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Training for Altitude: Performance at Altitude with Jerome Sullivan
5.6k Plays6 months ago
In the latest episode of the Uphill Athlete Podcast season on altitude, Alyssa welcomes IFMGA guide and Uphill Athlete coach, Jerome Sullivan, on to the podcast. Jerome has spent significant time climbing technical objectives in high to extreme altitudes and has found much success in being awarded a Piolets d’Or in 2016. Jerome and Alyssa discuss the risks and challenges of not only existing, but performing at high altitudes. They dive into the mental and physical preparations as well as the deep partnerships needed to stay safe in difficult objectives. They also discuss Jerome’s memorable experiences at altitude and when to choose between continuing forward and turning back. Join us for an exciting conversation about what it takes to perform at altitude.
Check out more information here: https://uphillathlete.com/mountaineering-training/
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Introduction
00:00:11
Speaker
Welcome to the uphill athlete podcast. Our mission is to elevate and inspire all mountain athletes through education and celebration. My name is Alyssa Clark, and I will be your host today. We are talking about performance at altitude, and I've brought on none other than uphill athlete coach Jerome Sullivan. He is an IFMGA guide and appeal at DeOr winner in 2016, among many other accomplishments. Welcome to the podcast,
Jerome's Mountaineering Journey
00:00:40
Speaker
Jerome.
00:00:40
Speaker
Hey Alyssa, thanks for having me. Of course, I'm glad that we are getting to get to know you more on the podcast and hear more about your experiences at Altitude and performing some pretty amazing mountaineering and alpinism feats while you've been a pie.
00:01:03
Speaker
So maybe I'll just kind of present myself. And so I live in France now. I've been living here for 30 years. So I grew up in the States of New Hampshire, but I've been living in France for a long time and I started mountaineering here, actually in the Pyrenees, which is a small mountain range in the south of France, for those who know.
00:01:25
Speaker
and my kind of progression in the mountains was actually very slow because I grew up in a place called Bordeaux which is famous for wine and not for mountains at all. So I just started walking around in the mountains and this
00:01:46
Speaker
Curiosity made me go to one summit and then to another. Then I started rock climbing and little by little I just always wanted to take it a step further until I moved to sham when I was 20 years old and then just kind of really took it a step further. Did the guide exam. Been working as a guide for the last 15 years.
00:02:12
Speaker
And I've just always been a very curious person and always wanted to kind of go and discover
00:02:24
Speaker
in usually the places where I had the least information.
Performance in Mountaineering
00:02:28
Speaker
And so that's obviously brought me to the greater ranges and that could be Patagonia or Alaska or Greenland or the Karakoram since we're talking about altitude today. And I've just generally been attracted by
00:02:49
Speaker
climbing new routes, not for the sense of climbing a new route just to be the first, but just because I have, I really like the adventurous part in mountaineering. So that's something that's really important to me. And I feel like in mountaineering, we can maybe see kind of different categories of people who are pushing more the performance to the limit and other people who are pushing the adventure.
00:03:19
Speaker
in the middle of those, because I also really like to do technical climbing. So maybe I'll get into that a little bit later. But usually the mountains that have been appealing to me have been steep is usually what I look for. Nice. No, that's super hopeful. And yeah, I feel like within mountains, there's performance.
00:03:43
Speaker
in terms of technical and steepness. And then there's performance in terms of like fastest known times where the route's probably not as technical but going for a speed attempt on it. So it's nice. We'll bring on someone to talk more on the kind of FKT side of things, but it's good to have you talk about more of the technical side. And when we're
00:04:10
Speaker
talking about the range of altitude that you usually inhabit for these projects. What's kind of the range that you have done?
00:04:23
Speaker
I usually stayed just below 7,000 meters. So between 6 and 7,000 meters. And to say the truth, the reason is that I just feel like above 7,000 meters, I'm not good enough to climb hard technical stuff. I think very few people are.
00:04:49
Speaker
Very few people are, but there are definitely some, and we can talk about that later. It's been very progressive, so I started in the Pyrenees, and the highest peaks there are 3,000 meters, and then I climbed
00:05:05
Speaker
in the Alps where Montblanc is the highest peak 4800 and then slowly I got to the Karakoram and so I kind of built up little by little and I've definitely understood that the higher you go,
Mental Preparation for High-Altitude Climbing
00:05:21
Speaker
Just the more struggle you have with everything and it's in one sense appealing because I think the mountaineers in general always look for a bigger challenge and you can find a bigger challenge as you said by going faster or by going
00:05:38
Speaker
steeper or by going higher. That's also a way to make things harder. I really don't enjoy altitude very much because I feel like I'm weak. But then on the other hand, I'm always attracted to altitude again because it's somewhere where you feel like you have so much margin of progression and you can get better.
