Hey Athletes! Did you know our very own coach Joe trekked up Kilimanjaro? Don’t miss this week’s special episode of Ask Me Anything!
Episode 64 of Ask Me Anything is up!
Ask Me Anything: Kilimanjaro vs Garage Gym Athlete
On this week’s episode of Ask Me Anything, the tables have been turned! Jerred is the one asking the question and Joe is on the hot seat. Jerred asks about Joe’s recent climb of Kilimanjaro. Joe shares his experience and how he and Liz were able to make it to the top!
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To becoming better!
Jerred
Transcript:
Jerred Moon
All right, ladies, gentlemen, welcome to the garage mathlete podcast gentlemen here with Joe. Courtney. What’s up, Joe?
Joe Courtney
How’s it going?
Jerred Moon
It’s going well, man. We’re kinda we’re doing an Ask me anything. It’s an ask you anything. It’s an ask Joseph some stuff and was asked me
Joe Courtney
anything about Africa.
Jerred Moon
It’s an AJ s asked Joseph stuff. AJ SS. So, for the listeners, what we’re doing for this episode, Joe recently got back from a trip. He did a lot of cool stuff climbed Kilimanjaro, all sorts of great things. And we’re gonna see how that relates to fitness being garage mathlete, all that good stuff. So, Joe, how was it?
Joe Courtney
Very hard. It was the hardest physically and mentally thing that less than I’ve ever done in why,
Jerred Moon
why was that?
Joe Courtney
It’s pretty much all factors that would make something challenging. You have I mean, well, honestly, the physical aspect was probably the easiest, almost pretty much because you’re not going, you’re not hiking far you’re not hiking high each day, but each day you’re getting a higher elevation, so the elevation works against you, then you’re camping and sleeping in a tent. So sleep is not ideal, there’s there was at least two nights where I pretty much didn’t get any sleep. And the other nights, it was like hit touching go. It was a rainy season. So we went during kind of a bad time, because each night it rained. And then when it rains near attend, you’re kind of like waking up worried that your stuffs gonna get wet, which ours did once or twice. So elevation, that it gets colder as you’re getting higher, of course. So the weather temperature, you’re making sure you have to pack everything very efficiently. Making sure you’re on top of hydration, and nutrition and all these things. So you know, you have sleep recovery are against you. And then elevation and all these things are Yeah, so it’s all it’s all the factors that you kind of try to work to be against, but are against you.
Jerred Moon
Yeah, when you can’t control your sleep. I know. It’s like anytime I do some sort of physical event like a, you know, Spartan Race or bike race or whatever. My sleep is always trashed before that event. And normally because I’m nervous or pensive, and then that that changes everything right? You’re like going to do this in your day to day training, or at least for me, and probably for you sleeping eight or nine hours, everything’s like perfect. And then you’re at quote unquote, Game Day, you got to use your fitness for something and you slept like four and a half hours the night before. And it’s a little bit harder, but it’s a good. It’s a good test. So you had everything going against you. You’re wet. You’re cold. Yeah, elevation, how is the elevation part of it? Because you know how high you were? What was the?
Joe Courtney
Yeah, so the total elevation on the the summit, the highest that we got was just over 19,000 feet, which is very high. Yeah, we started at 5500, we started at about a mile high. So 5500 ish feet. And then the very first day, we skipped all the way up to like nine or 10. And then from there on, we were between 12 and 15 going up and down. So we were we were still really high, like even at 12,000 feet, that’s like the highest we’ve ever hiked in been. And we were living at that for the entire time. And it’s because you need to get acclimated somehow. So on the third day is when we went all the way up to 15. And then came down and slept at 13. But on that third day, we both got like small headaches, and a little bit of nausea because of the elevation coming down. And then some other some other small factors that just kind of put it all together. But yes, we were that high for the majority of it and like you felt it like it wasn’t even just the hiking part. Because when you start hiking, it’s like oh man, I’m already out of breath. But then you kind of get into a groove almost like when you go for a run like zone two or whatever. You’re like, Okay, the first five minutes, you think you’re more tired than you are but then you just kind of just kind of find a happy medium. But like doing mundane things like putting on a pair of pants going to the bathroom. You just like stop after a second you’re like, Oh my god, I guess I just put my hands down. The simplest thing of like getting out of your sleeping bag going walking to your new little table or your the bathroom. And she’s like, oh, man, I gotta run out of that. And just all those little, little mundane things. So yeah, you’re a pie.
