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Still no word from Thomas Dold. Maybe he didn’t like being called the Stair Master?
No matter. I will not rest until I get a response. I’m starting to realize that simply using the CONTACT portion of his Web site as a means to get in touch with him may not properly demonstrate just how much I’d like to interview the greatest tower runner of our generation. So, I’ll soon be contacting Dold’s PR firm. Surely, they will understand the magnitude of answering five questions for Anyone Can Enter.
Stay posted. Or, if you’ve got some time to kill, send your own message to Thomas, and encourage him to get in touch with me!
The training continued to reach new heights today on an outdoor set of stairs at Leesville High School.
We climbed 1,000 steps, albeit wind-aided.
Also, I switched deodorant, trading in Old Spice Fresh for Old Spice Pure Sport. You never know what might give you the slightest advantage.
Now, I’m hoping to gain another advantage. It’s time to solicit some advice from a true tower running legend. That’s why I just e-mailed Thomas Dold, the five-time winner of the Empire State Building Run-Up and champion backwards runner. Yes, I said backwards runner.
Only problem is, he’s in Germany and, well, he’s kind of a big deal. Champion tower runners probably don’t have all day to respond to the dozens of interview requests they receive. Then again, I’ve never even tried to interview a tower runner, so maybe this will be easier than I think.
In the mean time, check out the English version of Thomas’ Web site.
Four days after my first stair climbing session, my frazzled calf muscles finally allowed me to resume training today after work. Miraculously, I improved from 20 stories to 50.
Except, I might be counting the steps I ran back down, too.
Regardless, that means that I ran an extra set of 5 stories. After the first two sets, I didn’t think I’d be able to equal Sunday’s effort. My climb was a struggle not only of physical endurance, but also of the fear that I’d fall down the stairs, shrivel into a fetal position, and be discovered by an unsuspecting co-worker tomorrow morning.
But something happened on that third set. Something simple, yet astoundingly crucial.
I remembered to breathe.
I huffed and puffed up the steps on the fourth set. By the fifth set, I was so confident that I actually hoped I’d run into somebody I know—anybody, really—so they could witness this unprecedented display of stairwell athleticism.
Of course, by the time I made it back to the ground floor, hands clenching my knees, I was too wiped out to notice the young woman skipping down the steps from the second floor. When I looked up, I only noticed her tennis racket bag bounding toward me. As I struggled to hold the door open for her, she graciously offered me some consoling words.
“Tennis is a lot more fun,” she said.
Maybe, I thought, but it won’t help me get to the top of the CN Tower.
More training, however, will. That’s why I think it’s nearly time to climb new heights. I need a longer stretch of steps. Whether it’s a taller building or a stadium. If you’ve got any suggestions on where I could go for a taller climb in the Triangle area—or if you know a legal way to get into Carter-Finley Stadium, Keenan Stadium, or Wallace Wade Stadium, leave a comment for me.
Also, I’d like to offer a big thanks to those who have sponsored me in the CN Tower Climb. If you haven’t, there’s still time. It only takes a minute to help save pandas.
In a little less than one month, Carie and I fly to Toronto to participate in what I’m calling my first official event for Anyone Can Enter (sorry, potato decorating contest, you were more like an ill-received appetizer).
In its 20th year, the CN Tower Climb for World Wildlife Foundation-Canada is hardly a secret. Then again, I’d never heard of it until a few months ago when the Empire State Building Run-Up received a fair amount of media attention. Turns out, if there’s a fairly tall building near you, there’s probably a charity hoping you’ll fork over some change to climb it in their name. Considering that the Empire State Building Run-Up was past and that the closet alternative seemed paltry by comparison (Winston-Salem has a 30-story climb), I figured the next best thing was the tallest free-standing structure in the Western hemisphere.
So I decided that October’s CN Tower Stair Climb for United Way would make a perfect event. That would give me plenty of time to train for something I had no business attempting without months of sweat-logged hours on a StairMaster. That was all until Carie looked at my proposed schedule and realized she wouldn’t be able to join me. Why not make it a birthday trip for her, too, and do the WWF climb on April 17, instead?
Secretly, I hoped she’d back off this offer. I even told her to sleep on the idea. After that didn’t work, I made us wait another week. But her persistent habit of scouring travel Web sites for the best airfare deals finally won out.
