Epic, Serious Situation in Crestone Group

Mark and Homie had an epic trip in the Crestones last night. I'm writing up a report but not sure how much I can make public. Suffice to say that 14ers are significant mountains even in good weather, but doing them in the dark, in a snowstorm, without a rope, while super tired and sleep deprived... This is not some glorified ultra-running deal, this serious, serious business...

I cannot express how frustrating it was for me not to be up there with my best friends. I'm a climber. I could have contributed there. I could have made a positive difference. Instead I worried like a mother hen, while sitting comfortably at the trailhead. Not being able to help at the time of ultimate need is...painful... I know it is silly, but I feel I let them both down.

The quest could have easily ended last night, but it didn't. Not on Mark's watch. They made it out by 1 a.m. and finally Homie slept solidly. His powers of recuperation are extraordinary, though, and I got a report that he ate heartily before blasting Culebra in 2:54, car-to-car. Oh, he also had to drive himself in there because of bureaucracy of the ranch down there. He's on the Little Bear-Blanca traverse now, having never done it. Once again, I should be there him and I'm not. Homie is superman in my mind, but even superman needs a companion in times like that. If the weather goes bad on him on that traverse just having a good friend with you can make all the difference...

In my mind this is not about the record any more. It's about commitment to a nearly impossible task. It's about finishing while not broken, mentally, physically, or emotionally. If anyone can spare the time to go hike with him, you'd be a hero, especially in the Elks. The traverse he is planning there is nothing short of ridiculous. You can even meet him partways through the traverse, as just doing that one day would be a lifetime achievement for most of us. 

More details on the Crestone trip later tonight.

Update from Crestone Group

Mark Oveson arrived in Lake City last night and I shared a slice of pizza with him before we both drove up to get Homie at the Matterhorn Trailhead after his link of Uncompahgre and the Wetterhorn. We arrived up there a little after 9 p.m. At 9:30 p.m. it started to rain, hard. Then it started to hail. At 10 p.m. Homie's headlamp bobbed out of the words and he immediately got in the car. He had started great, but then faded a bit. He was tired and now a bit behind Cave Dog's time. He was still behind on calories and liquids, but also sleep and elected to sleep first. After getting down to the smooth dirt road we transferred Homie to his bed in the Land Cruiser. Mark was driving his FJ. We then drove 3 hours over to the San Luis trailhead, getting there around 1 a.m. Man, that is a long haul. Once you leave Slumgullion Pass it is 41 miles on narrow, dirt roads where it seems like you are on the edge of control at 30 mph.

Homie ate while we packed his Nathan running pack and he took off 1:27 a.m. in about 45 degree weather. The skies looked good and he stayed pretty dry this night. He made the top in 3h27m02s, which he was a bit disappointed about, but came down in well under two hours, doing the roundtrip in 5h21m11s. Mark and I were already up and the Cruiser was started before he hit the trailhead. Once again we had a long drive ahead of us, 30 miles on dirt. This gave Homie the opportunity for more sleep, albeit on windy, bumpy roads. Once we hit the pavement on highway 117/114, we amped up our speed to 85 mph. It was quite the change from the 3-4 mph on Cinnamon Pass.

At the Willow Creek Trailhead, I prepared Homie's pack while Mark got ready. They started up together at 9:35 a.m. I was able to communicate with Mark via texting. Homie was only carrying two small water bottles and once he heads up Challenger from Willow Lake he might not be able to restock with water until after coming down from Crestone Needle. That could put him in a pretty serious dehydration hole. I feel really good about Mark being with him. As they left Mark said to Homie, "My goal is to get 3000 calories in you before these peaks are done." That the perfect attitude for success on this project.

I met Jennifer and Gerry Roach in Crestone and Gerry will be driving Mark's FJ around to the South Colony Lakes Trailhead, where we'll pick up the boys, hopefully around 9 p.m. but it could be later. If they arrive by 8 p.m. there is a chance of getting Lindsey before the unmovable appointment to climb Culebra at 6 a.m. tomorrow (Sunday). I doubt this will happen, though. They will have to head directly to Culebra. On the plus side this should give Homie a solid 5-7 hours of sleep to make up for the huge deficit he is running. We'll see, though.

Gerry came down a day early to relieve me. I'm a little disappointed that I will now be superfluous and just take up valuable space. Hence, I'll head home tonight with Mark. Gerry was like the father in Breaking Away (an absolutely stellar coming-of-age movie). The father is at work at the used-car lot, but not working. He's listening to the bike race that his son is dominating on the radio from the front seat of his car. For complex reasons he "had to work" that day. He so excited by his son's performance that he can't stand it any longer. He closes his door and peels out, headed for the race, to watch his son succeed. Gerry was reading the blog and reading 14ers.com and he couldn't stand it any longer. He wanted, he needed, he HAD to be a part of it and not later, but now. He called me and we devised this plan with the vehicles, which was actually quite a hole in our original plan.

