Recently, I endeavored to climb my Everest. It would be my first endurance event since the NYC marathon in 1995 and a smattering of somewhat intense activities (how the NZ Queen Charlotte trek 10 days seems like a warm up now) in between. My Everest is an event called 29029 ft in Sun Valley – and to make it an “event” we were to do it in 36 hours.
To prepare for Everesting, I trained for 6.5 months diligently. I shifted my life to make this a priority. As a nutritionist I did all the things. I added in nightly recovery epsom salt baths, stopped fasting and started adding more carbs, and learned about zone 2, And at 50, I also worked to uplevel my nutrient supply so that I could help my perimenopausal body – and mind – make some peace with its ever-changing hormonal inputs and responses.
I added a cross country road trip there and a few flights from the road. While this gave me an altitude acclimation win (and some awesome time with friends), it was also part of my failures as hours on the road, no magnesium baths, and different food choices challenged my body. I also did my final training jog (27 miles) and then got into the car to drive 8 hours. Why was I surprised when my hip flexors screamed at me in Boulder?! But as a win, I got help, I got a better travel plan and I learned.
All this got me to the mountain – and with the greatest partner as well as some new friends and an incredible support system courtesy of the event hosts 29029 who led a great pre-event day to help us get our minds ready. Intuitively, I knew that was the most important part of this but I didn’t really know it until I was “leaving it all on the mountain,” as the founders challenged us to do. No truer words have been spoken “a bad day for the ego is a great day for the soul.” Today, as my soul sings recounting these reflections, I am reminded of how ego crushing this event was – and so grateful for how I get to rebuild mine.
Day 1 I donned my Maine-based Spring hiking gear so as to protect myself from ticks and sun, covered head to toe with layers so I could reduce as needed. Later on the mountain, I would also remember that I was rejecting suggestions to go in shorts and a tank top not as an adult but as an overweight child who was teased about her thighs rubbing in shorts, I stuck with pants so that I didn’t risk that repeat – oh the wounds that we carry. As I completed my final summit (9), I recall being with a new friend, a man in shorts, whose thighs rubbed together (we discussed how he was addressing the chafing) ascent to get his red hat. We all, perhaps me the loudest, cheered him on.
Lessons from the mountain – leave your childhood traumas there, its a beautiful graveyard for things that no longer serve you.
I also brought my own food (Perfect bars and Simply Fuel) and Promix electrolytes because that is what we train to do. “Nothing new on event day.” Despite several people commenting that I should lighten my load and my clothes, I carried and ate what I had which meant fewer stops and deliciously doable fuel.
And it worked. Breakfast and the first two ascents up the mountain were magical. The heat and direct sunlight hadn’t hit us yet, my friends an I found our all day pace and we even took moments to honor different individuals important to us as we did each ascent in their honor.
Mother Nature had a different plan for me. I went to the loo to discover the gift of my now two weeks late period. Not a little bit but the whole red tide. Other than graphically sharing about it with anyone who would listen – yes I wanted their sympathy – I didn’t think too much about it. I suspected that my travel and final weeks of intense training had thrown my cycle off and here it was. But as women, we are used to showing up and pushing through, period or not. How many times have I given talks or done TV or traveled to Bali to do a story for Good Morning America only to get my period when we were out in the coconut palms (ok that one only happened once, but I will never forget the native woman who helped me). Unfortunately, as I would learn, though challenging in their own rights, none of these were an endurance event where the blood was already pooling in my legs not my belly, and where losing my shit literally – which I normally actually love how my body lets it all go on day 1 and 2 of my period – meant a potentially insurmountable challenge. As I climbed on, my body was not so subtley suggesting I call it and watch the second half of Bridgerton season 3 on the couch.
After another ascent, I took a turn for the worse. Lunch didn’t really happen and that’s when I started to leave it all on the mountain – first in the portable potties, then in the bushes. I also started trying anything – Immodium (good move), Advil, salt pills, and soda – to calm my tummy. Momentary relief would help me up the mountain but by ascent 5 I was taking 30-45 minutes at the rest stations which was double our pace and not a red hat pace. So I started to mentally break down.
The funny thing about mental breakdowns on the mountain is that they go into the cobwebs of your memories and create their own playlist. They start wherever they want and they don’t tie into current reality no matter how many years of therapy or other work you’ve done, and no matter what your besties – new or old – from the mountain tell you.