00:06:08
Speaker
It's kind of a two-faced coin. I don't know if that expression really exists, but it does in French. Yeah, yeah. Two sides of the coin. Two sides of the coin. Yeah. So touching on something you just said about how you feel
00:06:30
Speaker
weaker in altitude, which, of course, I think all of us do to a certain extent. How do you prepare yourself when, say, you're looking at an objective in the Karakoram, for example, that's still quite high? What does that preparation look like as you're going into a higher altitude experience?
00:06:51
Speaker
So there's various factors. Obviously, the physical preparation is really important, but I'm sure there's a lot of podcasts on that. And today, we're talking about the mental side. So I fell on this phrase from a guy which is pretty famous, which is called Wolfgang Gullisch, and he was one of the
00:07:12
Speaker
Strong climbers of the nineties and he said the mind is the most important muscle and i thought it was fitting for our podcast because in the mountains and in altitude.
00:07:24
Speaker
We often think a lot about the physical side and sometimes we tend to forget the mental side and it's the most important muscle. It's also the one that consumes the most oxygen to function correctly and obviously in higher altitude that's what we're lacking. So there's definitely a lot of things that you can set up
00:07:45
Speaker
before your trip to help deal
Motivation and Experience
00:07:49
Speaker
with the lack of oxygen up there. When we talk about, I would say, success on a mountain, I think there's different things that we can think of. We can think of getting to the summit, which is kind of what we think about first and just waving our little flag on the summit.
00:08:12
Speaker
we can talk about getting back down safely and just doing the best that we can on the mountain. And there's a variety of things that I do. The first one I think, and this is, I think a lot of people who are into sports will recognize a lot of methods here, is just projecting and visualizing. So what I like to do when I'm preparing a trip is that I gather
00:08:39
Speaker
tons of information beforehand. And that can be just by looking at Google Maps and trying to identify different places on the mountains that are going to be kind of pivot points. So that could be different orientations or different steepnesses or ridges or faces or places that are going to present more obstacles.
00:09:01
Speaker
When i'm on google earth or looking at photos or i've gathered information from other people i can also kind of project myself and sometimes even just close my eyes and daydream about what i'm going to do.
00:09:17
Speaker
I feel like this is a really good way to have almost lived the situation beforehand. And it's a really great way to manage stress and pain because mountains are painful. And when I do this, sometimes I even like to project myself with sensations of cold, of hunger, of blisters in my feet, etc.
00:09:47
Speaker
Really try to imagine how things are going to feel. And that's one of the ways I think you can kind of manage the difficulties beforehand. Another really important point, and I think this is the biggest point for me, is motivation.
00:10:08
Speaker
Preparing also helps me a lot in my motivation because I'm kind of building up to the moment where I'm going to be on the mountain and all the excitement and motivation also builds up. And when the challenging moments on the mountain arise, I think it's the motivation that's the key instrument for me in keeping on moving forward.
00:10:32
Speaker
This famous mountaineer called Voite Kurtika said that imagining was the art of suffering. And I think that's pretty spot on. And it takes even more truth when you're in high altitude.
00:10:50
Speaker
Things just tend to come together, so it's hard to eat. You're hungry, your fuel is depleted, you've been going on for a long time, you're tired, you've had poor sleep, your body is fatigued, and you're going to encounter obstacles that you haven't planned for.
00:11:10
Speaker
um, deep snow, hard ice, et cetera. And so in these moments, knowing how to suffer through them is also really important. Uh, so motivation is key there. Like, I don't know how many times I've been, you know, close to the summit or not close to the summit, doesn't really matter, but just in a really hard situation and thinking, okay, well, I really feel like I should turn around. And in those moments, I think the,
00:11:37
Speaker
will and has pushed me forward a lot. And I think it's hard sometimes not to mix motivation and obsession. And as we talk about safety, maybe later on, we can talk about obsession. But I think most mountaineers have a little obsessive streak. Oh, definitely.
00:12:07
Speaker
Yeah. And then there's the, sorry, the last thing, the last thing is, is about, um, uh, you know, methods for preparing is just building a whole baggage of experience. And I think that's, that's also really key. Just spending a lot of times in the mountains beforehand to know, you know, the widest, uh, variety of, of situations. And when you actually live these situations, then you're a lot more prepared.