Anyway, Gerry and Jennifer and here to not only watch their "son", but to be a huge part of his success. Talking strategy with Gerry, I know he "gets it." Gerry is, of course, the man. He's done the seven summits - first guy to do all the real seven summits. He's done the top ten peaks in North America. He's run the Pikes Peak Ascent in his youth faster than either Homie or I. Much faster. Yet, he is completely humble. He never talks about that unless prompted and then he's a great storyteller, as anyone who has read his books knows. Gerry is just in awe of people like Homie as I am and he and Jennifer will be great support. This is payback, too, as Homie has paced Jennifer at Hard Rock 100 at least twice.

Yes, we've been having some SPOT issues. Thanks to the people that have called me with the news. We have a spare and if we switch. I'll send out the new SPOT link.

Hey, 7 News picked up the story and used my photo of Homie without permission:

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/31380709/detail.html

Bill

Red Cloud/Sunshine

I drove him down the road to the Red Cloud/Sunshine trailhead and he started up around 10:15 a.m. He has nine peaks done and "just" 49 to go. He did 8 peaks in the first 24 hours (7 in the first calendar day) and is heading for his 2nd and 3rd peaks of the second 24-hour period. We're about 2.5 hours behind the original, idealized schedule. The bad weather caused us to get behind, but Homie did Handies 20 minutes faster than that original schedule. These next two peaks are supposed to take four hours. 

On the short drive down we talked a bit more about the tough Wilson group. Thoughts of giving up the 14er quest a half day into it ran through his mind. They went through mine as well and I wondered how he'd handle it. So much preparation and now so much interest (there were over 500 follow-up posts to his original announcement on 14ers.com - after only 12 hours!) had been put into this venture. I wondered how I'd comfort him if he gave up. I'd say that you can't control the weather, but that wouldn't be enough. I figured he'd have to just keep going and try the Wilson group again later, in better weather. I met a guy in Silverton while waiting for Homie's train to come in. He was riding the entire Colorado Trail. He was on this 14th day with still 90 or so miles to go to Durango, the terminus. He figured it would still take him three more days. He was sitting out the entire day because of the bad weather report. I asked him if he ever thought of quitting and he immediately replied, "Every day. I hate this. It isn't fun. I don't like struggling to do 20 miles in a day. I can easily do 100 miles a day on a road bike." Yet he was committed to finishing it. He didn't want to have to come back and do it again. He even said, "One and done." Before Homie stepped on the train Wednesday to start this whole thing he said, "This is a once-in-a-lifetime thing." I figure he will finish it regardless of how long it takes and regardless of what barriers are put up to bar him. Obstacles are just opportunities to prove to himself how badly he wants this. To break the record takes incredible planning, toughness, and world-class endurance, but it also takes luck. Since he can't control the luck, all he can do is keep going, keep adjusting, keep strong, keep showing how badly he wants it.

Seeing something like this up close, and I know I'm barely over 24 hours into it as I type this, well short of his Hard Rock 100 time of 36 hours, I'm still amazed at the level of suffering. Heading up the next pass at Hard Rock, knowing there are many other runners around you and being on a good trail nearly the entire time is a long, long way from being completely solo, in the dark, in a driving rain, at 14,000 feet while trying to negotiate a 4th class slab. But that's obvious. There aren't hundred and hundreds of people clamoring to do this each year. It takes a level of masochism that so rare and so far beyond Hard Rock. To me, it seems the only way anyone should go through something like this is during a war, where you life is at stake. Where if you don't keep moving, keep fighting, you'll die. That's the only thing that should motivate someone to go to this level of suffering...

Homie left for Sunshine at 10:21 a.m. Once again he was wearing his Gortex shell. Alas, it never really rained very hard and I doubt he had it on for long. He did both peaks in 4:06 roundtrip. Cave Dog had done 4:09, so this is really close so far. I then drove him up to the Nellie Trailhead for him to launch up Uncompaghre. He left the car at 3:55 p.m. Based upon that departure he is currently 14 minutes ahead of Cave Dog's pace. Which is essentially a dead heat in something that will last almost 11 days. 

We talked to Mark Oveson as we passed through Lake City. He's coming down in his FJ to drive Homie into San Luis at a faster pace than I can do with all the gear in my Land Cruiser. I'll follow at a more pedestrian pace (literally, as Google Maps says it will take me 3.5 hours to cover 60 miles.) San Luis is 14 miles roundtrip and Homie will be starting it around midnight. We then go to the Crestones where Mark will accompany him on those five peaks. Then he'll do Lindsey in the dark and get to Culebra by 6 a.m. Sunday. At least that's the plan.