So here we are, a month before the event, and I’m in no shape to climb a stepladder, let alone 1,776 steps skyward. I was somewhat comforted by the WWF’s claim that it takes most people about 30-40 minutes to walk the Tower’s 144 stories. But if I’m going international for the first official Anyone Can Enter event, I think the Canadians deserve my best. While 4 weeks of training may not be ideal, it’s better than nothing.
The WWF’s Web site suggests that taking the stairs where you work is a great way to kickstart your training. I’m guessing that they’re assuming you work at the CN Tower, because I’ve been taking the stairs at work every day for the past month and walking up the stairs is nothing compared to running. Our first training session was supposed to be a casual series of Sunday morning jogs up the six-story building where I work. But on my fourth climb, I got cocky, all-out sprinting the final two stories. Exhausted, I had to call it quits after climbing less than one-fifth of the equivalent of the CN Tower.
If I can barely feel my legs after running up 20 stories, I hate to think how my calves will react to 144 stories. But at least it’s for a good cause. And even if I have no chance of winning this event, I can still compete in one area of the climb. Only with your help, of course.
The person who raises the most money for the WWF will receive a two-night stay at a swank Toronto hotel and a new digital camera. However, you should know that, currently, the top fundraiser has raised nearly $3,000 (I’m assuming those are Canadian dollars, but the conversion rate was about equal the last time I checked). The good news is that I’ve set a modest goal of $100. I’ve already donated $10 to my cause, which should hopefully cover the cost of my t-shirt and top-of-the-tower bottled water.
So if you love panda bears—or even if you’re just mildly amused by them—please visit my sponsor page and donate a few bucks. Or, if you prefer, do the same for Carie.
The pandas thank you.
For the past week, I’ve gone to bed every night consumed by the same simple question: Have I done everything in my power to create the best decorated potato I possibly can?
Considering that I came up with a possibly unprecedented idea; made three trips to two different grocery stores for a total of 8 potatoes and two six-packs of beer; made two trips to Lowe’s for spray paint and epoxy; went on one nearly endless scavenger hunt for an elusive toy needed to finish it off; and poured in countless hours to the effort, I can honestly say that, yes, I did everything I could. Actually, much more.
Unfortunately, a panel of unnamed judges didn’t see it the same way. My potato car didn’t place in Big Boss Brewing Company’s St. Patrick’s Day Potato Decorating Contest.
I suppose I should back up and explain how this obsession began.
Last week, I learned about the contest in an e-mail blast from Big Boss. There were no rules, just this direction:
Carve-up, dress-up and display your spud for all to see. Best potatoes should show an original concept and celebrate the season and of course beer! Deliver your fancy potato to Big Boss Brewing by March 16th. Potatoes will be judged overnight and prizes will be awarded on Wednesday the 17th.
After a short brainstorming session, I settled on the potato car. A quick Google image search confirmed what I’d hoped. My idea had possibly never been done before. After numerous iterations that rendered potato cars looking nothing at all like a potato on wheels, I settled on my final solution: one large russet potato spray-painted green with a white Big Boss logo stenciled atop the spud, accompanied by wheels ripped off a toy school bus with Big Boss bottle caps as hub caps. Bottle caps, I should add, that I had to carefully pry off the bottles with needle nose pliers, rather than a bottle opener, to avoid bending the top of the caps.
After turning in my potato car on Tuesday night and checking out a few of the other entries, I have to admit that I felt pretty good about my chances. Honestly, I felt great.
So as Carie and I walked the rickety steps to the brewery’s tap room tonight, my heart was racing. And then I saw it. Behind the bar, the verdict had come down. First, second, and third place ribbons adorned three potatoes. None of them mine.
The first and second place spuds were worthy victors. The first place winner showed a potato drinking a beer next to a coffin full of French fries with the title “Irish wake.” Second place, while not as clever an idea as the Irish wake (or a potato car!) was an elaborate spectacle of beer and potatoes. But the third place winner must have bribed a judge. There’s no other way to explain how an entry with a barely decorated potato and absence of a beer theme could win. Clearly, these weren’t sanctioned judges.
