Walking4Air

I am going to be a lab rat!

I have never really ever imagined I would say that although when I lived in the UK I did toy with the idea of signing up to one of the new crazy experiments some mad scientist or professor was about to embark on.

Now I’m going to get the chance to do it at the Cape Town University of Technology! The Sport Management Department has a state of the art Human Performance Laboratory and our team, through the company we are doing our Aconcagua expedition with, has been approached as people who participate in extreme events like climbing high altitude mountains.

They are going to be doing a series of scientific assessments on us that will measure and assess our physical and lifestyle characteristics as people who participate in high altitude expeditions. We will be tested pre-trek and post-trek with another post-trek assessment 6 months later.

I have never been a lab rat before and the closest I have gotten to any research done in a lab is through my psychology studies I’m currently busy with. I am always studying what others have studied and reading research others have done and now for the first time I’m going to be a participant in one of these studies.

These assessments, which will measure things like our oxygen uptake, leg injuries/weaknesses, stature mass and we’ll be tested on the benefits of antioxidants during exercise, will give us a new way to look at our upcoming climb in a more scientific way.

I’m quite looking forward to being a lab rat and am quite excited to chat to the (nutty) professor about my results and get a firsthand experience of “behind the scenes” research that I am always studying about.

In other news, our flights have been booked and money has paid and it’s official, we’ll be leaving Cape Town on the 4^th January and heading up to Johannesburg for the night and then we’ll be flying out of Johannesburg mid morning 5^th January, heading to Argentina.

One very big mountain is awaiting my very eager feet!