00:12:33
Speaker
And bad experiences are, in my sense, the most helpful in building up this package. Yeah. No, that was fantastic. But I think a great point that you made in talking about your progression is that you didn't start out in the Karakoram. You started out in the Pyrenees, which is kind of funny that you say it's a small bat, right? Because I think of the Pyrenees as still quite a formidable
00:13:04
Speaker
a series of mountains. I've run there a couple of times and yeah, like you had a pretty gradual progression to get to the point where you felt comfortable in the Karakoram. It wasn't just, hey, we're going to jump right into that. And I think with the accessibility in many ways that we have to the mountains now is that there is this urge to go straight to the highest, the hardest without following that.
00:13:35
Speaker
Um, which I'm sure as a guide, you probably deal with that urge as well, um, from clients. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, my, my friends from the Pyrenees will hate me if they hear this podcast and that I've said that the mountains, uh, they're, uh, they're vast. Let's say they're vast. Um, they are, they're not as high though. I can see what you mean there. Yeah.
00:14:02
Speaker
Yeah, my learning curve, and I think this is talking about experience, it's really key. My learning curve was very slow because I didn't have a mentor and I just kind of learned on my own. And I think that although it was longer, I think it was very strong in the sense that I've had the trial and error type of learning and it makes it that you don't forget things.
Decision-Making and Partner Dynamics
00:14:32
Speaker
So definitely in high altitude when a situation arises and I would say a situation always arises because everything goes wrong in altitude.
00:14:46
Speaker
It can be a small tooth pain that becomes something very, very painful or just a small cough that gets bigger or something always comes up. Then this suitcase full of experiences that you're carrying around
00:15:04
Speaker
that you've built up over time is definitely really, really helpful. And I think if you skip that part, then you're very, there's a big chance that you will find yourself not knowing what to do in the face of adversity and these problems that always arrive. Yeah. So going off of that, how has your ability to keep yourself in control and
00:15:34
Speaker
you know, like knowing, I guess, how do you know when to turn around? Because you were talking about motivation and kind of like, hey, there isn't a strong element of this is very hard. And how have you been able to navigate through your career of understanding this is just hard right now, I have to push through it, versus this is dangerous, we should really turn around, especially when you're not quite as
00:16:02
Speaker
with it as your brain's getting tired and altitude. Definitely. In my climbing, I've always really put a lot of importance in the people with whom I climb with. That's always been, I would say, the most important thing. Obviously, the appeal of the mountain and the
00:16:25
Speaker
sense of desire that you can have to climb a mountain is really big, but I've found over lots of trips that what really makes it important is the people you go with. And in this sense, I think that for me, that's the number one factor that's going to
00:16:43
Speaker
help me turn around at the good moment is having a deep understanding of your partners and a lot of love and caring for them, which is actually really hard in the mountain when you're having a hard time to sustain yourself.
00:16:59
Speaker
being able to transcend that feeling of survival and care about your partners. And so I think that's really important is a deep understanding and knowledge of your partners and what they're capable of and at what point maybe they are not going to be able to take decisions, but you are going to be able to take decisions and seeing that they are I'm capable of doing basic stuff or that
00:17:29
Speaker
maybe their mental abilities are starting to decline. And that can be, you can have obviously physical signs or signs that are more vocal in a discussion that someone's becoming incoherent. We use as guides something that we call the three by three. I don't know if you're familiar with that.
00:17:56
Speaker
No, I haven't heard of that. It's quite simple. You have to imagine a grid with three variables. The first one is the human variable. The second one is the terrain. And the third one is the weather. So the human is going to be, well, is your partner feeling good? Is he showing signs of altitude sickness?
00:18:25
Speaker
Is he over-motivated, under-motivated? There's obviously a lot of them, and I would say that's the most difficult variable because it's the human, right? It's hard to really understand everything about it, and the other ones are more consistent, and they're the terrain, and that's going to be, well, the exposition is south-facing, east-facing,
00:18:50
Speaker
Does it get the sun? Is the rock good? Et cetera. And then the third one is going to be the weather. And that's obviously just going to be related to the weather forecast. And then the three other filters are before, at the start, and during. So before is going to be during the preparation when you're at home. At the start is going to be at the start of the mountain. And during is going to be kind of at the start of every pitch or while you're climbing.
