September 26, 2023 - Building The Big List Of Skills

One of the things on my mind as I think about the High Five By 55 project is putting together a list of skills it would be helpful to build before I try running High Five. I'm not sure what needs to be on this list. I have some items I can think of right away, but more wondering about those things I don't know that I don't know. Wondering about those is what will keep me up at night. So, I'll try to figure out what those unknown unknowns are over the next several years. And I'll get started by putting together my Big List Of Skills that I want to or need to develop.

The list so far:

- Wilderness safety - my thought is to take a NOLS Wilderness Safety course. Unfortunately, those are not really offered locally, so I'll have to do this during some travel

- Understanding rock quality - for the two class 3 climbs, I think it would be helpful to be able to identify between good rock and rotten, crumbly rock

- Reading the weather - it'd be great to be really strong at determining if an electrical storm was about to break out before heading above tree line

- Navigation - I have a really strong natural sense of direction, and rarely get lost. But I've gotten turned around from time to time in the wilderness. Compass skills and the ability to navigate between mountain ridges and valleys and read trail and contour maps well would be a huge plus for a race with no marked course.

- Sleep - sleep? Yeah, sleep. I'm not one of those people who can sleep anywhere. I don't sleep much, and I don't sleep super heavily. When I've tried to sleep during a race, it's been mostly a failure. Developing the skill to "sleep anywhere" would be really helpful in the event I need a nap during High Five 100.

There are certain to be many other skills that would be helpful or even downright potentially life saving for me to work on in the next decade. I'm maintaining this list and will continue to add onto it as more items come to mind. 

If you can think of anything, I'd love to hear about it from you.

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