The fact is, it has nothing to do with the air in the stairwell and everything to do with your airway.

“Track Hack” was coined long ago by middle distance runners (i.e. 800 meter to mile runners). Mountain runners get it too. So do aggressive hikers, who call it “Hike Hack.” Even cycle sprint racers get it, although they don’t have a clever name for it that I know of (“bike hack” doesn’t seem to have the same pop to it). These athletes are in their anaerobic zone during most of their event and are breathing as hard as their lungs will let them. They are breathing so hard in fact, their airway gets eroded from the air passing through it. This erosion causes irritation in the airway. This irritation causes a tickle in the throat and this tickle causes the cough.

This irritation can even cause the mucous membranes to produce mucous for protection and lubrication, which can lead to some phlegm in the cough. It can also affect other airways like the nasal passages, which cause sneezing in that case. This erosion can even break little capillaries in the airways causing the taste of blood, or a metallic taste in the mouth.

Sounds bad for you, right? Well, it’s not. It’s just a nuisance.

Vertical training like stair racing tends to produce the hack more often and more severely than other sports. The vertical component of locomotion tends to make us breathe deeper and faster than other sports, mainly because we aren’t adapted to going “up” fast for more than a minute or so. We are more adapted for flatter surfaces because that is what we do most of the time.

The shape of your throat has a lot to do with it too. Some people don’t get the hack no matter what their exertion or fitness level. Others practically get it just thinking about a stair race. I’m one of those lucky few. Even though I train on stairs often and have done over 30 stair races around the US, I still get it when I train hard or when I do a stair race.

What is the solution? Well, there are two as far as I have found. Either slow down so you don’t breath very hard, or wear a mask. My mask (pictured above) causes me to breathe back in my own warm moist air. This warm moist air is easier on my airways so I don’t get the hack or the sneezes. Other people see me in a mask and they assume it’s further confirmation of their suspicion about the dusty stairwell, but that’s not it at all.

Since this is such a common assumption and resulting complaint, many race directors have had the stairwell air tested. In every case, the results have come back showing the air to be just as good as anywhere else in the building and no more dusty – even later in the race after lots of people have gone and the stairwells are crowded. The oxygen levels haven’t changed either, which is another conclusion people jump to.

In fact, because the stairwell is more humid and warmer later in the day from the other racers’ bodies and breathing, you will be LESS likely to get the hack.  Cold dry air is the worst for causing the hack, so doing fast stairs outside on a cold dry day will give it to you worse than any indoor stairwell could. Especially if it is a long stairwell or aggressive hike beyond 10 minutes of sustained high levels of effort (i.e. 80% or more of your max heart rate).

Training does help as your throat will adapt and get tougher, but if you are a “hacker” like me, you probably always will be to some extent. Even as your throat gets tougher with conditioning, so do your legs, heart and lungs, so you are able to put more into it, therefore increasing your ability to erode your airway and continuing to cause the hack.

So is it hopeless for us hackers? Not really. You can learn to live with it or train in a mask like I do. You can also run part of the race in a mask, take it off when you feel too restricted and then whip it back on at the top as you cross the finish line, keeping it on for about 5 minutes until your breathing gets back into the normal range. My climbing buddy Jeff does this and while he still gets the hack, it is greatly reduced.

The mask does slow me down a bit, but not as much as you might think. I estimate it slows me down about 15 seconds  in a race like the 69 floor Columbia Tower in Seattle. That drops my overall place down about 5 spots, but it’s worth it to not have the inconvenience of coughing and sneezing for 4 days. If I feel particularly competitive, I’ll race without it and live with the after effects, but it’s also a nice excuse to pull out of my pocket when one of my stair climbing friends beats me by just a few seconds.  ;)

Understanding the mind-body connection is helpful to develop these mental skills faster. This post is the first step to that end.

While it’s an overstatement to say that muscle fatigue may all be in a person’s head, a series of studies suggests that the body’s cue to slow down during tiring physical activities does start there.

It is known that the extent to which people can use their muscles voluntarily depends on motivation as well as the physical condition and level of fatigue of the muscles. But less is known about the specific mechanisms involved involved with the sensation of fatigue.

While most research to date on muscle fatigue has studied muscle tissue itself, a series of studies by the University of Zurich has shifted the focus to include the brain, as well. The researchers say the studies show a link between muscle fatigue and changes in the interaction between neuronal structures, specifically, processes responsible for reducing muscle activity during muscle-fatiguing exercise.

