Yesterday was the big day: Biathalon Day. It started with a 5K at 8:00 AM and finished with climbing the stairs to the top of the Space Needle! It was an amazing day, to say the least.
All of the Lj’s did really well at the 5K. First, guess who scored a first place in her division?? That’s right! None other than my lil’ Gigi! She was SO proud when she got those results- and so were we! She’s been training for cross country this fall and her efforts really paid off! Bradley placed in the top eighth for his division and I placed in the top 33rd percent for mine. Neither of us really has that much at stake in the numbers, but it’s interesting and kind of fun to see how we stack up to our peers. It must also be mentioned that Bradley got best mustache, second year in a row! That thing gets him more attention, I’m telling you. Jude’s goal was to run the whole way, and HE DID. He got nervous about halfway through, but then he found his second wind and started going so fast I couldn’t keep up with him! It was marvelous to see! Unfortunately we had to bust out of there to head to Seattle, so we didn’t find out about Gigi’s win until much later. I’m writing to the organizers to find out if there is a medal or anything that I should pick up. That said, her pride and ours is plenty! 😊 (Mom guilt, tho…)
The climb was pretty incredible. I wrote the names of all the people I was honoring all down one arm and Bradley drew a big Space Needle on the other. I met Drea and Macky, we put our climbing socks on and we headed into the chute. The Needle has a double helix of flights of stairs that wrap around inside the stem of the needle. The elevators are just on the outside, and when they would drop or rise rapidly by, it made me startle every time! The let us start climbing every 15 seconds, giving a bit of lag time in between.
Once I started climbing it went both way faster and way slower than I thought it would. I rapidly began to breathe hard and my heart was pounding, but I kept a pretty solid pace. I kept reminding myself that this was not going to be a problem, that my breathing was fine, and I was just amazed that I could keep on going! There were paramedics throughout the climb, and at one point, as my heart was beating like a bass drum, I did decide to stop and rest for a moment. I stood still for about one whole minute, knowing one minute of good rest would do a lot more good than a few seconds of quick rest, and then I headed up to the top. It only took me 13 minutes to climb it! I was planning on 20-30 minutes, so I far exceeded my expectations.
It felt like quite an accomplishment, to climb such a building. And now I’m kind of hooked. It was a supremely good workout. I went home and read up on stair-climbing as an aerobic exercise and learned that because it is so strenuous that 15 minutes of stair-climbing is the equivalent of 30 minutes of jogging. It was difficult to find data that supported the strenuous level of climbing- most of what I found was about how you should take the stairs instead of the elevator. But then I found a post about athletes who are training for intensely aerobic events use stair climbing as a tool because it is so intense. I wish I could have access to someplace like the Space Needle stairs on the regular. It’d be awesome to climb up those every day to double down on a quick aerobic exercise, then hit the weights.
It was an incredible experience. I loved the climb and I loved doing it with Drea and Macky, my partners in crime. Or I should say partners in CLIMB! Ha! You know. Because we climbed the Space… Ok. Anyhow, it was incredible. And part of what made it such a memorable day was carrying those names. The cancer list just keeps on growing and it’s bothering me in a big bad way. I feel good that I got to do something when there seems like nothing I can do. I did this, with them and for them and anyone else. Thank you for helping me with contributions and kindness. What a day. ❤️
And then this:
Christina
#1: You are amazing. Writing everyone’s name on your arms was surprising and humbling…I know I commented on IG, but it made me cry to see my dad’s name and knowing you carried it all the way up a building more than a thousand miles from me. That was really, really cool of you.
#2: Your husband’s ‘stache is also amazing and I can totally empathize…Cam always gets tons of attention for his beard wherever we go. When we did the color run the volunteers stopped us to put more and more color in his beard, and the car ended up covered in color dust because of it 😛
#3: Seriously, you’re awesome.