Climbing UAlbany for the American Lung Association
This morning bright and early the Pure Adapt team participated in the annual “Climb UAlbany” event for the American Lung Association. Each of us raised money in sponsorships to climb the 22 story Colonial Quad at the University of Albany. Our team was formed by our kickass lawyer David Green, and the ten of us that participated on the team were able to raise over $1,000 to benefit the ALA of New York State. According to the website, the total raised was $27,531!
We originally planned on walking the stairs, but the competitiveness in us kicked in and we decided to race them. Our exact times aren’t posted yet, but I think we all finished in under 5 minutes. I sprinted the first 15 flights and then hit a brick wall and walked the rest…I’m not a huge cardio guy - most of my time at the gym is spent lifting - so it showed in my conditioning. Mike, who is in fantastic all-around shape, walked a few laps with me and then sprinted the last few.
George took a great photo of all of us after the event, but he can’t seem to find it on his computer so you’ll have to take my word for it that we all participated. We were all given shirts and medals: Greg plans on rocking his medal for the next few weeks (we worked together after the event and ran a few errands, Greg had the medal hanging from his neck everywhere we went…you could tell people were wondering why some dude was walking around stores with a medal hanging from his neck…freaking hilarious).
A couple of random thoughts:
- You would be SHOCKED at how many people are in horrible shape. Seriously, if you walked at a normal speed you would do 22 flights in about 8 - 10 minutes and wouldn’t be very fatigued at all. By the time I was at about the 5th floor I saw tons of (mostly overweight) people pulled over on the side struggling and contemplating whether or not they could finish. I spend a lot of my time around people who place a high emphasis on health and fitness, so I’m always a bit taken back by how much some people neglect their own health. Not to get all political on you, but to a large degree I see a simple solution to our health care problems: eat right, exercise, and sleep. Cancer rates would go down, type II diabetes would go away, and our reliance on expensive drugs with horrible side-effects would be eliminated. I’ve always felt this way, but sometimes I forget how bad it is because I don’t see it.
- A few days ago it was almost 60 degrees outside and I went to the gym in just a shirt and shorts. Yesterday and today it snowed and was cold as shit. So is life in upstate NY. Unfortunately, whomever planned this event must have thought that at 8 AM it would be 75 degrees out and not 20 and windy/icy, because we spent about thirty minutes outside reviewing the rules and stretching as a group as we all froze our asses off. My bald head can’t take the blistering cold for that long.
- The event was horribly unorganized and inefficient. For example, it took Greg 30 seconds to register and the rest of us about 30 minutes. Why? His last name - Pautler - falls under the N - Z category. The rest of us, along with about 90% of the people there, had to wait in the ridiculously long A - M line.
- And yet we all were there for less than 2 hours and freaking $27k+ was raised for charity. How cool is that?
- This all led us to conclude that we would absolutely kick ass at organizing charitable events. We have some cool stuff going on with Tastefully Driven’s “Commerce with Conscience” program (more to come soon) and I think this will become and increasingly important focus for us as we grow.
On March 29th, 2008 at 11:16 pm
Hey Adam,
Thank you. Thanks for being a part of something so positive and helping to raise money for a real cause — that totally rocks! You guys should totally organize a charity event, that would be great! Keep up the greatness
best,
D
On March 31st, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Adam,
It is very inspiring that you guys take time for such a great cause. If everyone had the mind set you guys did the world would be a better place.
But on another note I think that this post is almost contradictory with the carpooling post you had a few days. I found that post really interesting and liked how you broke everything down. Anyways, the 10 of you guys raised around $1000. Which is terrific, I’m not knocking that at all. But you guys were there for about 2 hours right? And I’m guessing along the line you each spent about 1-2 hours each on top of those 2 hours finding sponsors, planning for the event, etc. Plus you all had to drive to and from the event. Finally you all also sacrificed time at work to participate. You said in the carpooling post that your time is worth well over 19 dollars an hour. Well if each of you spent 3.5 hrs (average) on this event, that is 35 hours total for the group and you raised $1000, that would put your hourly worth at about $28.50. That is not considering the cost of gas and vehicle deprectiation, etc that you got into or the opportunity loss of the time you could have been working and making money. (Or the fact that at least one is a lawyer and his time is worth MUCH more.)
So I guess the way you have got us thinking it almost would have made more sense for you guys to just donate the money out of pocket and stay at work?
Just some food for thought, I know there’s more to it than just the money.
On April 1st, 2008 at 7:40 am
Hi Regular Reader,
Great comment: yes, you are definitely correct. That’s kind of what I was getting at when I mentioned how inefficient and poorly planned the event was. All in all, I probably spent 3 hours and raised $100, so from a pure cost break down it was the exact same thing as car pooling.
The way I differentiate (besides the whole fact that it was for charity) is that it was a one-time thing, not a regular occurrence. If we were doing this every weekend, I would find a way to make it worth my time or I would just scratch a check.
Thanks for reading,
Adam