In the first study, researchers found that nerve impulses from muscles inhibit the primary motoric area in the brain during a fatiguing, energy-demanding exercise. This was found to be similar to how pain stimuli are conveyed. Study participants repeated thigh contractions until they could no longer achieve the force required to carry out the task. When the same exercise was conducted under spinal anesthesia, consequently interrupting the response from the muscle to the primary motoric area, it was found that the corresponding fatigue-related inhibition processes became markedly weaker than when the brain had received all the muscle information intact.

In a second step, functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to pinpoint those regions of the brain that showed an increase in activity shortly before being interrupted by a tiring, energy-demanding activity. These were found to be the thalamus and the insular cortex, respectively, areas that analyze information that could pose a threat, such as hunger or pain.

The third and final study in the series, published in the European Journal of Neuroscience, found that the neuronal system has a regulating effect on muscle performance. Specifically, the study found that that inhibitory influences on motoric activity are mediated by a part of the brain known as the insular cortex.

Tests using a bicycle ergometer showed that the communication between the insular cortex and the primary motoric area increased as fatigue wore on.

Taken together, the results of the studies suggest that it may be possible to develop ways to optimize muscular performance, the researchers said, opening up new avenues for research and therapy.

References:

1. Lea Hilty, Lutz Jäncke, Roger Luechinger, Urs Boutellier, Kai Lutz. Limitation of physical performance in a muscle fatiguing handgrip exercise is mediated by thalamo-insular activity. Human Brain Mapping, 2011; 32 (12): 2151 DOI: 10.1002/hbm.21177

2. Lea Hilty, Kai Lutz, Konrad Maurer, Tobias Rodenkirch, Christina M. Spengler, Urs Boutellier, Lutz Jäncke, Markus Amann. Spinal opioid receptor-sensitive muscle afferents contribute to the fatigue-induced increase in intracortical inhibition in healthy humans. Experimental Physiology, 2011; DOI: 10.1113/expphysiol.2010.056226

3. Lea Hilty, Nicolas Langer, Roberto Pascual-Marqui, Urs Boutellier, Kai Lutz. Fatigue-induced increase in intracortical communication between mid/anterior insular and motor cortex during cycling exercise. European Journal of Neuroscience, 2011; DOI: 10.1111/j.1460-9568.2011.07909.x

Source: http://www.personaltrainertoday.com/muscle-fatigue-partly-in-the-head-study-finds

I’d say that’s utter domination…

If you look at the team competition page, the time spread between us and 2nd place is so big, it looks like we cheated!

Also, if we had formed another team with our 5 fastest women, they would have been the 2nd fastest team overall, even though the next fastest team was all dudes. Oh yeah, and these five women would have beat the fastest Crossfit team too of course (quite handily I might add).  Our two fastest women also beat the fastest Crossfit DUDE on the score boards.

I’m not dissing Crossfit per say, I’m just saying that they talk the most about being intense and since tower running is the most intense sport, it’s a good proving ground. I’m just sayin…

You might also have noticed that our relay team smoked it again. Mike and Eddie were back and this time brought a new member who proved he’s all that too.

The next fastest relay team was pretty fast, but as you can see, the time spread between us and 2nd place was unbelievable here too. Also, all of our top 5 single racer guys ran faster than that 2nd place relay team did. I thought that was pretty incredible since relays are 3 person teams with each person only running 1/3 of the building.

We also nabbed the lion’s share of the age groups.

C’mon other gyms! Isn’t there anyone out there who can match our mad skills? I don’t even care if you recruit Lance Armstrong to be on your team, just do something to give us some competition please! Being unbeatable is fun, but if the races would just be a little closer it would be more exciting for all…

The next local race is in March. Click here to be part of the X Gym winning mojo!

Doing this type of training however, makes me an extremely inconsistent racer. While I usually place in the top 10 overall, I am still all over the place and occasionally crash and burn as I find out what NOT to do by trial and error, like this particular Willis tower race, where I bonked at floor 40 and dragged my miserably taxed wimpy legs the rest of the way up the remaining 63 floors to come in at an embarrassing 40th place overall and falling far short of my own PR.

So what did I learn NOT to do? I learned that road bike riding isn’t as good for tower running as I thought it would be. Because riding on streets with traffic lends me to the mercy of said traffic, stop signs and lights, I can’t control the variables like I can on the incline trainer, row machine or rope machine. Plus, to be honest, I sometimes wimp out since there is no particular course I follow because I am also riding to get somewhere and accomplish something, since my ADD won’t allow me to ride just for the sake of riding.

In the gym however, I can control the variables, so I learned a lesson there.

OK, enough about me and my lame explanation for my pathetic performance at the Willis tower this year. Plus, it makes me cranky just writing about it. What I really want to talk about is the awesome superstars I had the pleasure of racing with, here at the tallest urban stair climb on the planet.

