Couch to Kili: A Layman’s Experience Training with MTI

By Kevin Burnett, Contributiing Writer

I enjoy climbing mountains. I like being at the tallest point. I appreciate the accomplishment of reaching goals. I just usually don’t like the hard work leading up to and enabling summiting!

Back in late 2023, an itch to climb Kilimanjaro with some buddies hit me. We’ve climbed many of the high points in the US. This seemed like a feasible next step.

My daily routines, though, were non-existent. I’d trained for mountains before and would get off my butt to get ready for those. But Kili was different. I’d been to 14,500’ before. Kilimanjaro is almost a mile higher. And it was a week-long trip, nearly twice as long as any hike I’d previously done. Kilimanjaro is not truly glaciated anymore, but still figured Rainier was the closest thing I could compare it to. I’d attempted Rainier twice. And I’d failed both times. I wasn’t thrilled with the possibilities.

The last real athletic training I did was when I was in middle school for football. Six knee surgeries and 15 years of a sedentary occupation later, I weighed nearly 290 pounds with a 6’4” frame. I didn’t want to waste this opportunity, and I didn’t want to fail again. Time to train.

I started to get moving. My first step was just to get some kind of routine going. The heaviest weight at the gym is the front door, right? My knees were the weakest part of me, and I wanted to strengthen them. My wife is a PT and she could monitor my form in my exercises to make sure I didn’t exacerbate any problems. I started step aerobics three times a week 8 months before the climb. Would that get me ready for Kilimanjaro? Not sure. But it was a start. My motto was “just do something.”

After two months, I increased the step height from four to six inches. That was tough for me, but I told myself to just keep going. Another month, another two inches. I would often have to stop during the workout to catch my breath, but then I was back at it.

I finished the fourth month of my step aerobics and figured I was probably making good progress for Kili. But I didn’t have a clue what I really needed, and I wanted to compare myself to some measure. I’d was aware of MTI,and had even used some of the programs half-heartedly, so I checked if there was a Kilimanjaro training program. Of course there was! I checked the sample training plan, the first week of the five-week program.

Day 1 – do 500 step-ups with a 25# pack on a 15-18” step. “Are you kidding me?! How in the world was I supposed to do that?!” Day 2 – leg blasters…”oh no.” If this was the start of the training programs, the very basic and easiest stuff, I knew two things: 1) step aerobics did less to get me physically ready for Kili than I’d hoped, and 2) I was nowhere near where I needed to be for this mountain. Ok, game time. Let’s do this.

I bought the MTI 5-week Kilimanjaro training program and started planning. I had seen an MTI Beta email before where someone mentioned how they couldn’t do the full or mini leg blasters, so they did micro leg blasters. I didn’t think I could even do those, especially with my knees! I needed to start elsewhere. How about nano leg blasters? That might work.

That led to the creation of a plan. I reviewed the 5-week Kilimanjaro training program and knew I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t even do half of what it required. But I could do a quarter of it. To start, I’d do the 5-week plan by doing a quarter of what was asked. The routine would probably wreck me, so I’d take a week off, then do the program again at half of what was asked. I’d take one last week off before the final push of the full plan. Then I’d climb.

I didn’t even have the 25# pack recommended, but I started the first day doing 125 step-ups. Ouch. The nano leg blasters on day 2 hurt. And then I had to run ¾ of a mile? I hated running and avoided it for any and every reason. I was built for power, not endurance! But the plan said run, so I ran. Day 3 was a bit of a “rest day” because of the ruck, and, somehow, I could do a 4 mph pace with less effort than running required. My toddler son would be my rucksack and my ruck ability gave me a slight confidence booster (how did I suck this badly at everything else?).

I didn’t immediately know it at the time, but the training for and climbing the mountain were as much for me as for my son. I wanted to set a good example for him. I wanted him to see challenges and conquer them. I wanted him to know Daddy wasn’t a quitter, and neither should he be. I wanted him to know perseverance, to know that even when he thought he couldn’t keep going, he could. I would show him through what I did, so he came with me on my rucks and saw me in our garage gym. Rucks were good days.

And then the step-ups would come the next day. Every day was harder than the last. There was no relief of doing what was done the previous day to “get good at it”. Each day was harder. You did how many step-ups before? Good – do more today. You ran how far before? Good – run farther today. You did how many leg blasters before? Good – do more today. I was too slow and couldn’t come close to the recommended workout completion time. I sometimes took longer doing a quarter of what was asked than the time recommended for the full workout! But I told myself, “just keep going.”