Update from Handies

After I left Telluride last night I drove up to the new Rock of Ages trailhead. I had never been there before. Homie told me that it just opened up a couple of years ago. It was a lot longer of a drive than I expected and was having my doubts but the trailhead was clearly marked when I got there. I couldn't find the second stove and had to make up two separate portions of angel hair pasta in the JetBoil instead. I put the meat sauce on it and was all prepared for Homie to arrive at his earliest estimate. But he didn't arrive then. Or at his original estimate. I knew from chatting with Mark that Homie's SPOT track had him hunkering down below El Diente in a steady rain. He's say that that he almost gave up right there. He was just squatting down in the rain, waiting for it to ease. He was a couple hundred feet above the trees and some modest shelter, but he didn't want to give up the elevation.  He had early fallen off a log into the stream at the crossing. At the time he cursed the mistake that soaked his feet, though soon he would have been just as wet anyway.

He moved on, tagging El Diente by the easier north passage instead of sticking to the ridge. Things were obviously soaked. He had all his clothes on at this point: pile, hat, gloves, all underneath his rain paints and shell. He didn't even have tights with him, but his calf sleeves and shorts had never the same coverage, though not the same warmth. The traverse went well and he found it not nearly as soaked as he expected. The last moves up to the summit of Mt. Wilson will incredibly wet and he went carefully and slow here. The descent to the north, down endless, steep, technical, physical, wet talus took a lot out of him. He made the saddle on his way up Wilson Peak, but it got dark on him before he was able to reach the summit and this slowed things considerably. Tricky, wet, slab climbing and scrambling forced him to be very cautious and he crept toward the dark summit.

He had left the trailhead at 2:21 p.m. and took 3h18m30s to make the summit of El Diente, then just under an hour to Mt. Wilson's summit (4h16m22s elapsed, 6:37 p.m.). Wilson Peak took nearly 2.5 hours more (6:16:59 elapsed, 8:38 p.m.) He got a bit lost on the descent but the GPS in his phone helped him regain the saddle, where he found the trail down. He arrived at the trailhead just a couple minutes before 11 p.m. I was sleeping in the back, having decided to wait until 11:45 (two hours past his original prediction) before driving down the road until I could get a 3G connection and check on this SPOT location. 

I had slept for maybe an hour, but my mind was whirling. The last okay message I got from him was from the summit of Mt. Wilson. I wondered if the rain was too much for him and that he had gone back out the way he had come in. We had met a couple of bow hunters at the Kilpacker trailhead. They had come up from Texas that day for elk season starting this Saturday. They had planned to hike in a few miles but didn't want to do it in the rain. I figured they would give Homie shelter until I could drive back around and pick him up. Around 10:15 p.m. or so another vehicle came roaring into the parking lot and three guys got out, chatting loudly. My mind raced again. What if Homie had fallen on the tricky descent and injured himself. He might have pressed his "Rescue Me" button on the SPOT and here these guys were to do just that. But they probably didn't know about me. I though again about driving down the road to check the SPOT location but decided to give him two hours. But if he was hurt or going the other way, then I was wasting time. The bow hunters had rented a satellite phone for two weeks for just $250. Having a couple of those babies would have sure eased my mind on these mentally challenging point-to-point hikes.

I was relieved when Homie banged on the truck before heading off to the porta-potty. When he returned I had the car running. He mentioned how tough that group was but was remarkably alert, in good spirits and surprisingly high in energy. The cold rainy conditions had caused him to not eat or drink much. He knew a crash in energy had to be coming and tried to eat some of the spaghetti I made for him. Once again, even though I was just following instructions, it seems I had made the wrong thing. He ate some and remarked that it was good, even though it was quite cold now, but most of it is still in the container now.

He hopped in the back to sleep, though we chatted for quite a bit before he came quiet. I drove down the long 4WD road, liberally using 4-wheel Low to avoid riding the brakes. Once the pavement it was over to Ridgeway, then Ouray, then up towards Yankee Boy Basin. When we got close I roused Homie to turn on his phone. He had the starting waypoint programmed into it and it even talked to me, telling me how many yards until "Sneffels Start". Per the rules of this crazy adventure, he had to start at least 3000 feet below the summit of Sneffels, so I couldn't drive all the way to the trailhead. In fact, I stopped maybe a hundred yards too low when Homie told me we had arrived at the only semi-flat spot. 