This year was the most competitive year ever, with a record number of Europeans showing up as well as the lion’s share of the top US climbers.

Sproule Love stepped up to crush us all and set the new world record in this 103 floor climb with a time of 13 minutes and 3 seconds! We didn’t plan on him being there, so he surprised us a bit. He is the real deal though, with amazing performances in other climbs and a history of athletic accomplishments and awards a mile long.

Jesse Berg, who was last year’s overall winner, took 2nd behind the new record setter.

Eric Lenninger, another past overall winner in this climb, placed 3rd.

Dan Ackermann a total ninja, at the age of 51, took 4th.

Kevin Crossman pulled a nice PR and took 5th.

Rolf, Oz, Lawrence, Brian and Justin – all superstars – rounded out the rest of the top 10.

Cindy Harris took 11th overall (including dudes), won it for the women and reset the record (her previous record).

Kristen Frey, currently ranked 2nd in the world, took 2nd.

Kourtney Dexter, ranked 4th in the world, took 3rd.

Did I mention this was competitive? Sheesh! This year really brought out the all-stars.

For the full results list, Click the link below:

http://www.theracershub.com/results_view.php?id=1503&result_type=file

Stay tuned! The video is coming soon, but until then, check out Cody’s vid of the climb in real time:

Another animal is Kevin Crossman, who took second overall. He has come so far in the last couple years it’s scary! I (PJ) was able to beat him in the past, but then he joined my X Gym, turned into a freakin’ Superman, and took off into the stratosphere. Speaking of Stratoshpere, he won that race this year in Vegas, tying the world record there, so he’s the “real deal” now, able to hang with or beat the other top world stair climbers now.

A newcomer, Wesley Reutimann, a local competitive bike racer, proved his forged-metal quads by taking 3rd overall and schooling many seasoned tower runners. He has quite a bright future in this sport if he stays with it!

Erika Aklufi won it for the women. She even placed 4th overall, including dudes! She is beyond words. The English vocabulary just isn’t adequate enough to describe her amazing ability. I’ve never seen a stronger climber for these long races. I am dying to see what she can do at a race like the Willis tower!

Kourtney Dexter placed second and ran a personal best herself. She’s an alien. That’s the only way I can explain her ability – especially in the sprint climbs. Kacie Fischer is the only one on the planet who could be a threat to her in a race 50 floors or less. From 50-60 it would be a toss-up between her and Erika Aklufi. From 60 to 70, Erika and Kristen Frey might be able to take her on a good day and past 70, there are only a handful of people on the planet who could hang with her. Since most of the races in the world are less than 60 floors, this makes Kourtney (in my opinion) the best tower runner in the known universe.

Sandra Nunez, our dear step-sister from Mexico, took 3rd overall with an amazing run. She is truly “all that” and more. As adorable as she is fast, this woman deserves the consistent rank among the top 5 world tower runners she keeps earning each year.

Personally, I learned some great lessons this year. I tried calculating my steps per minute based on the number of steps in the building (plus 2 per floor since I two-step the landings) but for some reason, that math didn’t work out. I had my predicted split times for every 10 floors written on my forearm and by floor 10, I was already behind pace so I tuned out my metronome and stepped it up. It took me until floor 40 to get back on pace and then at 50 I backed off because I usually start my most intense suffering at about that point in most climbs.

Well, that suffering never hit me, so that slowdown turned out to be a mistake. I sped back up at 60 and still felt fine. At 65, with 10 floors to go, I started my sprint. Usually, I’m too tired to sprint at the finish, but this time I was able to sprint all 10 floors and could have kept going.

With so much fuel left at the end, I knew I blew it. I also wasn’t feeling the usual hot lava in my quads, hams, butt and triceps, so my customary 10 minutes of writhing around on the floor at the finish line wasn’t necessary.

I could also have conversations with people, so my heart and lungs obviously weren’t pushed to the max either. I did however, set a personal best by a couple seconds despite all that and placed 7th in the elite category, so I really shouldn’t be complaining. It showed me that I am indeed in the best shape of my life, so with continued training, I should be able to destroy my previous time there next year.

My other step-siblings did great too of course. Mark Trahanovski won his age group again. Jeff Dinkin is back on the horse and took 2nd in his age group. Kacie Fischer raced with her team and helped them win a medal. She also took 4th overall for women. Jonny Rocket smoked it again, winning his age group and most of our other team members either got a PR or went home with a medal.

