Letter from Nepal

I received an email the other day from my friend and occasional running buddy, Tom Dmukauskus. In his professional life, Tom designs microchips for Intel; in his free time, he is a seasoned adventure-seeker. Tom's approach to life is to work until he has saved up 4-5 weeks of vacation time, and then take trips that involve trekking around the globe through some pretty rugged environments. In 2006, he spent a month hiking through remote Greenland. This year he is in Nepal for the Tenzing-Hillary Everest Marathon

It's good to have friends like Tom who can help put the normal vicissitudes of training into perspective. Let's just say that whenever I'm tempted to think of how tough my training is, contemplating running down Everest makes it seem pretty tame.

Anyway, I thought I would share some of Tom's email, partly because the event in which he is participating sounds interesting and partly because it sounds insane. Here's Tom:

"...we took off on a 16-passenger plane of Yeti Airways, able to see the
enormity of the Himalayas for the first time. The arrival in Lukla is quite
harrowing, with the runway basically going all the way to the edge of cliff.
Getting out of the plane, every single person's jaw dropped. We hung out there
for the morning, enjoying the feeling of suspense of planes taking off and landing. A relatively easy trek (3 hours) to the town of Phakding followed. It was along this trek that I first comprehend the unbelievable strength of the Nepali porters -- commonly carrying 90-120 kg (not pounds, kilograms) of sundry items (several rucksacks, cookware, groceries/supplies to upvalley villages, meat, 15 sheets of plywood to be used as tables, etc.) In general, they lean forward quite a bit and actually use a cloth strap around their forehead to counterbalance their load -- their neck muscles have to be absolutely ridiculous."

"After arriving in camp, I went for a 25-minute run, and even at the modest 2600m altitude, breath does not come easy when going uphill. As I returned toward camp, 4 Nepali schoolgirls, I'd guess around 8-12 years old starting running with me, through a little village, up and down a hill and onto a suspension bridge. There was no age reported in the results of previous marathons. I now wonder if I will get my clock cleaned by a 7-year old or something. On Friday, we got our first taste of uphill, climbing reasonably steeply (but nothing worse than the Alps for instance) to Namche Bazaar. This is a major town and the gateway to Everest...."

"Saturday was a rest day for the trek, and boy did I rest. After breakfast, it would appear that I was hit hard with AMS (Altitude Mountain Sickness)-- I wanted to do nothing other than lie down. In addition to being incredibly sleepy, my resting heart rate was 50% faster than normal, my breathing erratic, and I briefly had a headache. I was just shy of fainting at dinner, and had the doctor examine me where he gave me rehydration powder, which really seemed to do an amazing job -- by this (Sunday) morning, I had bounced back up and was able to tackle a 4+ hour hike that gave us a preview of the finish of the marathon."

"It is absolutely, positively, brutal -- at about the 21-mile mark, there is a
~1700ft elevation gain in the next ~2 miles. I suppose I should take solace in the fact that much of the route is up stairs, so all of the training I did in the Harvard football stadium should pay off. The downhill section we covered was also somewhat narrow with a bit of loose rock sitting in the trail as well. It seems that the runner will not be able to take away his focus for even a second, or he will be plummeting to the ground. I can't imagine how incredible it will feel to cross the finish line 9 days from today."

"A little more on a couple of the other folks I've met here -- Gunter: A German fellow who made it his goal to run 100 marathons before his 50th birthday...he made this resolution when he was 43. Everest will be his 104th. His 50th birthday is May
31st. This means that he has run 104 marathons all in the time since I have run
my last one (October 2000). Nick & Phil: A couple of running buddies from the UK who are trying to do the highest (Everest), lowest (Dead Sea), coldest (North Pole) and hottest (Marathon du Sable) in a calendar year. As Nick parenthetically mentions, Badwater (the 135 mile ultra from Death Valley to Mount Whitney is technically the hottest, but a little too ridiculous even for him.)Alright, that's an earful out of me for now. If I survive the marathon, you will hear from me on the 29th. Cheers, - Tom"