Suddenly, I was an overweight girl who didn’t know what or how to eat, who didn’t know how to care for herself or her tummy, who had no business on the mountain. She was embarassed to ask for help and she thought everyone there felt she should throw in the towel. I vividly remember a call from a doctor and producer for a reality show that I was the dietitian for – they called to tell me about a failing participant “sometimes people aren’t ready to do what they need to do to win” they said. And that was to be the storyline. I felt like that was what was going through everyone’s head around me. Ironically, just as I had stood up to the doctor and producer and told them that this participant had digestive issues and needed a different plan – the coaching team was there to do that for me too. But that would come later. First, I crumbled. Even having friends bring Roger over didn’t cheer me up as I was just a failure – a red hat wanna be who wasn’t gonna be and it was because I could heal my digestion … so I was also a professional failure (how many professional and endurance athletes have I helped but I can’t help myself?!).
It was a brutal 8 hours that followed which included two attempts to do ascent #7 one at 7pm when I had kept down a ginger ale and some crackers, one at 12am when I had tolerated a few jolly ranchers. Remember that event team I told you about – they are priceless. They found me on the mountain, stopped someone hiking who had an extra carb goo (my first time trying and forever grateful for better goo) and then helped me get EMS down when it was clear I shouldn’t be going up. Then EMS again when I reached the wall and left it all on the mountain (basically bile) and smartly didn’t attempt a 40% incline with zero in me.
I phoned a friend – an iron woman herself, an iron woman / triathalon trainer, a woman (so she got the period part), a mom, and someone who’s known me (and as she reminded me, known my mental and physical strength) for decades. We hatched a plan that started with broth and sleep, and ended up with my trying some breakfast at 5am (I puked it back up).
My friend and partner on the mountain grabbed a coach. It was 6am and he was not so secretly trying to tell my family to get me an IV which would mean I would need to call out, be done, with my event. But the coach had another plan “Ashley what will make you happy”? “I want to get back out on the mountain, we have a whole day left.” “Ok then you just need to feel better first. Get outside, start with fluids, then start eating LOTS of carbs” “Ok I want to try to climb four more” “YOU ARE NOT LISTENING TO HIM” my friend said – literally the first time I have ever heard him raise his voice. I smiled and said “I am listening, I just can’t get my mind to shift yet” and we hugged. So I took the coach’s advice and the next one that I encountered and I hit the water, the ginger ale and soon after kept down a few crackers, which led to half a bagel, which led to the other half, which lead to potatoes….
And I got back out on the mountain about two hours later for the most magical 3 ascents of my life. I climbed with relative ease (there is no actual ease on the Wall) at a great pace, had fun with others, and joyfully supported others as they got their red hat. Most importantly. I took some personal moments to leave my childhood and first fifty year traumas on that mountain. I lovingly said goodbye to them and was gleeful to meet the new endurance athlete within me. And I birthed a new ego. One that is soul-led and for whom one of the defining aspects is to learn from my failures – especially my nutrition ones.
Here are my failures – I mean lessons – that will help me as an endurance athlete and human being moving forward:
– taking care of your body daily helps your body be able to recover better.
– don’t get behind on your calories. This was emphasized but it didn’t click until I experienced it.
– food as fuel is totally different than better nutrition for your health. Literally it was just a quantity of carbs thing that saved me.
– Coke and ginger ale contain a magical ingredient called high fructose corn syrup that is otherwise awful for us but somehow works to address nausea – there’s no ginger in ginger ale, and the ginger wasn’t what did it as I literally tried free basing ginger chews before hitting the ginger ale.
– stick with the choices you’ve trained with, and train with the choices that will be there at the intensity you will need them… this was also emphasized but doing long endurance (zone 2) I had not trained to fuel zone 3-4 with the same choices.
– liquid nutrition – broth, smoothies, juice is such a win when your body is so stressed
– better not perfect. I named my company after this mantra. I live it, I teach it…. except when it comes to my expectations for myself (you know for my first endurance event in 3 decades to go perfectly – OY). It really is the better way.
And most importantly, give yourself grace.
My lessons and my joy are from the journey, every step I took on and off the mountain for 6 months, and every decision I made to create the space to do this was exactly what I needed in my life at this time to acquire the needed resources for the next part of my journey.
Say hello to Ashley Lamar Koff, the endurance athlete and personalized nutrition expert who is coming to a mountain, river or planet near you.
