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On Top of the World
Exclusive Interview by Robert Yehling

Sometimes, you wake up and know it's going to be an awesome day. Here's what my sleep-encrusted eyes focused on when I checked my email the morning of May 25, 2001:

It happened late night U.S. time, when most of America was fast asleep. Erik Weihenmayer, a 32-year-old blind mountaineer from Golden, Colorado, and 18 members of his team, including 8 sherpas, stood on top of the world at mid-morning Nepal-time, at 29,035' on Mount Everest (www.2001everest.com).

My God. Does the human spirit know any limits? I spent the day sifting through all of the great sports feats and achievements I could think of. I drew a single conclusion: Maybe someone, somewhere along the line has matched Erik's summit of Everest - Lance Armstrong's recovery from near-fatal cancer to win his first Tour de France comes to mind - but you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who topped it. Squeaking through the ever-shifting Khumbu Ice fields - blind? Yo-yoing up and down from Camps 1, 2 and 3 to base camp, then going lower to get some air, then going back up through the Death Zone of Camp 4 and South Col - without seeing? Passing the razor-thin ridge trail and climbing up Hillary's Step, racing the clock before Everest tried to throw you off her face with a snow hurricane - minus your sight?

If Erik Weihenmayer (www.touchthetop.com) isn't Sports Illustrated's Sportsman of the Year or a candidate for Time's Man of the Year, something's wrong. He put the dreams of all blind and handicapped people on his back and summited a mountain that turns away 90 percent of its visitors and claims its share of lives every year. Maybe the most dangerous part of the journey came afterward. The Weihenmayer entourage almost didn't get out of Kathmandu to return home, due to the unrest following the shooting of Nepal's King Birendra and the Royal Family.

Summiting is nothing new for Erik: He's now 5/7ths of the way to standing atop every continent in the world. He's seen North America, South America, Africa, Antarctica and now, Asia. He and his wife, Ellie, got married during his ascent of Mt. Kilimanjaro.

I spoke with Erik two days before he left his Colorado home for Kathmandu. The conversation was poignant and revealing, showing a man whose excitement for climbing Mt. Everest was running in equal parts with his anxiety.

Robert Yehling: What type of training, if any, is left to do when you get to Kathmandu?
Erik Weihenmayer: The training's pretty much over. We're getting over to Kathmandu and taking care of the last minute things, like setting up tents on the roof of a building, making sure we have the right guy wires, things like that. We want to get out of Kathmandu as fast as possible and fly helicopters into Lukla. That's at about 8,500 feet, and we'll hike from there to Everest Base Camp. These are usually quite pleasant days, like hiking in Vail, although the trails can be a little rocky. We're going to be climbing up to 2,000 feet per day; it takes nine days to get to base camp.

Robert: You've been in altitude before, summiting a 23,000-foot peak in the Andes and Mt. McKinley in Alaska, but never into the Death Zone - above 26,000 feet. How do you prepare for such extreme altitude?
Erik: Last year, we spent eight days on 20,500-foot Omalabarb in the Himalayas. We felt pretty good at 20,000. I've been to 23,000, but never higher. How I perform above 8,000 meters (25,000 feet) is a mystery to me. You can't train for that altitude; you try to insure a VO2 max and make sure the fitness is there. I've been running foothills in Golden, in the Rockies - 1,000 and 2,000 foot mountains. I've also been spending long days on the mountain, 10-15 hour days in the winter, sometimes hiking over a big snowfield, finding intermittent scree, boulder fields, snowfields. These long days are what I call excessive moderation.

Up on the mountain, you feel like you have a huge pack on your back and are suffocating. There's a correlation between that and being at a high VO2 max. So I've been trying to run and get my heart rate really high; my VO2 max is 80 percent of 190, so 150.

Robert: You went completely blind at 13 after years of slow deterioriation of your eyesight from a congenital condition.
Erik: That's correct.

Robert: What I'm wondering is, did you ever see pictures of Everest in elementary school geography books before you lost your sight?
Erik: No, and I'm glad (laughs). It might have scared me too much! But in a mountaineering store in Colorado, they have a plaster sculpture of Everest. I put my hands to it and felt the contours, and all of the routes to the summit - including the one we're going up. I was wondering when my hand would stop going up the wall!

Robert: What have your mountaineering friends and colleagues who have summited Everest told you about the mountain?
Erik: From what I've been told, Everest is like climbing up a black-diamond ski slope for a month. Some parts of the mountain are 50-degree angles or more, so you're leaning into the face. It's a matter of being steady on your feet, because there are sometimes thousands of feet drops on either side.

I think the trickiest parts for me will be the Khumbu Ice Fields, because it's an ice field and boulder field. Also the Hillary Step, which is about 40 feet of vertical rock climbing, and then on Summit Day coming down. I have two long trekking poles, these cool long poles. They extend to the top of my nose on descents so I can feel what's below me, snow or rocks. The help to give me more balance.