00:19:20
Speaker
And you kind of cross these factors all the time. So if I'm at home and I'm looking at the weather forecast and it's supposed to be sunny and I'm climbing a north face and the zero degrees seems to be at the right height and my partners are feeling good, okay, I get all the green lights, so I'm good to go. And then at the start, I can assess again and see how all these things are going. And then during the climb, it's the same.
00:19:46
Speaker
And we do this in the guide work all the time. We don't put it on paper anymore, but it's just going on in our heads all the time. And this kind of protocol, like a mental exercise, actually works really well. And when you get really used to doing this, you just go through it all the time. The problem that we get a lot in the mountains, and I'm sure a lot of us has felt this, is that you're afraid.
00:20:14
Speaker
and fear is definitely something that's important. If you're not afraid then obviously you'll probably even have an accident. But knowing if your decision is based on fear that's irrational or if it's rational or if you're
00:20:36
Speaker
overwhelmed by fatigue and hypoxia and you feel like your brain isn't working correctly anymore, then these protocols really actually help to take decisions and to stay on the safe side. And then something else which is a very personal thing
00:20:57
Speaker
each mountaineer I think is kind of the commitment level that you're willing to put in and that's very personal. I've definitely changed over the years and what I would have done probably 20 years ago I probably wouldn't do now. In September I was in Patagonia trying to climb a mountain that I've already done three attempts on.
00:21:27
Speaker
And we had good weather, but a lot of other green lights weren't there. And for those who know Patagonia, it's very rare to get a week of good weather. So obviously your motivation is 100%.
00:21:43
Speaker
And, uh, you know, I, we turned around, we decided not to go and we still had four days of good weather, but there were too many other factors that seem to be, you know, off. So it's, it's really hard. Uh, and we were with my partners, we were on the same level of, of, uh, you know, commitment that we were willing to put it. And I think that sometimes, uh, the definitely altitude
00:22:11
Speaker
kind of really makes these already hard decisions even harder because they're just so blurry. And if you talk to a lot of people, they will tell you that when they were in high altitude,
00:22:26
Speaker
kind of communication started to get blurry with their partner. Like the fatigue kicks in so hard that you're just in survival mode and you're not communicating really well anymore. And that's when I think like really profound friendship with your climbing partners is really important to be able to just, you know, say things. Absolutely. How often is it so in a situation where
00:22:55
Speaker
probably you should turn around. Is that coming from your assessment maybe of your partner who needs to turn around versus assessment of yourself?
00:23:06
Speaker
That's definitely tough because we always invest a lot of time and energy in these projects in terms of training, in terms of money, in terms of time. And just because we dream about it so much and fashion is really strong. So being on the imagine and when your partner looks at you and says, I don't feel it, I think we should turn around.
00:23:35
Speaker
And you personally feel that you could keep going. It's difficult. It's hard. And it's definitely happened various times to me.
00:23:47
Speaker
And I think I've always respected the decision to turn around. I'm a very optimist person by nature. So I kind of always see the good side, which is in one way good because it kind of pushes the team forward. And I have that tendency to.
00:24:06
Speaker
you know, kind of push my partners. And on the other hand, it's bad because sometimes you have kind of a blindfold on and you refuse to see what's obvious to some other people.
00:24:22
Speaker
And I know that most of my partners have a very pessimistic view of the mountains. And so we kind of balance each other off, which is really important. I think if I was to climb with a kind of a double of myself would be a terrible idea. Yeah, no, that's a really good point. I would actually say I probably fall more that I have not done even close to what you've done, but I tend to fall over to the optimism side and
00:24:49
Speaker
a lot of my partners are very pessimistic, which works out well. How do you think you found that balance? Did it just kind of happen? Yeah, I think we're attracted by people who kind of naturally balance us.
00:25:12
Speaker
I've climbed with a lot of people, but not many of those people have become partners that I've done big trips with. And so I feel like a lot of small details, which are probably, I mean, this isn't even conscious. I think it's just unconscious that you're attracted by these partners because you feel like they complete you.
00:25:38
Speaker
It's pretty complex like on the mountain i would i would say you know climbing and being fit and skilled is only a small part of actually actually getting to the summit i mean.
00:25:53
Speaker
being able to dig out a bivvy and being able to cook when one of the two person people is completely wasted and just ready to go to sleep. And the other one says, no, wait, we have to eat. I mean, that's definitely a quality that's really, really important for sure. So yeah, I think, I think it's the ying and the yang find the balance. Definitely. I'm curious.
