Stair Climb for Los Angeles

ELEVATORS ARE FOR WIMPS!!!
BACKGROUND:
At 1,005 feet, the US Bank Tower is not just the tallest building in Los Angeles, it’s the tallest building west of the Mississippi. Participants race or walk up 1,679 steps (75 stories) in support of the Ketchum-​Downtown YMCA then take the elevator down to street level where a Block Party awaits, complete with games, live bands, food trucks, and a beer garden.
The best part is that every step you take strengthens the Y’s essential community programs in and around Downtown Los Angeles. Our time-​tested YMCA programs support children, teens, families, and seniors in some of the most under-​resourced neighborhoods in the city.
STATS:
75 Floors/1,679 Steps
Climb as an individual
Climb with a team
ESSENTIALS:
Desire to help the kids of the Ketchum-​Downtown YMCA
In physical/​mental good health
EXPERIENCE:
A couple years ago a co-​worker told me about a fundraiser for the kids of the Ketchum-​Downtown YMCA. Climb for a cause, instead of my own pleasure??? Heck yeah, I’m in!!!
I went to the Stair Climb for Los Angeles website registered, paid the required fee, and checked the training calendar. Training begins early July and ends mid-​September. Although training is not done in the U.S. Bank Building, training sessions do typically take place in buildings in downtown LA in the early evenings, a couple times a week.
Cost effective, with Ketchum YMCA validation is available at City National Bank Garage for both training and the day of the event. Check the website for full event details.
It’s a fundraiser, right?! Social media makes raising money so much easier than the old days of going door-​to-​door. And Ketchum makes it even easier by providing participants a form letter with the Who, What, When, Where, and Why.
The day of the event is literally one big block party with food, a beer garden, games, rock wall climbing, swag and more.
The worst part of climb is waiting to climb. To keep a flow in the stairwell going, there is a schedule, depending on if you’re on a team, or individual, etc… But once at the starting line the heart starts pounding so hard and fast it feels as though it’s going to explore, such an adrenaline rush. The word GO! is the only relief. Upward and onward.
Water handlers pass out water on landings for climbers to grab and go. If you choose to participate, be forewarned, heat rises and by the time you reach the 65^th-​ish floor, the stairwell is a bit stuffy. But reaching the top is oh so amazing. The feeling of accomplishing something to help others, it just doesn’t get any better than that. Oh and the view from the top is real and it’s spectacular.
After a little walking around taking in the view from the tallest building west of the Mississippi and cooling down, Ketchum offers bananas, apples, energy bars, and water on a lower level. After a bit of a rest, elevators await to take you down to the party in the street.
Once on street level again, anticipation sets in, what was my time? Unfortunately the first year I did it I couldn’t stay long enough, as I was heading out to Joshua Tree the next day for a weekend on the rocks. However, times and ranks are posted on their website, so come Monday morning I checked the stats, 16 minutes, 50 seconds. Not bad for a virgin. The following year I slowed down a bit with a time of 17 minutes 52 seconds.
Want a win-​win situation? Mark your calendars for next years Ketchum YMCA Stair climb. A way to help others, while putting yourself through boot camp, granted you take advantage of the training sessions. Since the buildings used for training’s are 40 – 50 floors, best to try to climb them at least twice each session. A slight over-​training makes for an easier climb on event day.
2014 was Ketchum’s 21^st year and is very well organized from the training sessions to the day of the event. Although I was unable to participate in the actual climb this year I did participate through making a donation. I look forward to climbing again next year. Such a great cause and a lot of fun. How about a team Unilocal???

I did the stair climb several years ago and it was one of thr hardest workout I have ever completed! It takes a lot of endurance and focus to finish the entire 75+ flights of stairs. It’s a wonderful feeling once I reached the top!

i have no idea why i did this in retrospect. it’s approximately 15 minutes of pure torture. your legs feel like lead, you can’t breathe, your head is throbbing from the lack of oxygen and you end up coughing up a lung/​runny nose for the entire week after (if you didn’t train like me). stair climbing is NOT comparable to any other sort of exercise except stair climbing… i get it now. in light of all that misery, the Y, staff and volunteers did everything within their power to make the experience as smooth and fun as possible, given the circumstances. the sense of accomplishment (you made it out alive/​did not go to the hospital) at the end and the view of LA from the top was also well worth the climb. above all, its for a good cause! also, i think its 81 floors, not 75, that you have to climb in order to get to the roof…