This continued for 17 weeks. I live at 4,000’ in a place where there are no gyms, no exercise equipment stores, and no one else to train with. Later, in the final five weeks of the program, I would get some more elevation, but now was not the time for excuses. My wife made me a backpack I could strap to my waist and I put water bottles and cans in. My 30# son and his nearly-outgrown backpack carrier became my rucking backpack. We got some old duffles and made some sand bags. It didn’t matter the quality – just keep going.

A few weeks before the trip, my family and I made a long international flight back to the US. The night we arrived, while my family slept and started getting over jetlag, I rucked 8 miles in the dark. Later, we took a vacation to the mountains. There, I did long rucks, ran the winding back roads of the mountain community, and did step-ups on the retaining wall of the local volunteer fire department building. I tried not to miss a day of training.

The date of the climb drew nearer and I didn’t know how I felt. My phrase was, “I don’t know if I can climb Kili, but I will.” I couldn’t run as fast as I could ruck, the step-ups wiped me, and I took too much rest between the leg blasters and sandbag getups, but I told myself to just keep going. “I’m going to climb this mountain.”

From previous experience, I wasn’t too worried about making it to the top. I knew if I could go slow enough, I could do that. On guided climbs, though, you often can’t set the pace, so that was a concern. But that concern was minute compared to my fears on how I’d feel coming down. My knees had never held up and I usually could not walk after long descents. The 14,000’ descent on Kili in less than 24 hours was going to…hurt. But I decided to trust the training process. The time to leave arrived before I knew it.

My buddies and I flew to Tanzania and started the climb. Day 1 was a climb from 5,400’ up to 10,000’. It was a nice climb and nothing out of the ordinary based on previous climbs. Day 2 was up to 12,000’ – a nice climb and at physically familiar altitudes.

Day 3 took us briefly up to 15,000’ before descending back down to 13,000’. This would be the highest I’d ever been. And, surprisingly, it was with similar difficulty as the other two days. Going down also felt good. Was this a result of the training? Most certainly, but I wasn’t yet sure to what degree. Day 4 was a bit up and down before we went back up to 15,000’ on Day 5. All was well, but the final challenge would be Day 6.

As we started up to the summit, I was apprehensive. But 16,000’ came – no problem. 17,000’ – I’m going to do this. 18,000’ – oh no. The air got thin quickly and we had to intentionally breathe to get enough oxygen to our lungs. Had I followed the time recommendations of the MTI workouts more closely, I might’ve been more ready. I made it to 18,500’ to the Kilimanjaro crater rim, tired and done. My buddies looked over and told me “just keep going”. They even took my day pack to help, to which I minimally objected. But we kept going. It was a struggle, but we pushed onward.

The summit was achieved shortly thereafter. I was at the tallest point on the African continent. We celebrated and took a small rest. And then it was time for more pain. Different pain. Would the leg blasters work? Or would I be limping down the mountain wishing that there would’ve been a Zipline installed so I could escape the excruciation? Only one way to find out.

I had planned an extra day of rest before flying home because I knew the leg pain would be intense, only compounded by decrease in pressure on the plane. Let’s see if a day’s delay would be sufficient or I’d need more. Down, down, down. We made it back down to our 15,000’ camp in 3 hours’ time. “That didn’t hurt terribly,” I thought. “Maybe I’m still on an adrenaline high from the summit?”

We continued after a short rest the remaining 5,000’ to conclude the 18-hour summit day. My knees felt as if nothing had happened. I woke to start Day 7 and…no pain! I got down the last 5,000’ and I could still easily walk. Wow! This was a first for me. I called my wife to let her know I was feeling good and was ready to come home a day earlier!

I know that my successful summit and, more importantly, how well I felt after the climb is thanks to MTI’s training program. It was my coach when I had none. It was my experience to lean on and trust when I didn’t know what I was doing. It gave me the tools I needed to succeed.

Thanks for showing me the path to victory. I developed some healthy patterns in my life, improved my mental discipline, pushed past physical boundaries to get a better understanding of what I was capable of, and started setting an example I want my son to follow.

I look forward to what comes next and how MTI can help me conquer my next climb. Rainier, I’m coming for you!