Jerred Moon
Yeah, I noticed that. So when skiing or whatever with the family a month ago, and we’re at the house we were at was at 12,000 I think and so, but then they had stairs, right? So every time I walk up the stairs, I’m like, oh god, I can’t breathe. But then I didn’t notice that when when I was skiing, you know? And is that kind of what you’re saying? Like once you get moving, you’re like, Okay, this is fine. But all the little stuff. You just notice how out of breath you are,
Joe Courtney
basically so like as we were like when you start or Basically when when you would see the start the day or start from from a small break, though you might have had, you get really tired, but then after about 1015 minutes, you’re you, you’re kind of compensate and your body kind of knows, okay, I, I know, my heart is gonna be high, I know, I get into a breathing rhythm. And I mean, I didn’t talk, we didn’t talk while we were.
And no talking.
Joe Courtney
Yeah, and like our guy was always like, make sure you’re drinking water. And I’m like, I can’t drink water and walk at the same time. degrees. So like, we would have to wait for the flat parts of the downpours or when we’d stopped actually, like drink and drink a ton of water then. But other than that, it was just just the monotonous of you know, one foot in front of the other and keeping your breathing, slow and controlled. And you just kind of you kind of you find your rhythm.
Jerred Moon
And you mentioned the year three elements being a big factor. Tell me a little bit more about that.
Joe Courtney
Yeah, 100% I think that’s the main reason why we succeeded. And one of the things that the guides mentioned to us like they, they for one tell you that you need to drink a ton. So you have to you have to carry on your on your person three liters of water, and drink that each day. They like that before you start the hike you they make sure you have a bladder, a water bladder and like a water bottle to drink out of. And they’re always telling you to drink and make sure you’re drinking enough. But like we were drinking three liters by lunchtime, we because we’re just so used to drinking water and three liters is basically what I would drink normally, or we both read normally in the day anyway. And this would include like the in our tent, they would bring us hot water for coffee and tea. So like in breakfast, lunch and dinner, they would bring us a big thermos of hot water. And I would have we would have at least four four or five cups of those each meal. And it was mostly because we needed to drink some stuff. But also because it was cold sitting in our tent and you’re cold so you’re just drinking hot water to stay warm as well. So just habitually hydrating as to as staying hydrated was one thing. Next is nutrition making sure we’re eating enough of what we’re getting and it didn’t matter and I think you and Marco both mentioned before I left was like don’t worry about macros at all Don’t worry about you know you said specifically Don’t worry about being low carb or anything like that. We didn’t have a choice they had a cook that made made our food for us and yeah, the you don’t have aesthetic goals or macro goals when you’re climbing a mountain you are eating what’s in front of you as much as you can. And just because you need the fuel and also you know being in that mindset of knowing that we need to get as much fuel as possible and eating to fuel for for our physically in like the altitude change kind of help as well. I ate so many times that I wasn’t hungry. And that’s one of the things that goes when you go down to is you lose your appetite. And I was like the number two thing that they would keep on kept on asking us after hydration was like Hey, are you still have an appetite? Are you guys still eating? Make sure you need enough. And I like Liz, she must have like somehow grown up on a mountain even though she did she didn’t. She had zero effect from a. But I did.
Jerred Moon
There’s always that person who’s like talking about
Joe Courtney
killing me over here. So each meal like she was hungry by the time we got to the meal if I’m just like, I’m not hungry, but I know I need eat. So I would just make myself eat enough as much as I could. A lot of times it would be after we finished eating I’d be a little bit nauseous because, you know, altitude in general could make you nauseous, but I was just eating I wasn’t hungry, but I knew I needed to. So having that habit of doing that really helped as well. Sleep you can only do so much. But when you can if you can, and we started toward the end, the last couple of days are the days leading up to the summit. We took Benadryl to make sure we actually got as much sleep as we could, and just preparing as much as possible to like, at the very last moment of when they would do they would brief us each night about Okay, this is what we’re doing the next day, this is what you’re going to need to pack and your day pack that you’re carrying. They would also take our pulse our blood oxygen level and ask us a bunch of questions if we were having symptoms of this than the other. So basically whenever they would come and do that we were already in our sleeping bag ready for bed so right when they would leave, we would go to the bathroom and go to sleep. So all of those elements things I think were the main thing that really helped us succeed. Physically like I said, it really wasn’t that hard. We were only hiking for I don’t know what the breakdown was per day. But it was only a couple of 1000 feet gain each day and then you can kind of come back down and total in total we would be hiking for like three to four or anywhere from three to five hours. And we were we were actually kind of the fast hikers so we never really felt that fatigue in our legs. It was just our lungs are the elevation was the only thing that was really holding us back.
