Preparations

Learning about the hill. Having heard about the dangers of the Bells, I immediately bought three guidebooks in an effort to learn as much as possible about the route. I failed on Capitol Peak once because of route error and did not want to repeat that mistake. I found a guidebook with an actual photograph of the backside ledges on South Maroon, marking the route with a zig-zagged line. The backside rocks and ledges are so labyrinthine, however, that the only value of the photo is to show you that you should be looking for an alternating series ledge traverses and gully climbs. You still have to find them on the mountain. I also purchased a detailed elevation map of the Maroon Bells Wilderness that showed the trail and the route up the grassy ledges. Even that was only marginally helpful. For two days, we walked right past the two cairns at the bottom of the trail and never saw them.

Getting in shape. Conditioning for a fourteen-thousand foot peak like Maroon should be directed toward legs and heart. Maroon requires a single-day climb of 3,800 vertical feet starting from an altitude at which oxygen is required in depressurized planes.

My year-round conditioning program normally includes 3-5 workouts per week. My routine includes 200-300 crunches, 6 to 12 weight machines (3 sets each) and either 30 minutes of high-setting Stair Master or a 2 mile run. As an alternative to the gym, I climb my 30 floor building and train with the Evansville Boxing Club. At boxing practice, we get in many highly aerobic rounds of heavy bag work, mitt work, ring work and sparring.

Jace lifts weights and does Stair Master at the Johnson Center at UK, either runs 2-3 miles or swims 1650 meters, plays competitive table tennis (vastly more demanding than you think) and cycles long distances.

Joey is a highly-skilled amateur boxer who has participated in two Golden Gloves tournaments. He is at boxing practice twice a week, works out at USI's gym, runs 5 miles, and also spars and does bag work in a home gym.

Jake maintains the most extraordinary physical condition of any of us, both wind and strength, but he never seems to work at it. He does something to stay in such steely shape, but no one knows what. He has summited Kilimanjaro, Cotopaxi and Chimborazo and once ran 52 miles non-stop (yes, two marathons ... one was not enough).

Nothing could be finer. Before climbs, we usually drive to Asheville, North Carolina, to climb Mt. Mitchell, the highest peak in the eastern half of North America. The trail gains exactly 3,684 vertical feet over 5.6 miles and is a great tune-up for an alpine climb. It tightens your legs very nicely.

I first climbed Mt. Mitchell in 1994 with Jim Horrar. We made every mistake you can make -- not in shape, cotton underwear, jeans, no trekking poles, sprint pace, too many breaks and warm clothes left in the car in the hot lower parking lot. It took us 4 hours and 45 minutes and we nearly froze to death on top where the wind chill was 50 degrees lower than the base parking lot. In 1996 and 1997, my times were 4:32 and 4:12. After conditioning for our Ecuador climb in 2000, Jace, Brendan and I reached the top in 2:59. Before the Maroon climb, my time dropped to 2:32 while Joey finished in 2:15 and Jace and Jake in just under 2 hours! Then, in November 2003, Joey, Brendan, DiShon and I reached the top in 2:22 and Jace in a sweet 1:45. Jace's time would have been better, but he stopped to beat me with a Nerf bat for a full minute on the way up. All of our times would have been better if the trail had been in better shape -- we got lost a couple of times due to overgrowth.) In July 2004, Jace later bettered his group-best time to 1:42, an incredible climb rate of 2,167 vertical feet per hour - almost three times faster than our ascent rate on the grassy ledges of Maroon. We may try Mitchell once more late in 2004.

Equipment. Equipment preparations for fourteen thousand foot climbs are considerable. You need a lot of gear to be fully prepared for the variety of dangerous conditions that a mountain can throw at you. Our equipment checklist is a time-tested document that has been developed and amended over the course of seven mountain climbs, all over 14,000 feet.

Jace and Jake had their equipment from the Ecuador climbs, but Joey did not. I met him at Quest for the Outdoors in Evansville one afternoon in May and we set about getting him what he needed -- Gregory backpack, Leki poles, bowls and utensils, capilene underwear, expedition weight capilene, Vasque hiking boots, Thorlo mountain socks, North Face mountain pants, North face Mountain Lite shell, gloves and glove liners, 300 weight fleece, sleeping bag, emergency blanket, blister packs, Nalgene bottles, etc. This is REALLY expensive gear, but it lasts a lifetime and can keep you alive overnight on an iced-up ledge at 13,000 feet.

Acclimatization. For those who have not experienced acute mountain sickness ("AMS"), its symptoms are exactly like those of a hangover -- nausea, headache, loss of appetite, listlessness. AMS attacks different people at different altitudes and some worse than others. AMS attacks while you sleep. During the day, you breathe faster to make up for the lower air pressure (lack of oxygen). During sleep, however, you revert to your sea-level breathing rate and get too little oxygen. This causes a slight swelling of the brain -- an organ that is very sensitive to oxygen deprivation. The result is AMS. If you ascend gradually, however, your body will react to the higher altitude by producing extra red blood corpuscles. The extra red cells carry extra oxygen to the brain -- even while you breathe at a sea level rate during sleep.

I have gotten AMS twice. Both times, I got it by moving from 8,000 feet to a camp located at or above 11,000 feet. My worst case of AMS occurred on Mt. Whitney where we left our motel in Lone Pine at 2,000 feet, passed camp sites at 10,000 feet (they were there for a reason) and camped at 12,000 feet. The next day, I ate less than 100 calories and threw up 10 seconds after my photo was taken on the 14,496 foot summit. On the other hand, I did NOT get AMS on climbs to 19,000 feet in Ecuador. In Ecuador, we did six training treks and camped at progressively higher altitudes (11,000 feet to 14,000 feet). Once the extra red blood corpuscles were in place, we tackled the mountains without altitude sickness.

A good rule of thumb for fourteen thousand foot climbs is to spend one night at 5,000 feet (e.g. Denver), one night at 8,000 feet (e.g. Aspen, Dillon or Colorado Springs), and then at least one, and preferably two, nights at somewhere under 10,500 feet. Going abruptly from 8,000 feet (or lower) to 11,000 feet or above is asking for it. You can also minimize AMS problems by drinking a great deal of water and cutting fatty food intake. Finally, you could get your doctor to prescribe Diamox, a diuretic that lessens the effects of altitude sickness, although I know of no one who uses this on fourteen thousand foot peaks.

 

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