Week 13: Climb for Clean Air – Small Win
Plan this week:
Monday: Long Cardio
Tuesday: Strength Training
Wednesday: Long Cardio
Thursday: Strength Training
Friday: Long Cardio
Saturday: Rest
Sunday: Muir Hike
How it actually went down:
Well, remember last week that I felt really awful during the hike? I started this week with being diagnosed with pneumonia. Wonderful. Like I need another hurdles, right? It explained a lot of things though, on how I felt or why I was so exhausted and winded. My doctor told me that it could take 2-3 weeks for me to fully recover. I was like.. WHA? Two or THREE weeks?? I don’t have that kind of time and people that know me know that I’m a wee bit stubborn. Anyway – I continued to work out. I want to push myself and see how far I can go. It wasn’t easy since I was absolutely have no energy. Antibiotic should do it’s job but my body have to heal on it’s own. Fast forward to the end of the week, my hard work paid off. I felt decent by Saturday and able to go on a hike and even made it to Camp Muir. This is a small win for me. After fourth try, I finally made it. It’s less than three weeks to the climb and I mean business.
How it actually went down:
Monday:
I did a light cardio. I was pretty much mad after the doctor visit and determine that I am not going to let this pneumonia thing stop me. I hopped on treadmill and I walk, slowly, for an hour. I didn’t have any pack on me or in any incline. Just plain flat treadmill with about 2 miles an hour. I was exhausted afterward, but feel very good about the fact that I did it
Tuesday:
Strength training with Weston. He worked me HARD! We started with 18lbs bar on my shoulder and did a step up with balance (about a foot tall step), squat, backward lunges with one foot on the half-dome, another forward lunges to the end of the gym and back, shoulder press, biceps curl and laid down on the mat with one of my feet on top of the steps and do bridges. We did three sets of each of them and follow by 10 minutes walk on the treadmill. I was winded half way through and actually had to step and catch my breath and to the point almost pass out but I kept on going. He was trying to work on my muscle without raising my heartbeat but lunges always got me. It was a great work out.
Wednesday:
I did another light cardio. I woke up with all kind of soreness on my lower body. Yesterday’s work out really did wonder to my muscle. I was so tempted to just lay around and rest (which I did pretty much all day since I was calling in sick), but I ended up forcing myself to walk on the treadmill for an hour towards the end of the day. I actually felt better afterward
Thursday:
Another work out with Weston. We focused a lot on upper body with a bit of lower body work out. I did a combination of push-up/pull-up (assisted), shoulder press and backward curl, bench dip, (another) lunges on a balance foam and squat with the same 18lbs bar. I was doing better today than last Tuesday and able to go through the entire three routines without feeling about to pass out
Friday:
I decided to give my muscle a rest.
Saturday:
I didn’t do anything since I had an event to go to in the afternoon.
Sunday:
I'm above the cloud! Literally.
Fourth trip to Camp Muir. I had so much going on the night before that I stayed up late (like.. until 3:30am late). Alarm went off at 4:30am and I finally got out of bed around 5am, get ready and we were out of the door by 6am. We got to the Whittaker Mountaineering at 8am, get some of the gear and head out to Paradise. We started to walk at 9:30am. John set the pace and I just walked behind him, focusing on my breathing and his footsteps. It was super windy and foggy, and our visibility was limited to about 100ft. We got to our first stop in an hour, at the start of the avalanche chute. I felt great and didn’t even feel a lot of breathing difficulty. I made it further than I did last week on the first hour. We took 15 minutes break and started to climb on the chute. I kept focusing on John’s footstep. One foot in front of another and did rest step and pressure breathing all the way. Before I knew it, I was on top of the chute and we kept on walking until we were above Pebble Creek. Our second stop is at 7,300ft.
I made it to Muir!
Another 15 minutes break, and we continued to walk until our third break, which is at 8,300ft. We ate lunch, took 30 minutes break and kept on walking to our fourth break an hour later which was at 9,100ft. I started to feel winded. This was the furthest I go on the Muir trip! I was determined to get there tho! We took another 30 minutes break for me to regain my focus and kept on walking. The fog break about 9,500ft and gave us magnificent view of the mountain as well as the surrounding area. I can finally see Camp Muir from where I stand! An hour went by and I didn’t want to stop since I knew we were a few hundred feet away from it, so I kept on walking. That was hard. I was struggling really bad in the last 30 minutes, but kept taking my rest step and pressure breathing until I finally reached Camp Muir! I broke down in tears. I made it. After fourth try, 3 weeks of illness, cold, fluid in the lung AND pneumonia – I finally made it to Camp Muir! Check out the collection of the photos here.
Fundraising:
Donation still coming in. I can’t believe it! Now I want to see if I can break $10,000. Any taker? Online donation can be made here. Oh, American Lung Association post my interview on their site. Check out the article here.
