Climbing Back...

The last few years have been a disappointment - at least with respect to my relationship with stairs.

Maybe I'll go into depth on the why and the how of things, but here is the tldr:

With no races to look forward to, I gained 20 lbs and lost some fitness.

Sure, I trained ~4 times per week for the past few year -  including stairs - but it wasn't enough to stave off the COVID weight gain or a moderate decline in fitness.

About a year ago, as COVID was winding down and races started to pick up again, I increased my training, thinking I'd make my comeback sometime later in the year.

But my weight wouldn't budge.

For perspective, I like to be at 172 lbs or lower on race day and during January I hovered around 192-193 lbs... and if I'm truthful, I was up around 194-195 lbs at my peak weight.

Come September, I finally weighed below 190 lbs. I signed up for the Sears Tower race in November thinking that maybe I'd be able to shed a few more pounds and not completely embarrass myself. 

But my weight wouldn't budge.

Still, I signed up for Sears and I wasn't going to back out. At the very least I had gained some of my fitness back and I could use it as a benchmark. 

Fast forward to Halloween and I made the trip to Chicago.

It was hailing. Seriously?!

Fortunately, the bad weather didn't last and I had a few days to train, relax, and experience the city.

The day before the race, I met up with David at Sears to pick up my racing bib. I hadn't seen him since pre-COVID and it was nice to catch up.

After walking around the city, I got back to my hotel room completely exhausted. My throat was scratchy and I had a headache. I took a short nap. My alarm went off just before dinner time. I had planned to meet up with a few other climbers for dinner, but by now I had a fever. Instead I took a couple Tylenol and tried to rest up.

How could this happen 12 hours before the race?

I felt even worse by bedtime, but set my alarm to 4:30 AM anyway. Maybe I'd feel better in the morning.

I didn't.

Racing was out of the question. I wanted to at least attend the race to see the other racers, but between bouts of chills and fevers, I wasn't sure I could get to the Tower let alone climb it. So I stayed in bed.

It was the right choice. The next couple days were spent mostly in bed, though I ventured out a couple times to replenish my dwindling supplies.

I managed to make it back home though the flight was miserable. I ended up missing a couple more days of work, too. So much for the "vacation".

I was disappointed. Not only did I miss the race, but my fitness took a hit as well. I tapered my workouts while traveling specifically so I would stay healthy and be at my best on race day. But instead I ended up resting for an entire week.

Though I was depressed... it somehow flipped a switch. Suddenly I was motivated again.

Motivated enough to change my diet 

Motivated enough to step up my workouts 

Motivated enough to write my first blog post in 4 years.

I've got 74 days until the US championships at Scale the Strat and a solid 15 pounds to lose.