For full official race results, click here: http://www.onlineraceresults.com/race/view_race.php?race_id=21446#racetop

To see the video of the race, festivities and awards, click below:

The next day, Kevin, PJ and his nephew Ryan met with some fitness celebrities for a beach workout by the Santa Monica Pier:

Hats off to the ALA for putting on another great climb! This was only their 2nd year, but it felt like they have been doing this for a long time. Great experience, no glitches, great flow, fantastic timing company (Hallucination Sports), yada yada. Great job ALA!

Below were the predictions I made before the climb (see previous post). I added the actual results as they turned out for this post. I listed their placing too, just to brag about the X Gym team. I was fairly close on the majority of the climbers. Kevin blew my mind with his performance, but he has a tendency to do that because he is a freak. I always expect Kourtney to blow my mind too, so when I predict her time, I just put up some crazy number that doesn’t seem humanly possible and that usually puts me pretty close.

• Predicted: 1st place: Kevin Crossman 5:30    Actual: 1st place at 5:09
• Predicted: 2nd: Brian Crossman 5:35    Actual: 3rd place at 5:33
• Predicted: 3rd: John Osborn 5:45    Actual: 2nd place at 5:30
• Predicted: 4th: Brady Renshaw 5:54    Actual: 4th place at 5:42
• Predicted: 5th: P J Glassey 5:55    Actual: 5th place at 6:00
• Predicted: 6th: Mike Walter 5:56    Actual: 9th place (7th for men) at 6:29
• Predicted: 7th: Mark Trahanovsky 5:58    Actual: 7th place (6th for men) at 6:21
• Predicted: 8th: Kourtney Dexter 6:20    Actual: 1st place (for women, but 6th overall including dudes) at 6:18
• Predicted: 9th: Kacie Fischer 6:22    Actual: 4th place (for women, but 13th overall including dudes) at 7:01
• Predicted: 10th: Kristen Frey 6:25    Actual: 2nd place (for women, but 8th overall including dudes) at 6:23
• Calvin Hancock (PJ’s 13 year old nephew) Predicted: 6:55   Actual: 7:18 (17th overall, 13th for men, 1st in 10-14 division)

I didn’t predict the rest, because I haven’t climbed with them enough, but here were my suggested start order and their actual placings and times:

Patrick Roby   16th overall (12th for men, 3rd in 20-29 division) at 7:17
Karen Geninatti   28th overall (9th for women, 2nd in 50-59 division) at 8:13
Sheila Klein   19th overall (6th for women, 1st in 50-59 division) at 7:33
Ann Stover    23rd overall (8th for women, 3rd in 40-49 division) at 7:55
Rich Camacho    10th overall (8th for men, 3rd in 30-39 division) at 6:45
Jennifer Tenczar   18th overall (5th for women, 2nd in 40-49 division) at 7:26
George Burnham   135th overall (62nd for men, 3rd in 60-69 division) at 14:10
Spencer Colby   26th overall (18th for men, 7th in 40-40 division) at 8:12
Ken Yu   61st overall (40th for men, 5th in 50-59 division) at 9:56
Ken Colling   90th overall (51st for men, 2nd in 60-69 division) at 11:07
Patricia Scott 21st overall (7th for women, 2nd in 30-39 division) at 7:39
Hilary Kenops    30th overall (10th for women, 4th in 40-49 division) at 8:22
Anne Jensen    10th overall (3rd for women, 1st in 40-49 division) at 6:55
Nelson Quong   72nd overall (45th for men, 12th in 40-49 division) at 10:33
Lesley Jacobs   99th overall (44th for women, 3rd in 50-59 division) at 12:14
Nicholas Blenkush   Couldn’t make it to the race.

The following racers started later in the day, to allow for some of us to come back down and climb back up with them:

Now for the team results (fastest 4 climbers averaged). Once again, no one was even close to X Gym:

  1.   21:54 X GYM                         (   5:29)
========================================

  2.   32:02 PRIME CLIMB                   (   8:01)
========================================

  3.   35:14 MERCER ISLAND CROSSFIT        (   8:49)
========================================

Oh, and I should mention that FOUR of our X Gym women ran faster than the FASTEST Crossfit DUDE! I’m not trying to “dis” Crossfit or anything. It’s just a great example of how much our women ROCK!!!

Check out the video below (especially the drama and suffering starting at 1:41).

Why is this so fun for me? Because it’s a new building that none of us have done yet, so we have no baseline times. New stairwells can be very unpredictable and 51 stories in one building can be up to couple minutes different than 51 stories in another building, so I’m going out on a limb predicting placings and times here before the race.

This climb is 51 stories and the floors are pretty standard. It’s 1010 steps, so I think I can estimate pretty close with my world-ranked step brothers and step sisters because I know how fast they are in other climbs.