00:26:20
Speaker
And this is a little bit off topic, but because you're a guide and a lot of our clients are being guided who are listening to this podcast, how do you assess when a client is able to move forward, even if they're feeling like, Oh, I can't do this. How do you balance that out of thinking, Hey, I know you really want this. You're actually okay. It's just these effects and being like, no, you know,
00:26:49
Speaker
have to make sure they, yeah, go for it. That's a tough question because I feel like it's a lot of just sensibility to what the other one is feeling and enduring. It definitely helps when you
00:27:05
Speaker
built a lasting relationship with your client and it's not the first trip out, right? Someone you know and you've seen many times and you have a better idea of what he's capable. But then on the other hand, sometimes from one year to another, you know, life just makes it that you can't go out in the mountains and stay fit. So I would say the three by three is our best friend at that moment.
Client Training and Safety
00:27:33
Speaker
If I'm on the mountain and I know that time is counted and bad weather is coming or it's really cold, then I would have a tendency to be more conservative. If there's no signs of bad weather or nothing that I have to hurry,
00:27:56
Speaker
then I'll usually keep going and take my time until I feel like the person is pretty wiped out. I've had many times, I was a younger guy when I took that decision too late and then the down part was really tough and long and I've as a
00:28:17
Speaker
as a guide I've understood over time that going hard is not what people actually want. People want to take pleasure in the mountains and it's not something that I've always been
00:28:32
Speaker
familiar with because for me being in the mountains was always a lot about having a hard time and suffering and overcoming the suffering but not everybody's like that and so I think another thing is just talking and trying to understand what people feel
00:28:50
Speaker
And kind of they're, they're just, they're generally the way they are. If they're someone that's going to, you know, push themselves to the over the limit, or if they're someone, you know, more cautious. And that's, that's usually just, just talking and getting a feeling for the people.
Philosophy and Motivation in Mountaineering
00:29:06
Speaker
Yeah. That's such an interesting point of people. I mean, we train people so that they do have a good experience in the mountains, you know, so they're not at the edge of their fitness.
00:29:19
Speaker
climbing Rainier or climb the Mont Blanc. But it is so funny because I think when you are talking about performance in the mountains, it's just an acceptance that there is going to be a strong level of discomfort and probably pleasure in a very different way than most people would take. Yeah.
00:29:40
Speaker
Absolutely. I used to think that if I, you know, I got down with my client and he wasn't completely wasted, then I, you know, I had failed in some way. And over the years I understood that no, that's not the way it is. What do you think has been a source of that motivation to push the level of performance for you? Like, what do you,
00:30:07
Speaker
What have you attributed to that kind of desire to experience mountains in that way? I guess I really associate pushing yourself and in that sense, suffering with having a strong experience and coming back down and feeling like I've lived something that's
00:30:30
Speaker
that's really powerful. And I mean, obviously there's something inherent to mountaineering and risk where, you know,
00:30:42
Speaker
And I think everybody kind of has a different relationship to this, but I do think that taking a risk and kind of finding the edge where the risk is something that you master and that you're in control and not crossing the threshold, but being close to that is something that gives huge satisfaction for sure. And I also have a feeling that
00:31:10
Speaker
pushing your physical limits also really helps people bind together a lot and kind of just be very kind and helpful to one another. And I think I've built friendships that people I've been on trips with are like,
00:31:31
Speaker
are like brothers to me now because I think we've lived these things and I have really good friends with whom I haven't lived these experiences in the mountains with and they're amazing friends and they're really good but we're not bonded exactly the same way so yeah I think pushing the limits I don't know I think it's something you know almost existential something philosophical here that probably different from for everybody but
00:32:00
Speaker
Yeah, I think most of my trips I've felt that I've somehow pushed it as far as I could. And when I wasn't able to do that, then I definitely came back usually with a sense of having not accomplished as much. And I don't know if it's a good or a bad thing, but I think a lot of people could probably relate to that. Yes, it's...
00:32:27
Speaker
I always attribute it that I don't really understand what content means, except maybe like the day after you've accomplished something that you've been searching or like, you know, striving for. There's like one day where you're happy and content, and then the next day you're back to being discontent. And I'm just kind of accepted that's going to be the state of my being for the rest of my life, probably, maybe, I don't know, maybe when I go there.
00:32:53
Speaker
Yeah, it's a terrible cycle because it's so much energy for one day, right? It's so hard. Yeah. But I think some of us are just... When I hear about your races, I'm just amazed at how much energy and how tired you must be. And I imagine that probably when you finish your race and you cross the finish line, you probably think never again.