Jerred Moon
Awesome. You three elements for the wind. Now I want to talk about fitness. I mean you were on the show. Drink track leading up to this. Do you think that was a good idea? Bad
Joe Courtney
idea didn’t
Jerred Moon
matter?
Joe Courtney
I don’t think it matters at all. I think the way most people
Jerred Moon
going to climb a mountain be like, you know what, I think I should probably hop on the injured track. You know? Yeah. Yeah. How do you feel? Like, why do you think it didn’t matter? You know, like, what are your thoughts on that? Um,
Joe Courtney
well, maybe just for me or us, because I mean, every Thursday, we were doing some sort of run, we were running on top of that, and doing a lot of zone two on top. So I think preparing wise, as long as you were supplementing with a lot of zone to work, because when you’re hiking, like I said, I was you get into that, that rhythm to where you can sustain it for a long time, but I’m not having a conversation or drinking water. So like, I’m pretty sure I was in zone two for the majority of the hike. But I’m just so used to sustain that for a long time doing zone two or like lower, even like lower zone to work, that I was fine. And like the recovery wasn’t much at all. So if you’re used to doing zone two, you could still do strength and just have zone to work on your, whatever fifth day, or of the week that you’re doing. So I don’t think physically that it’s that big of a deal to be doing strength work and go and climb mountain.
Jerred Moon
Yeah. Cool, man. Well, anything else? We should hit? Anything else you want people to know? garage mathlete versus Kilimanjaro?
Joe Courtney
I went, we went. Yeah, it was. It was more mental probably than physical. Especially on the summit day. So that day, and I want to I mentioned the, that’s probably the big highlight day. And let’s say that we woke up at midnight, and we started hiking at 1am to get to the summit when the sun rose. And like, the mental Battle of knowing like the dread of Okay, I know, I’m not going to get any sleep this night. And I know we’re going to be leaving and hiking in the dark in the cold ascending the mountain. And just that kind of messes with your mind. As we started that day, the first 90 minutes, two hours or whatever, I was trying not to look at my watch, so that we get psyched out. But first, that bit of the debt portion of it. I felt great. I was thinking, Okay, you know what, this isn’t that bad. We’re going to just fine. And then like, it started snowing and sleeting. And this huge wind was blowing at us for a while and and my temperature dropped, I was absolutely freezing. So this is when I was like, holy crap, this really, really sucks. So at one point, we when we stopped, I was telling telling the guys that I was getting pretty cold even though we on the ascent, they don’t let you rest for more than like two or three minutes because they need to keep your temperature up. But you also can’t go fast, because they don’t want you to sweat. So our steps were literally like step one Mississippi, step one, Mississippi, and you’re just doing that for like six hours going up the mountain. And it’s fairly steep too. So I tell them, I’m cold. And they gave me a jacket, an extra jacket. And funnily enough, so everybody in Tanzania is like, kind of small. I think I’m a head taller than everyone. And it was like one of our cruise jackets that was on top of my jacket. So it was like a really, really, really tight check that I said that I had to squeeze into. Either way, they made me warmer, and I was happy about it. I didn’t care how it looked. After a few hours, I was like, Okay, I’m starting a warmer, that’s fine. But I still had to like, really, really dial in some positive self talk and a lot of repetitive things that I was just telling myself for probably like two hours, just like positive self talk to myself over and over and over again. Because I was freezing, I was tired. We’re still going up a mountain, it was pitch black. So you can even see where you’re going or how much you have left. It’s like oh my god, I don’t know when this is gonna end. I don’t want to look at my watch, because I don’t want to see what time it is and think, okay, I still got three hours of this left. So, yeah, the mental side was huge toward it. Just repeating that over and over. And then eventually, at whatever time it was, we stopped for a break for a second. And I look over and I just see like the slip through a little red sliver of the sunrise. And I’m like, Yes, my ray of hope it’s gonna get warmer. The sun’s coming up. That means we’re getting closer. It didn’t get that much warmer, but it got a little bit warmer. The sun helps a little bit.
