shot with some metatarsal inserts in my shoes.
01:00:29
Speaker
And it's much better. And I'm thinking to myself, you know, why didn't I do this before? Why did I put this off? And so, you know, that's the message I have is, you know, get things looked at. Don't put them off. Get them taken care of. And if you do that in conjunction with the program, you're just going to have a, you know, a much better quality of life in most cases.
01:00:52
Speaker
Oh, for sure. Some people know I've just had my second knee replacement. I'm definitely a big believer in that. My first knee replacement seven years ago, I was really reluctant to go down that route because I thought it would be the end of whatever I could do. But I got to the point that it was so bad that I couldn't climb, I couldn't ski, couldn't hike even.
01:01:13
Speaker
And it gave me, you know, I've had seven incredible years since then of back to running. You know, I'm running 30 miles a week and all that until, of course, now I'm dealing with a new knee replacement. But, you know, had I waited, you know, I wouldn't have had those seven good years of being able to get back in the mountains, skiing, climbing, running, all that kind of stuff.
01:01:35
Speaker
And so I'm completely on board with you there. It's sort of like an old car is going to need a lot more maintenance than a brand new one is. And we need to spend almost as much time on the maintenance part as we do on the recreation part and the fun part. It's kind of shifted. I like to tell people I know it's like we're like helicopters now. For every hour in the air, there's two hours of maintenance.
01:02:05
Speaker
And anybody who's been around helicopters knows that story. So I think that it's something that that's another little one of the kind of points that's come home to roost with me as an aging athlete is that I'm going to have to spend more time.
01:02:23
Speaker
on the foam roller and stretching and recuperating and rehabbing and that sort of thing than I ever have done before. And you're a great testimonial to how that can work. And like I said in the beginning, I'm hoping that in seven years that I'm like art. I'm out there doing this stuff. I really hope so. Well, the other thing I've discovered is a lot of people have gone through
01:03:00
Speaker
kind of a limitation. I know one of your athletes is Alex Panko. I had an opportunity to meet him and his fiancee recently when I was out in Colorado, which is kind of fun. And he lives downtown in Chicago. And I know he does a lot of his training in the stairwell of the building, either where he works or where he lives. And you and I have talked about that before.
01:03:33
Speaker
where I worked about being able to access it for purposes of training in the stairwell. And then he approached the building management and the firm said, hey, great, that's cool. And the management said, oh, no, no, no, you can't have that. There's not a lot of air in there. You might suffocate. What happens? If something happens, it's hot in there. And I'm thinking to myself, okay, I'll carry a radio. You want me to carry a radio? I'll carry a radio. How about one of those, you know, I've fallen, but I can't get up. Beepers, you know, I'll do one of those. But it was a no-go.
01:04:10
Speaker
shut down with with COVID and I'm very lucky I had a I have a concept to rower I used to use a lot but I don't work I don't use it very much anymore in my case it kind of even when I work part of the technique is kind of part of my lower back but an old Nordic track okay just an old wooden Nordic track we've had over years and years and that has just been a lifesaver but other than that most of the things that I had to do until recently I actually got
Accessibility & Success Stories
01:04:42
Speaker
with. But most of the stuff I did I did all in my basement with some a set of nested dumbbells, a step-up box that I built myself. I put a hook in the ceiling and hung a TRX strap from that and then strung some parachute cord onto some weights you know so I could do some shoulder stuff. But the point the point of this is
01:05:08
Speaker
I didn't have some bands or something, but I needed very little to still do the program. I did need an order track for something because the aerobic part is such a huge portion of it, but it could have been other kinds of aerobic equipment. It's important that people understand you can do an awful lot. If you happen to be lucky enough to live in an area,
01:05:33
Speaker
Utah, New Mexico, Colorado, Washington, get to those places. You can do a lot of that work outside. But it doesn't take a lot. A lot of these things are body weight or minimal. I mean, if people have read your book and looked at your killer core routine, they know what I'm talking about. OK? It can take a lot of equipment. It still can't do anything else. Yeah. Yeah. So that's important. It's not an equipment heavy
01:06:02
Speaker
program generally. No, it's more of a time heavy and a desire heavy. You know that Nordic track, it's funny you mentioned that because I'm sure there's a great number of people listening to this who don't remember Nordic tracks or never heard of them. It was a very simple fitness device that kind of simulated cross-country skiing in some, you know, in a fashion, I would say.
01:06:28
Speaker
You can put those things up for $10 at garage sales all over the place. They were very popular in the 80s and early 90s, and now they're just sitting in people's garages and basements and collecting dust.
01:06:42
Speaker
Yeah, I've seen them a lot. Craig's List, and the same thing with some of these other exercise equipment. If you wait until February or March, there's going to be a lot of treadmills on Craig's List. People will be all excited in January. I was actually thinking about trying to rent a stair climber stick at my garage. Just because again, it's hard to simulate that.
01:07:11
Speaker
where I do belong. And they've done a really nice job of allowing people to come in at a very limited capacity. He has a stair climb machine, so I go there periodically when I need to do the step up. I mean, those kind of pack carry kinds of things. It's hard to simulate that. So I don't want to leave the impression you don't need anything, but it's pretty minimal until you get fairly far down the road. But yeah, the Nordic tractor.
01:07:39
Speaker
things like that and barbells and you know it took me a long time to kind of get what I wanted. You know doing a little bit of that a little bit of that. You know the coaches are really and I'm sure he's represented it. I know you are are flexible about you know adapting the program to
01:07:59
Speaker
meet the needs of individuals. That's certainly been my case, and I can't imagine it would be different for anybody else. Yeah, because everybody's in different situations. And like I said before, where we don't work with very many really super high level athletes, I would say the bulk of the people that we work with are what I would call terrain challenged.