00:33:22
Speaker
And then the next day you're happy. And then the day after you think, okay, what's next, right? It's just the cycle. It is. I've stopped doing the never again. I say, I don't have to run for a day. Like I'll give myself, oh, I'm not going to move for a couple of days, but I'm, I know far too well. It will never be never again. Um, but I think it, you know, it's so similar what you're saying about.
00:33:50
Speaker
that fine line. It's the same thing in ultra running for many reasons is that you are kind of trying to have that, whatever it means perfect race. And so you're playing that line the entire time of like, okay, am I going out too hard? Am I holding back too much? And it's just, I always say like, with ultra running, that fine line is maybe you stop
00:34:17
Speaker
you have to stop the race. Maybe you have to drop out. Whereas for you, and this is part of the reason I've always struggled with finding my place in mountaineering alpinism is because that fine line is not just, Oh, I didn't finish the
Stories of Commitment and Turning Back
00:34:32
Speaker
race. It's, you know, much more consequential. And that has always been a bit intimidating. Well, really commitment is definitely, uh, for me, what makes, what gives most sense to mountaineering.
00:34:47
Speaker
And it's really important to know what level of commitment you're ready to accept.
00:34:56
Speaker
because and to have established something with your partners, something that you're on the same base because when you're on the mountain, usually it just completely goes out of control. And it's an illusion that we like to keep that, okay, we manage our level of commitment, but the truth is that it's rarely the case. I know I was,
00:35:24
Speaker
two years ago in Pakistan on a mountain called Pumari Shish and when we were in base camp with my friends we had established a million plants and looked at the mountains under 50 different angles and taken lots of photos because it was a south face and so the sun hit it and it had some really big snow mushrooms at the top.
00:35:46
Speaker
And this was not something we had planned for beforehand. When we left France, we were feeling pretty comfortable that the route was safe. Hard, but safe. And when we arrived there, we were surprised. But, you know, already our level of commitment had taken a step more because we'd done the journey, we'd done the trip, we'd spent the money, we'd taken the time off, we're at the foot of mountains. So we were
00:36:10
Speaker
we wanted to climb the mountain so we had said well we're not going to climb if there's mushrooms and everything but already our commitment took a step higher and we decided to climb the mountain but to find the least dangerous way to climb it and so we started climbing and we got to two thirds off and we
00:36:32
Speaker
Obviously at that point, we were starting to feel very tired. We were around 6,300, 6,500 meters. And we arrived to a kind of a critical turning point where we understood that the route that we wanted to do, the exit to the summit was not doable because the conditions were too poor. And the only exit way to the summit was actually to climb
00:36:59
Speaker
quite a while under a really, really big snow mushroom. And we had all three said that we would not do that. And we all three changed our minds. And we climbed those pitches and it was fine. Nothing happened. But what I want to say is that it's really difficult to kind of
00:37:24
Speaker
establish a level of commitment that you're okay with and to follow it through as kind of, you know, the summit gets closer and you understand that this dream of yours is something that can come true. It's, it's, it's, it's just something that kind of slips away. The control over this. That's a great, that's a great story to lean on. I'm curious, has there ever though been
00:37:51
Speaker
a point where you had that conversation, you established, okay, this is what we're going to do. And we got to the point, you went, yes, like, even though, of course, the summit is right here, or whatever that success is, you went, no, we said we were going to do this, and we're going to turn around.
00:38:10
Speaker
Has that also been true? I mean, I figured. I turned around and I think this happens to a few people who decided to climb Cerro Torre. There's a very famous route called the Ragney Route, which is the historic route and climbs a lot of really big mushrooms. And we got to the foot of the last mushroom, which was
00:38:31
Speaker
30 meters from the summit. So now you've walked four days out of El Chalta and climbed a lot and you're 30 meters from the summit and it was really hot and the wind was picking up and things felt really off and you turned around. You knew that that pitch would be very demanding. We had to dig the tunnel. It was going to take four or five hours. So we turned around 30 meters from the summit. That was really hard turning around.
00:39:02
Speaker
In the end, I mean, I'm still here to try it again next time. And what was the feeling? Okay, yeah, I was gonna say what was the feeling coming down at like obviously disappointed, but pretty very disappointed. Very disappointed. But you know, when we get to the end, and you know, have a drink and some food and some laughs and, and call the people you love at home and talk with them and
00:39:27
Speaker
I guess, disappointed coming down, but probably also a little bit proud to be able to take those decisions. And we said that mountaineering was hard, right? So this is something really hard to take that decision. So yeah, I think I'd definitely take some pride in turning around sometimes, for sure.