This is a relatively short climb too, so certain sprint-climbers like myself, Kourtney and Kacie have an advantage for sure. There are lots of awesome climbers coming out for this one though, so it will be super competitive. Here are my predicted placings and times for the top 10 on our team. These will also be our approximate start order:

1st place: Kevin Crossman 5:30
2nd: Brian Crossman 5:35
3rd: John Osborn 5:45
4th: Brady Renshaw 5:54
5th: P J Glassey 5:55
6th: Mike Walter 5:56
7th: Mark Trahanovsky 5:58
8th: Kourtney Dexter 6:20
9th: Kacie Fischer 6:22
10th: Kristen Frey 6:25

I’m not too sure about the rest, because I haven’t climbed with them enough lately, but here is my suggested start order after Kristen to minimize passing and congestion:

Patrick Roby
Karen Geninatti
Sheila Klein
Ann Stover
Rich Camacho
Jennifer Tenczar
George Burnham
Spencer Colby
Ken Yu
Ken Colling
Patricia Scott
Hilary Kenops
Anne Jensen
Nelson Quong
Lesley Jacobs
Nicholas Blenkush

The following will be starting later in the day, to allow for some of us to come back down and climb back up with them:

Adam Walter 8:50 (Mike’s 9 year old son – so he will go back up with him)
Calvin Hancock 6:55 (PJ’s 13 year old nephew – so he will go back up with him)
Beverly Grant 8:45 (PJ’s girlfriend – looks like a 3rd trip up for PJ – yeah buddy!)

The X Gym/West Coast Labels team did it again though. We took 8 of the top 10 places as well as 1st, 2nd and 3rd for both men and women! Justin won it for the men and Kourtney won it for the women, edging out #1 world ranked stairclimber Kristen Frey by only four seconds, to set the new course record.

For the full race results, go here: https://www.runraceresults.com/Secure/RaceResults.cfm?ID=RCPJ2011

To see the race, the fun and the festivities, check out the video:

If you are a tower runner and would like to study the staircase in real time for your own planning purposes, see this video:

Tim Van Orden was only 9 seconds slower than his best time up this staircase, despite racing in the New England trail running championships – and WINNING the masters division by the way, making him the state champ. Then he ran from that finish line to his car, drove an hour to Bennington, hopped back out of his car and ran up the monument (so he missed picture time).

See full results here: http://www.coolrunning.com/results/11/vt/May21_Climbt_set1.shtml

The X Gym women also smoked it with 4 in the top 10, namely Kourtney Dexter, who beat her own course record, Sandra Nunez and Kacie Fisher, all finishing 1st, 2nd and 3rd overall for women. Sheila Klein also made it in the top 10 overall, and I should also mention/brag that she’s 52 years young! Yep, X Gymers don’t seem to age either…

This race always seems to thrash me more than any other. I’m not sure if it’s the steep pitch, the cement stairs, or what, but it’s brutal. I could barely squeak out 16th place overall, but even if I had tied my best time on this course, I still would have only placed 10th. Oh well, I’ll keep plugging away and training for next year.

As you may know, I experiment with a different training routine every race. This makes some of my times slow and some fast, depending on how that experiment went, but this time it was a so-so result. I was about 20 seconds slower than my best, so it obviously didn’t work as well as my experiment two years ago, but now I know, right? I’m asked all the time, “Why don’t you just stick with what you know works?” My answer is, I just can’t help it. Yes, I know what works, and I could train like that for every race, but I’m a scientist and it’s more fun to experiment. Besides, I would get too bored doing the same thing every time. I’ve got ADD.

I was the most happy to have the X Gym team win again, setting a new team course record thanks to Sean, Kevin and Jesse AND the new male and female course records thanks to Sean and Kourtney. It turned out to be another total domination by X Gym with fastest male, fastest female, fastest team and most of the top ten and lots of age group winners to boot. Yep, God really likes us.

I am also proud that we raised over $10,000 as a team! Special thanks to Stacey Mertes, our “poster child” and leukemia survivor, who combined her team from last year with our team this year to focus efforts on raising money for this worthy cause. Her son Logan, was the fastest 6 year old up the tower this year, and her parents Lou and Nicole tore it up in the 60 and 70 age groups! Shirley, our team matriarch, who is 81 years young, also tore it up, just like she did last year.

Special thanks to Andi Barber, who took the reins from the legendary Wilma Comenat this year, as the new head of this massive event. Andi did an amazing job and everything went as smoothly as it could. No race I have participated in is better run than this one and that says a lot, especially since this is the largest climb on the planet with over 8,000 participants, between the firefighter climb, the racers and the non-timed climbers!

For the full list of the 2011 Big Climb results, click here.

Video coming soon!