Homie got his stuff together and I was glad to see him in tights. He had to be tired and it was cold and foggy out. He took around 1:15 a.m. and I set the alarm for 4:30 a.m. When my alarm went off I hit the snooze for 9 minutes. I should have got up and turned the vehicle around, as that proved to be a bit of a trick on the narrow, very steep road. When I eventually did it, I had to go back and forth a few times, each time grinding into the steep slope. I snoozed one more time and then Homie arrived before it went off again. He had made the summit in 2h05m, feeling like he was moving really slowly, but came down in just 1h19m, feeling good and moving well. Now he was truly tired and he laid down, sleeping in fits, for the long drive back down to Ouray, over Red Mountain Pass on the Million Dollar Highway (paved) to Silverton and then up and over the steepest, rockiest pass so far: Cinnamon Pass. Topping out this pass at 12.,640 feet at sunrise was incredibly beautiful. The steep, super tight switchbacks on the descent proved a bit taxing on my arm driving (I had rotator cuff surgery 3 weeks ago and cannot use my right arm). I was getting pretty good at steering, braking, reaching across my body with my left hand and shifting into neutral, then into 4-wheel Low, then into 1st, then 2nd, then back to first, steering with my thighs while shifting. Probably not the AAA-approved method of negotiating Cinnamon Pass, but it worked.

We hit the junction to American Basin and instead of turning right and going uphill towards Handies, I turned left and headed downhill, away from Handies, in order to abide by the 3000-foot rule. This time I parked a touch high, at Homie's recommended flat spot. After he geared up, he head downhill about 50 more yards until his phone told him it was the "Handies Start" and then headed back uphill, dropping his phone off with me on his way by. 

I tried to sleep for another hour, as I had had only four hours total so far, in 1-hour and 3-hour bursts. It was light now and despite my efforts I only slept for maybe 15 minutes. I know this because I was listening to an audio book and that was all I needed to remind when I woke up. I was typing this report when I heard "Yo!" It was Homie, already back from Handies. He had taken a direct route up to the summit, covering the 3000 feet in just 1h36m04s. He had found a perfect dirt/small talus slope to surf on the way down and  descended in just 49 minutes! (2:25:54 for the roundtrip). He ran right by the truck, has he had to return to the starting point and I scrambled to pack up my computer and drive down the hill to pick him up. He was in great spirits, moving really well. While there are many remarkable things about Homie, what really sets him apart is that he can recover and go so much faster without getting much sleep, food, or water. He was still running well behind on his calories. Despite moving well, he knows that can't last unless he starts upping the intake.

Bad Weather in the Wilson Group

Homie blitzed the Chicago Basin, making the summit of Windom in just 1h22, Sunlight in 1h58m, North Eolus in 3h10m, Eolus in 3h25m and back to camp by 4h17m. Way too fast, but it did allow him to walk all the way out and soak his legs in the Animas River before boarding the train at 11:45 a.m.

I met Homie and Loobster at the train station and after pulling out Homie's gear from Loobster's pack, we bid him goodbye and headed for the Kilpacker Trailhead via Ophir Pass. The drive went easily, but Homie made the mistake of sitting the back, facing backwards, while re-packing his pack. This caused him to get nausea, and he never gets car sick. We had to stop for a bit and Homie walked a ways before getting back in, facing forward. This sickness prevented him from eating anything on the drive.

He took a sandwich and a coke with him when he started towards the Wilson Group, pretty much right on schedule, but in the rain. I remained at the trailhead for two hours in case he turned around and it rained steadily the entire time. I finally started the drive around to the Rock of Ages trailhead and am now updating the blog in a restaurant in Telluride.

Homie has sent his SPOT message at the top of El Diente and is currently traversing towards Mt. Wilson. After that he'll drop way down, get some water, and climb Wilson Peak before descending the other side to where I'll be waiting. Hopefully the rain will let up, though Mark Oveson has told me the weather report for tomorrow isn't any better. Bummer, but he is so incredibly tough that I don't know what will stop him.

Chicago Basin Peaks Done!

Homie has 4 peaks done and is almost to the train stop. He's off to a great start. Just 54 to go... Loobster's job will soon be done and mine will start.

I took some photos from around Silverton on my walk this morning and they are here.

The schedule is somewhat fluid, but the next peaks are the Wilson group and he should start those around 2 p.m. and finish around 9 p.m. Then we go to Sneffels and then back through Silverton and over Cinnamon Pass to Handies, Sunshine and Redcloud.

Game On!

Homie started this morning at 5:15 a.m. (atomic clock time) and bagged Windom and Sunlight by 7:15! Only 56 14ers to go!

The weather here in Silverton is overcast and damp.