00:39:49
Speaker
I want to say usually we talk a lot about our successes and that's something that in today's world is what's very emphasized and people don't tend to talk so much about failures and you learn more about failures than you do about successes. That's for sure. Their experience is that you don't forget. I have another story on Cerro Torre and this time I did turn around and
00:40:19
Speaker
I broke two vertebrae's, my hip, and almost died, and had to have 50 people come and get me from El Jardin. And that's because I wasn't able to see the signs that were obvious, not to me at that moment, because I was quite obsessive with climbing that mountain from the east face, so the rocky face. And the signs were there. I should have turned around, but I didn't.
00:40:49
Speaker
Let's go. But I learned a lot. Well, I'm glad. Yeah, I'm glad that you're all right. But I am curious. What? Yeah, how do you differentiate motivation from obsession? How are you now able to separate the two? Well, I think obsession is when you refuse to see the signs and
00:41:15
Speaker
that you still keep on just going headfirst, although there's a lot of signs that you should acknowledge that should tell you that it's too much. And when you're in this state of obsession, I think it's really, really difficult to realize it. And that's when it's important for friends to be there to be able to tell you, hey, man, did you think this is going a bit too far?
00:41:45
Speaker
I mean, I've definitely been obsessed various times with climbing a mountain. I think with age, it's a little bit easier to kind of take a step back and say, whoa, wait a second here. Is this really so important? Is climbing this mountain going to, what's it going to change? Is it really going to change anything than just you being happy about having climbed the mountain? No.
00:42:15
Speaker
So is the value that you're going to gain from climbing that mountain, is it important enough that it's going to for the sacrifice and the risks that you're going to take? And it's definitely easier today. But yeah, when I was younger, I think it was really hard and motivation and obsession, they tend to really mingle together. And I think motivation can transform into obsession over time, like having had
00:42:44
Speaker
many failures on a mountain and keeping on going back, I think that definitely could be a sign of obsession. There's a lot of mountains. Yeah, I think there are. Sometimes it's good to change. Yes. And sometimes the lesson that perhaps we need to learn is not the one of standing at the top of it. It's the journey of... Absolutely. Absolutely.
Joy in Preparation and Memorable Climbs
00:43:11
Speaker
I've had that conversation with clients where they're like, I've had this mountain in my head is the pinnacle of changing my life and getting on fitness track and improving my life in so many ways. And I've said to them before that mountain did exactly what it needed to do, whether or not you sit on the top of it.
00:43:36
Speaker
Yeah, the path is huge and just making new friends and creating new bonds with people and training and getting fit and projecting. And I think I have probably the most, the funnest time in the sense that we've said that climbing the mountain was kind of a mix of fun and suffering. The funnest time for me is packing my bags and
00:44:02
Speaker
thinking about climbing the mountain. I think that's where I get the best experience because in my head I'm climbing it, but I'm not cold, I'm not hungry, I'm not suffering. I can just open the fridge and take something to eat. So yeah, maybe a couple years I'll just end up preparing for climbing, packing bags and then climbing next to my house.
00:44:32
Speaker
Johanna will just be like, he's packing again. He's not going anywhere, but he's still packing. Maybe that's the evolution. Well, I'm curious to kind of this has been amazing and really glad to get the chance to talk with you about this. I guess what's your name? You said a couple of stories, but are there any other
00:44:59
Speaker
or one specific memorable moment where things went really right or perhaps not quite what you were expecting. I mean, they always kind of go not what we were expecting that happened at a higher altitude situation. Yeah, definitely. I think my first experience at high altitude was really
00:45:20
Speaker
a great one. And this also happened in the Karakoram range. And so we usually climb mountains when we climb Alpine style. It's pretty classic to be two or three. And in this case, we went to a mountain called K13, which was really special because we're the first people to get a permit to climb that mountain in 20 years. So the locals there hadn't seen any tourists in 20 years. It was really crazy to be there.
00:45:49
Speaker
The weather was horrible, but we didn't really listen to the, you know, three by three, like I said, we should, and we still went to climb the mountain. And it was, it was really tough because it would be like maybe 10 ish hours of okay weather and then it would snow a lot and
00:46:11
Speaker
we were climbing this really big ice streak, which would just become a really big avalanche funnel. So we would kind of strategize to set up camps on the side of the ice streak where we could to be safe, let the storms pass and climb again, which is really not a sustainable strategy if you're looking at a long career in engineering.