Jerred Moon
Sunday does help with the mental side a little bit.
Joe Courtney
Yeah. And then we reached the top. And yeah, it was still really rough. Because we even got to like there’s like two peaks at the top. The first peak is just, I forgot what it’s called. And then there’s a second peak that’s like, a 40 minute walk further. And it’s just a little bit higher, which is the official peak. And that last peak was like, Oh, wait, I’ve already at the top. But I have to go to this other part, which is it’s even colder over there. Because there’s like a glacier next to it. So there’s like an even colder when we’re like, oh my god, he’s going to get to this peak. I thought I was already here. I’m so cold. I just want to take my pictures and turn around. But yeah, the positive self talk really, really helped. And then really, legs didn’t get fatigued and sore until on the way down because it was just He’s centric for hours on the way down. And so
Jerred Moon
so you got to the top and you’re just kind of like, whatever I’m over, I want to go home.
Joe Courtney
When we got to that first peak, it was like, Yes, this is awesome. If you’ll find the sun is up, I’m kind of happy. It’s like, Okay, let’s go to that other peak. But by the time we got to another peak, the snow is gotten deeper, the wind is picked up more, and it’s just absolutely freezing. So all the pictures of us in front of the main sign were were completely bonded, I became cfaes as a coach, just like we are for absolutely freezing. I just want to turn around and go back because I can’t even stand right now. And our guides just kept on wanting to take pictures and pictures. And yeah, it we’re talking about this yesterday that it does kind of suck that we didn’t want to savor it because like, we weren’t that long to get there. But it was still not fun.
Jerred Moon
All right now. So to put it on my gauge of of how bad it was, there was the the South Carolina Spartan beast we did together probably one of the only hard truly hard things we’ve done together. You know, let’s say put that on a scale of one to 10 and then put your climb on a scale of one to 10 just so I know where we’re at. As far as mental misery.
Joe Courtney
Up until the actual summit day summit point. I’d probably put it at like a seven or an eight. But then that summit day, that summit point that go into that into the night was probably at a 12 if the mill springs Spartan was is the 10 because I mean, the entire just the climb was six hours. That’s how long the Spartan was. And during the Spartan I remember I was freezing, and I was cold and even though I was limping I I was just mad.
Jerred Moon
Well, that’s what that’s what I’m asking because I saw you quite angry during that race. So I was wondering where the the mental side was in comparison. Yeah,
Joe Courtney
I was just mad and wanted to get to get it over with but for the this thing, it was like I don’t know if I got mad if I got frustrated plenty of times, but it was just oh my god. I don’t really know if I want to do this. So yeah, definitely a meet yourself. Big time.
Jerred Moon
That’s good, man. Those events are good for you. I think. That’s awesome. Good on you for finishing in two. You didn’t. Didn’t bow you really can’t when you go that far.
Joe Courtney
Right. Like, that’s one of things I was saying. I was like, you’ve been hiking for six days. You can’t pack out now.
Jerred Moon
Yeah, you really can’t. There are people who do But
Joe Courtney
yeah, I think Liz looked up the statistics. She said like 60 to 70%. pass rate, your success rate, something like that. Maybe you’re on 60 or so I don’t know what the official numbers are ready to get that but yeah. And we did without a lot of I mean, I guess the main thing was doing it without a lot of altitude syndromes. sickness. Yeah, pretty accomplishment considering we live on the water.
Jerred Moon
Yeah, that’s quite a change. I mean, similar to Texas elevation there, but even lower somehow. Well, that’s crazy, man. Thanks for sharing. And if anybody else does have questions for Joe and Kilimanjaro at all mascus Mountains in general, if you’re prepping for one and you’d like to talk to Joe about it, just go to garage mathlete comm slash ama. You can ask us questions. ask us a question asked Joe question. Anything really and we will get it answered. But it’s cool to be able to do this one today. And yeah, that’s it guys. Thanks. Thanks for watching. If you’re on the YouTube channel, and if you are on Youtube, go ahead and subscribe. Hit the like button. We’d really appreciate it. If you’re in the podcast feed five star view and make sure you’re subscribed here as well. If you just randomly found us in you’re not subscribed, just fix that problem. But that’s it for today guys, thanks for watching or listening