Robert: In your book, "Touch The Top Of The World," (www.touchthetop.com), you clearly spell out the essential role of your teammates. However, one thing that really impressed me is how you are not carried along with any degree of special treatment; you're building ice shelters and dragging heavy packs like everyone else.
Erik: I hate the idea that anyone has to drag me along.

Robert: How are they most valuable to you in a way that differs from the needs of a sighted person?
Erik: I work pretty closely with my teammates, but there's not a lot of talking. A teammate will hike in front of me and call out terrain changes, like "Cliff to the right;" or "Boulder to the left." We have our own little language of terms that we use. Someone might call out "Serpentine," and I know it's a trail that weaves to the left and right. If there's a rock in the trail, they call out "Iceberg." If the trail is really narrow, it's a "Goat Trail."

My teammates might talk to me like three times in 20 minutes. If they can be oriented enough for a word or two when we summit, we'll be fine. I could hike along with no talking; I've hiked with my teammates saying nothing, using only a bell. They don't have to talk; I just have to have two climbers who aren't disoriented.

Robert: It helps that you're such a skilled technical climber.
Erik: I've done rock climbing above 20,000 feet, I've done El Capitan, big ice fields. My technical skills are beyond what people usually bring with them to Everest, which is really useful.

Robert: Still, with all the preparation, summiting Everest often comes down to one thing - how moody Everest is on summit day.
Erik: There's complete truth to the thought that preparation meets opportunity. It is completely true on a mountain. You've got to be ready when you have that window, and you've gotta move. If you're ready on that beautiful day, you'll summit.

Robert: Do you have a set timetable for making the final ascent up the mountain from Base Camp to the top?
Erik: I think we're looking at four days - one day from Base Camp to Camp 2; then one day from 2 to 3; then a day from 3 to 4; then a day to summit and come back down. I've heard of people spending three days at South Col. Because you get weaker with time, you don't want to hang out there.

Robert: I'm sure you're aware what's going to happen if you summit Everest. You're already pretty well-known, but you're going to become a full-fledged celebrity and inspiration to others, just as Lance Armstrong did when he conquered cancer and won the Tour de France the first time.
Erik: I try not to think about the awesomeness of the achievement, because if I do, I get really nervous. I look at it as something I'm going to do, efficiently. I know what to do, so you just go and do it. I try not to let fear and nerves get in the way.

Robert: A lot of people would find it strange that a blind man's passion is scaling the highest peaks of all seven continents, yet, you have spoken a great deal about the inner joy and meaning of meeting the top of a mountain.
Erik: First of all, the idea that people say they climb a mountain because there's a great view at the top is a sort of cop-out: Why not save the trouble and just look at a picture of the view? Lots of times, when you summit, you're looking into a sea of clouds. You don't suffer on a mountain for two months for the view.

For me, it's the sense of going through an incredible process, where every element of life is pushed together into one experience. You have fun with your friends, you're tired, you're miserable, then one day I'll take my glove off and touch a rock, or columns of ice … all of the frustration and exhilaration is pushed into one thing.

I remember one day at Mt. McKinley, we were going from 14,000 to 16,000 feet, where the real climbing begins; it's 55 degrees (pitch) at its steepest. I didn't get into a rhythm the whole day. I was sucking wind, my pack weighed 60 pounds, the weather turned bad, and I was miserable. We stopped in a snow cave, and we were barking at each other. I thought I couldn't take it any longer. Then someone told me to poke my head out of the snow cave. The first thing I felt was sun on my face. It was 11 p.m., during the time of year when the sun doesn't go down in Alaska. The guys were describing the view, the Alpen glow on these mountains; it was very inspiring and helped us to push ahead.

Then there's the sense of what I call the internal moment. I love the feeling when my body gets into rhythm on a rock face where you're reaching, stepping, moving, with the wind in your face. It's totally incredible, beautiful when you're moving up a mountain or problem-solving a rock face.

Robert: Plus, it's not a competitive sport; after all, how do you compete with a huge mass of earth with its own weather patterns, moods, shifting surfaces and tales of woe?
Erik: It's not a sport where if you win, someone has to lose. I wrestled in high school and college, and never could get over the fact that for me to beat that opponent, I had to make him lose. On the mountain, you all work together. You're not competing with the mountain; you're working with its rules. If a high wind comes, you sit in the tent. If you're not acclimated, you sit tight; if you don't, you get spanked. You're competing only with yourself.

Robert: What aspect of the mountain climbing experience offers you the greatest satisfaction of overcoming the obstacles of being blind?
Erik: For me, being a part of a climbing team, when people don't see me as blind but as a part of the team who will help them out … well, that is an honor. I'll carry weight on my back, set up a tent, build snowwalls, do what I can to help the team. I'm not the token blind guy making the trip, believe me.

You know, 70 percent of able-bodied blind people in this country are unemployed; there's a problem with that. I want to help shatter these perceptions.