00:46:35
Speaker
So we eventually, we made it to the slopes right below the summit. And again, this was my first time in high altitude. And this was 6,400 meters at this point. And we had done all the technical part. And now it was just a big snow slope. And it was bullet hard ice with powder on it that would just slide from under your feet.
00:47:04
Speaker
And this was very humbling for me because I really understood that that was my weakest point. And it was really kind of the group that made us get to the summit that day, just relying on one on each other. And the funny story with this is that we were pretty sure that we were doing the first ascent of the summit.
00:47:27
Speaker
And we got to 20 meters of the summit and my friend, which was destroyed at this point, just kind of trudging on by pure motivation, looks up and says, hey, is that a fixed rope that I see on that rock?
00:47:46
Speaker
And so after all this, you know, all this hardship and, you know, the avalanches and all the suffering and stuff, it actually made the summit even better because we had like a story to go with it. It wasn't like usual when you're just like, Oh, cool. I did the first set standing on the summit. It was like,
00:48:06
Speaker
well who, the mystery, who set up this rope? Because obviously we'd done our research before we went there. And it was at the end of the story, it's pretty cool because we actually understood that it was a team of a Japanese university maybe 40 years before who'd climbed it from the other side and set foot on the mountain. So we got in contact with them and it was great.
00:48:30
Speaker
And, uh, yeah, I think that was my first kind of summit in altitude and it will stay a really cool memory because, because, because of, uh, because of the group of people, um, and these, these, uh, these partners stayed like really, really close friends.
Future of Mountaineering and Conclusion
00:48:46
Speaker
And, and because of just the story of it and how improbable it was to make the summit on that day. Oh, that's a great, I love that. There's a rope up there. What the heck? Oh, that's awesome.
00:49:01
Speaker
So what do you see? I mean, we're seeing an increasing amount of efforts on Everest on these high mountains from kind of the speed side. What do you see on the performance of technical climbing, alpinism? What do you think the future will be on that?
00:49:26
Speaker
Steve was definitely kind of one of the first to present mountaineering as a real sport where you would train. And that I think has made a huge difference. And I think it's actually taken a long time to kind of catch and for people to understand the value of being just very fit in the higher mountains.
00:49:50
Speaker
But I think now it is catching on. And the place where I live here, and we also I know that we have a very gifted climber, which is training like, like, you know, an Olympian for climbing big mountains. And I think that's definitely, he's on the way to, you know, having a very successful, successful career in mountaineering. And I definitely think that's the future. And that's something that's changing a lot in mentalities and ways to getting to prepare
00:50:20
Speaker
get ready for climbing big mountains. And parallel to that, because people are getting fitter and going faster and more technical, it's allowing to envision to climb steeper mountains at very high altitude in a faster way, so alpine style. And I mean, a lot of these altitude big walls are
00:50:47
Speaker
have been climbed with fixed ropes or in different styles a long time ago. And now they're envisioned as alpine climbs because speed and fitness is starting to allow that. And I think that's the biggest breakthrough is that it's just realizing that our bodies are capable of this. For sure, the commitment in these cases is just very, very high because
00:51:17
Speaker
Climbing in that style at very high altitude is, I mean, you're not allowed any mistake really if anything goes wrong. It's over. But I think in the next decade, we're definitely going to see some climbs that we thought were not doable that will get done in short times or in really good style. Nice. That's exciting.
00:51:47
Speaker
Yeah, a great segue in many ways to say that training is the foundation of being able to do these things safely and with good speed. Yeah.
00:52:00
Speaker
Awesome. Well, Jerome, thank you so much for coming on. This has been a great conversation and we'll definitely have you and Johanna onto the podcast again. Um, so yeah, where, well, are you are a coach for uphill? You're taking new clients right now. Absolutely. Absolutely. I'm assuming. Awesome. Yeah. So,
00:52:27
Speaker
Jerome, is it? No, no, it's been great. I've been, I've been working with up to athlete a year now and it's been really rich experience. Awesome. Well, yeah. So if you want to work with Jerome or chat with him on a phone consultation, he is available and you can tap into much of this amazing wisdom and many years of experience, um, guiding and climbing himself. So thank you, Jerome. I appreciate you coming on. Thank you. Of course.
00:52:58
Speaker
So if you want to talk to Jerome, you can visit us at uphillathlete.com or write to us at coach at uphillathlete.com. And thank you for listening to the uphill athlete podcast. You can rate, review, subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. And it's not just one, but a community. We are uphill athlete.