After seeing the results, I froze. For the next 20 minutes, we sipped our beers, dejected. The following retaliations were discussed:
-Creating a diversion to steal back my potato car
-Throwing our beers at the third-place potato
-Getting a potato gun and returning to Big Boss for a potato gun, drive-by style rampage
Of course, I remembered the words I typed in my first entry last night: Anyone Can Enter isn’t about having the fastest time, winning the most prizes, or striking it rich. It’s about having fun and trying something new, if only for the sake of trying.
That’s all still true. But it says nothing of totally getting robbed! And quite honestly, this might have been the only Anyone Can Enter event that I can actually win!
Fortunately, I know a great way to turn my frustration into motivation.
There’s a potato festival in Elizabeth City in May. It just happens that they hold a potato peeling contest.
I’ll be entering, and those potatoes are going to get it.
The view from Cooper’s Hill is worth every inch of the steep crawl to its peak, rewarding climbers with a spectacular panorama of a sleepy English countryside dotted by farmhouses.
That’s assuming you’re not sandwiched between a drunk Australian dressed up like a sumo wrestler and a kilt-wearing Scotsman on the UK’s first bank holiday in May, preoccupied by the haunting vision of your ankles snapping in a chaotic race against an enormous wheel of cheese.
Lucky for me, I managed to survive the 2006 Cheese Rolling by sliding down mostly on my tush, soiling my Levi’s to such extremes that I later packed them in our motel wastebasket rather than my suitcase. With my strategy in place—a combination of cautious sliding and hesitant somersaulting that I’d call smart but my lovely wife still calls wimpish—I never had a chance of wrapping my grass-stained mitts around the 7-pound wheel of Double Gloucester cheese awarded to the winner. I had something much better, after all—one of the most memorable weekends of my life and a newfound respect for aged dairy products.
Given my Cheese Rolling experience, it should come as no surprise that I was disappointed to learn this week that the event will likely be cancelled this year. Then again, it seems fitting that it’s in the news. Starting and maintaining this blog is the realization of a dream born on that old hill. A dream to force myself into awkward situations I’d never experience if I’d stayed at home and watched a Family Guy marathon instead. A dream to publicly humiliate myself on a regular basis. A dream to chase the cheese, no matter how stupid it might seem.
It’s a dream that for too long has been tucked away in the back of my mind, something I occasionally pull out at parties or mention in passing as that one great idea that got away. But that ends today. Starting this blog is my affirmation, my promise to myself and the blogosphere that this idea will no longer sit idly in the dusty recesses of my brain.
If you’ve ever run with the bulls, competed in a bratwurst-eating competition, represented your country in the Nude Olympics, or just been fascinated by someone’s motivation to throw himself down a hill in the name of cheese, consider Anyone Can Enter your new home for stories and personal accounts about some of the strangest, quirkiest, and ridiculous competitions that allow anyone to enter. My mission will be to compete in one event each month and chronicle every step of the way right here.
Sure, I have delusions of grandeur just like anybody else would. In my wildest dreams, Anyone Can Enter becomes a hub for anyone who’s ever dreamt of winning a wheel of cheese and ruining a fine pair of slacks in the same day. And, yes, it would be incredibly awesome if this spawns a book deal, a TV show, a movie, and a Jon Page action figure that accompanies your kid’s McDonald’s Happy Meal.
But, Mom, if you’re the only one still reading this, so be it. Anyone Can Enter isn’t about having the fastest time, winning the most prizes, or striking it rich. It’s about having fun and trying something new, if only for the sake of trying.
For me, it’s also about living a better lifestyle. On April 6, 2011, I’ll turn 30. I’d like to do it a bit faster, stronger, and about 20 pounds lighter. To help me get there, I’ll be adding some normal races into my routine and I’m shooting to run a marathon sometime near my birthday next year. I should probably mention more about how I haven’t gone for a run of 3 miles or longer in about six years, but I’ll save that for another post. We’re talking baby steps here. In fact, my first event—a potato decorating contest at Big Boss Brewing Company in Raleigh—required no athletic aptitude. Next month’s CN Tower Stair Climb in Toronto, however, is sure to kick my butt. Again, more on that later.
In the future, also look out for posts in which I track down former winners of the events I’m entering. I’ll need their advice to guide me through the early rounds of the National Hollerin’ Contest and coach me on how to finish the Krispy Kreme Challenge without regurgitated doughnut glaze on my running shoes.
Along the way, maybe I’ll inspire you to chase a silly dream of yours, too. Either way, it should be a fun ride.
