Per Aspera Ad Astra

I see, yeah. Here are my initial thoughts about that... Going without a guide would be an incredibly bad idea, so if you're sure you want to run it, you'll need to find an extremely fit guide that can keep up. If you don't bring a guide, you might die. People have tried and died. I saw marked spots where people died on the mountain. This isn't Everest, but it's not Utah. I gained a lot of humility on this mountain. On day 1 and 2, I was making a lot of jokes about going "haraka haraka" (fast) instead of "pole pole" (slow), as all the guides recommend, but I was a lot quieter by the time we reached Lava Tower on day 3. :)

The altitude is going to be a much bigger factor than you might expect. Living here in UT and having been above 3000 meters ~100 times in the last year, I expected to be totally fine, but I still had somewhat of a rough time above 4000 meters, and a very rough time above 5000 meters. If I hadn't had the several days of acclimatization, I would have been in bad shape by the summit, despite very ample red blood cells (hct of 49). Going in, I wanted to do it slightly faster than average now (6 days), and then come back in the future and really go after a fast time, but even with a lot of trail running experience, I've totally lost the interest in doing this fast. I think it's better to do it reasonably and appreciate it, unless you have Kilian Jornet super powers. Doing it fast will be an extreme suffer fest for the vast majority of people, and at least for me, I really doubt I could hack it.

No matter what, unless your VO2 max is really insane, you're just not going to be running above Barafu. It's really steep, really rugged, and REALLY high. My summiting pace above Barafu Camp (15400') was literally 2 hours per mile, and only 2 groups (both of whom left before us) beat us up to the top despite what sounds like an absurdly slow pace. Breathing was quite hard even at that pace, the air was FREEZING, and the thought actually crossed my mind that if I fell asleep due to fatigue and lack of sleep (we were summiting at night), I'd probably die without help.

I don't mean to scare you off of climbing Kili, because it was possibly the coolest experience of my entire life, but it's not just some trail that you can easily run like in a typical 100 miler, in which anyone can very easily finish with the right level of grit and a moderate fitness level. Mentally speaking, my 100 mile finishes from my ultra days were all easier than climbing Kili in the 24:10 total climbing time I put in from Machame gate.

Now, if you're really confident that you can perform well at extreme altitudes and don't struggle to put down enough calories really high up (I have a weak stomach, so that was a big factor in why I struggled at super high altitude), you can probably run it faster than I'd ever be able to, but you'll probably want no-one other than Simon Mtuy as a guide (he has run up and down in under 9 hours). It would also be 100% necessary to acclimatize beforehand, so you'll probably want to figure out a way to get up to Barafu and camp for a day or two before coming down and trying it again. You'll want to do the Umbwe Route via Baranco/Karanga/Barafu. Going up the Western Breach via Umbwe is faster, but everyone without a death wish stays away, as it's extremely unstable with the melting glacier.

If you want to do it a little slower than all out - and I should reiterate that I firmly believe that even we fit Utah folk are woefully underprepared for super fast Kili ascents, so doing something moderate would be much smarter - my lead guide Emmanuel Alfred (a 2:44 marathoner at Nairobi, which is at 5500' and far from flat) was absolutely awesome and is capable of doing it quite quickly, even if not quite in record speed. He led someone up and down Marangu/Mweka in 31 hours a few years ago and loves a challenge, so I'd happily get you his info.

With all this in mind, I really would strongly recommend doing it in some capacity. Until I get all of the photos up here, check out the 180 or so that I posted on facebook. Making the summit minutes before sunrise and watching the sun come up from 5895 meters was truly a unique experience that I wouldn't trade for anything.

Per Aspera Ad Astra

April 19, 2024