Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board record attempt post?

did it get deleted?

Unfortunate, I think the guy was genuine and serious, all while respecting fellow hikers and the Mountain.

On the other hand, Badwater starts in a couple weeks, I've been posting in ultra sites wondering if anyone is attempting the full 'true badwater' experience up to the summit. It is clearly one of the rarest of human acheivments (considering time, of course) but since the permit system, it has probably taken less of an interest. And for most people after having run 135 miles through death valley, you probably don't want to run another 11 miles up 6000ft?

If you search on "cactus2clouds" the thread comes up, but if you try to open it you are told that it no longer exists.

Strange -- it was a pretty harmless thread. There is a discussion of the subject at:
http://www.mt-whitney.info/viewtopic.php?t=634

yes, I was serious. I was only trying to bring honesty back to mountain climbing.

On the site referenced by AlanK, Cactus is quoted as saying "it doesn't make sense to encourage other runners to do an insanely fast descent during the time of year when the trail is really crowded."

I agree. "Insanely fast descents" and "really crowded" trails don't sound like a healthy recipe. But I also hope Cactus isn't just speaking about "other" runners in those situations.

Again, my concern is that safety on the Trail is, and always remains, the paramount goal for everyone sharing the road up there.

my question to them was whether october is typically dry enough to run the trail. if october is dry, then mid-week would be a good time for a runner to go for a record or personal best time without putting others at risk.

if october normally has a couple feet of snow on the 99 switchbacks, then that might explain why there is no record for whitney trail because there's no time during the year when there isn't snow or crowds of people. anybody know the answer?

c2c,
Two years ago I had a perfect running day in mid October up there. I went up the MR and ran down the main trail. Very few people and the few that I saw were more than happy to let me pass on my way down.

So, cactus2clouds, do you have a real name and what makes it so clear to all of the rest of us that you are honest and true while the rest of us are either liars or impediments to your progress on the trail? You have a peculiar way of soliciting help from others, don't you know.

Just so you know, you can do just fine in late September or early October in mid week. You'll not have more than a handful of people to pass and most of the time there will be plenty of room if you just ask people to let you by. As for how you verify it, you can do the GPS log or maybe you can do as others suggest and get people to sign time cards for you, but, hey, even if you do it in 4:30 or so, lots of people will say you're a liar too!!! Back in 95 I encountered a man of about 40 who was running the same deal and I spoke with him at Outpost Camp while he was descending. he told me he was 3:45 into a round trip, lived at Mammoth Lakes year round and ran regularly up there. Conversation lasted about 20 seconds while he drank some water. True or not, it seemed plausible at the time; he was fast.

So, in the end do it for your own pleasure. Who's going to be impressed anyhow? I saw on the other forum where you referred to people on this forum as a "rude and feisty bunch, probably jealous", but that might not have been the case had you not come across so arrogantly. "Pride goeth before the fall".

Adrian

i wasn't literally referring to every single person on this board. it was just that i wasn't welcomed on this message board in the beginning. people have a tendency to jump to conclusions. my mistake was not explaining where i was coming from, having read a lot of controversies on mountainspeedclimbing.org and later on cascadeclimbers.com

i made the mistake of thinking that hikers are different than most people. i thought that hikers don't need lengthy explanations or introductions, just ask a simple question and get a simple answer. i was wrong.

It sounds like I should explain this a little more, since people still seem to be upset at me. If you go to those two sites there is quite a lot of arguments on both sites and some very viscious personal attacks on cascadeclimbers.com about the rainier records a couple guys claimed. Anything on this message board is really mild in comparison. On that board, anything goes. I want to avoid all that.

Now you might think, just don't tell anybody, keep it to yourself and just run! Okay, but how many of you on this message board climb Whitney and don't tell any of your friends? Fair question. We all like to share our accomplishments with friends. How many of you keep quiet about your times up Whitney, especially if you did it faster than average? Honestly now. I hear people talk about their times all the time, I see them posted on the Internet. We all have some pride, otherwise Whitney wouldn't be so popular. How popular would Whitney be if it was only 14,200 feet? Yes, it's beautiful, yes it's an amazing experience, but lets imagine that the tallest sierra mountain was only 14,200 feet, then White Mountain at 14,246 feet would be the tallest peak in California. The foot traffic would be crazy even though it's just a boring dirt road to the top. Imagine if an earthquake caused shifting along fault lines and lifted White Mountain to 14,500 feet... It would be the tallest in the continental US! People from all over the world would want to hike that dirt road. So you see, most people who climb Whitney have a sense of pride for their accomplishment, and they like to tell others about what they did. This is a good thing. Fulfilling a dream goal is a much better way to build self-esteem than just slamming on other people, like little kids on a playground. It's not my goal to take away from anybody else's sense of accomplishment, and I can't! As Eleanor Roosevelt once said, "No one can make you feel inferior without your permission." For some people, Whitney takes two days. They would have much difficulty trying to do the whole thing on a day hike permit. But they still do it, and they get to experience the mountain at night. The day hikers can't take that away from them. They are proud to climb Whitney and don't care how long it takes.

And just to clarify, I'm not an eliteist, and I have friends of all sorts of backgrounds and interests. I try not to judge other people for who they are or what they do. Racing is fun. Some people run faster than me, some people slower, okay. Some people do riskier things than me, like motocross racers or Olympic downhill skiers. Other people are not so adventurous and get excited about playing bingo or slot machines. Some people hike slow and enjoy the scenery. Some people try to see how fast they can run it. As long as your happy and enjoy what you're doing, that's what really matters. It sounds like everyone can agree on that.

In response to Adrian. I have to say that if C2C makes it up and down in 4:30 and has some reasonable proof of this accomplishment, I WILL be impressed.

Let's face it any "proof" can be manufactured and at some point you have to take a persons word that they did not do so. But if he took a camera that records the time on the picture and took pictures of various landmarks on the way up and down, that would do it for me.

C2C --
Nice post. I'll be cursing you as you run by me!
(While i suck air)

Regardless of everyone's options on this matter, if the discussion is keep fair and clean, I thought this is what forums like this are for.

octtober is a perfect time to go I will be there oct.6,7,8 went last year at that time It was great.. I will time you 4 or 5 hrs. out of my time is no problem...mark