01:08:21
Speaker
and live in big cities. It's very flat and they're really limited in what they have access to. And it does require a little bit of creativity and also some flexibility on the part of an athlete to say, okay, I can't get to the mountains very often. But we can build in substitutes pretty easily for that kind of stuff. And as your testament to that, it's worked quite well for you. You've been able to, Alex Panko, like you mentioned,
01:08:50
Speaker
And I think, I mean, maybe the most incredible one of all my stories and my success story was with working with this fellow, David Ruski, who's a banker in Manhattan who climbed both Choyu and Mount Everest within two weeks back to back without supplemental oxygen. And he did all, I mean all of his training in the stairwell of this tall building that he works in.
01:09:14
Speaker
And he luckily had a great running background. It was easy to transition. He had a very high work capacity for that kind of stuff. But you can succeed even on something as challenging as Mount Everest without oxygen. Not everybody is going to be able to pull that off. And he's an exception, but just shows you the range of possibilities if you're willing to tolerate it. The desire in him was extremely high. And he's used to training a lot because of his running background.
01:09:44
Speaker
But there were days where he put in 10,000 vertical feet in a stairwell. I don't know how he did it. That makes a couple hours on a treadmill or a stair machine sound like nothing. It's so interesting because there are people who do this. But the other thing is, there's a whole gamut, there's a whole spectrum of adventures that you can pick.
01:10:20
Speaker
book. My first mountaineering book. My very first mountaineering book. I still have that copy. I still love it. And I actually haven't reread it for several years, but I have reread it a few times. And it just, you know, since it sparked something that when you get it the right age. And so, and that's kind of been my, my kind of a
01:10:42
Speaker
my motivation, I guess, or my kind of love for the mountains and the adventures and things that people have done. But it doesn't have to be that. I did go back and I did go to Everest and try and climb it. But I know that I can do other things. And one of the things I was looking at, just as an example,
01:11:10
Speaker
happen to run across them because we were doing a trip, just a couple's trip, Leslie and I and some friends have done some traveling in some cool places. We were in Morocco. Morocco, by the way, is a really, really great country to visit. I mean, it's just, it's just a, it's interesting and you don't have time to talk about it, but it's a, it's really well worth it. But I looked it up and I realized that there is, the Atlas Mountains are nearby. You're going to be there and I want to do some training and kind of, you know, not get out of touch with everything.
01:11:41
Speaker
And so I was searching on the web and they had this group was sponsoring a Climb Mount Tube call. And it would have, so it sounded really good. It was really cheap. I can't remember exactly what it was, but we did our tour. We ended up in Marrakech. Everybody went home. The much better adventure guys arranged for somebody to pick me up. A guy picks me up, takes me up to a little village called Imlil.
01:12:06
Speaker
You know, there's some mules there to kind of carry up the supplies. You know, we hike up very nice young guy guide really interesting guy.
01:12:29
Speaker
trekking poles and I think boots and stuff like that with me. We get up, we climb up to the top of Mount Tube call. It's really cold and it's really windy. I remember that, it's February after all. And then we hike back down, have a nice lunch, I go back down to Imlo, a guy picks me up and I'm back in my, in Marrakech in like, I don't know, 28 hours or something like that. But it was just, I was able to do that.
01:13:02
Speaker
But I saw that another one they have, this December, they're doing a trip across Costa Rica where you bike and hike and kayak, I think. I can't remember exactly what it is. You know, and it's like, I can't remember if it's 160 miles or 140 miles. It doesn't really matter. One of the people I met in Mount Everest, a guy named Chad Gaston who lives in Costa Rica, I thought, this is gonna be great. I can go down there. I could walk across and do this cool trip across Costa Rica, then go see
01:13:36
Speaker
And of course, that trip didn't happen. But it gives you the opportunity to do that. So you may not be climbing mountains, but the adventure travel industry, not this year, of course, but it was exploding. And it's going to come back and explode because people want to go places to see things. And they want to get their feet on the ground. They want to do stuff.
Encouragement & New Challenges
01:13:56
Speaker
And whether it's
01:14:03
Speaker
in Austria, Germany, one of our guides in Everest, Kahn and Bliss, leads those in the summertime for a company. He was talking about them. And they're terrific. And they require a little bit of conditioning. You get ready to do those and enjoy it as opposed to struggling. So it just opens up.
01:14:29
Speaker
That's, you know, that's pretty cool. It is. Yeah. Oh, thanks. Yeah. I think that's a, that is a great thing. I mean, and certainly I've done some of those hikes and runs, you know, the last few years going over there with my wife and we'll, you know, run and stay in a huts and things like that. Run from hut to hut. It's, you know, it's beautiful, fantastic stuff.
01:14:49
Speaker
Well, Art, I've taken up a good chunk of your day, and I really appreciate your taking this time, having this conversation with me. It's been a lot of fun. I hope folks can take some things away from this that's inspirational and motivational for them. Just learn some things about how you've navigated this whole process. But do you have any closing comments for us?
01:15:13
Speaker
You know, I think we've covered it. I mean, I really would urge people who are on the cusp, those that are kind of undecided about this, to jump in. I mean, I have found that jumping into these trips, whether it was backcountry skiing, which I hadn't done before, or climbing, you're going to end up expanding your horizons, having a fabulous time, being personally challenged, and you're going to end up better off. You're going to feel better if you do the program, and you're going to have new relationships, see new
01:15:45
Speaker
of plunge. Go for it. Thanks. That's great advice. I really appreciate it. Well, thanks to the listeners. I'm really glad you tuned in for this chat with Art and we'll catch you on our next episode. Thanks for joining us today. For more information about what we do, please go to our website uphillathlete.com.