Walking 75 flights of stairs sounds like a fun challenge, because I’m a masochist like that. It took me 18 minutes and 22 seconds to complete this feat. I learned that I’m out of shape and that I shouldn’t have started by running up because that only lasted for about 5 flights before I was on walking mode.
Overall, I thought the event was well organized and ran smoothly. There was very little confusion. There were starting times on our bibs, but it seems that you don’t have to start at that time. They let one climber up at a time and allowed about 10 seconds between each climber. Everyone was considerate while climbing and would move to the side for others.
The reason for my 4 star rating is the required $ 150 donation to participate. Now, I don’t know about everyone else, but that’s a lot of money for me. From my experience in other cardio events, there is usually a flat registration fee of around $ 30+ and then we ask for donations. With this event, we give them our credit card info when we registered, and then if we don’t raise the $ 150, they take the difference from our account. I ended up putting in at least $ 55 myself, a large sum, if you ask me. I understand that the money goes to a good cause and administration, but that’s still a lot to ask, especially since there were thousands of climbers.

Damn, pure hell! 75 floors of utter tiredness, lungs burning, and constant thinking of can I make it to the top. Well I did in 19 minutes, which is ok time.
From my experience I learned don’t go too fast in the start, because by floor 12 you will be extremely tired, especially since the at gets thinner the higher you go. Also get ready for your lungs to burn!
Make sure if your a slow runner to stay away from the Rail side. Also remember to take a quick photo at the top and eat as much apples and waters they give you!
Would I succumb to this hell again? Yes totally!

Oh Stair Climb. It was a fun experience but something I would never do again.
Parking was a total nightmare. They blocked off most of the entrances so finding out how to get in was annoying. They said it would be $ 3 to park after validation which it was actually $ 7.50.
So I trained leading up to this but you dont get to train in the US Building. The building we trained on only had 52 flights of stairs. The US Building has steeper flights and more steps per flight so it throws you off your game. It starts off on some wide and breezy steps and you think oh this might not be too bad, a couple of flights in the stair well gets narrow and there is no more breeze.
They were supposed to have water stations every 10 flights, but some stations had no more cups (and it didn’t seem like the volunteers were doing much about it or trying to get more they just sat around and stared at everyone — kind of rude). The later it got on the day the less flights had water available which kind of sucked.
Once you got to the top you weren’t allowed to go around the building or near hte edge so you couldn’t really get any good pictures. you were ushered down to another floor where they ahd water and windows you can take pictures out of — i just climbed up 75 flights of stairs. I want to take in the actual view not through a freaking window!
The free beverage in the beer garden was nice. I was told last year they gave everyone a free meal ticket. This year there was only $ 1 off a food truck. Kind of sucks especially since you are required to fundraise/​pay $ 130 just to do the event.
meh. glad to say i knocked this one off the list, but def something I wouldn’t do again

This was a great event for a worthy cause, and as a first time YMCA climber, I can say it was organized beyond my expectations. Climbers have the opportunity to practice twice a week at a neighboring high-​rise to get a feel for commercial staircases (2013 was the PWC office building «Figueroa at Wilshire») — I highly recommend this training as it is fun and as close to the real deal as you can get.
On climb day, Hope St. was shut down for a block party — complete with food trucks, rock climbing, vendor tents, and a bandshell! Climbers are spaced out so the staircase remains pretty open, and when you’re finished, you can enjoy fresh fruit and water, then take the elevator down to the block party!
Compared to other climbs, this one had plenty of water stations and the stair case was well air-​conditioned and not at all stuffy. The YMCA staff who facilitate this event are awesome!

This is a great event to do with some friends or co-​workers. The event is set up pretty well and is pretty organized. The stair climb consists of a little under 1,700 total stairs. They spread out the climbers throughout the afternoon so the stair case is not full of people. If you sign up in a group, you will be able to go with your group and end around the same time. They have water stations pretty frequently, especially as you get higher up in the climb. At the end of the climb, you will get a medal, water, and some fresh fruit.
Don’t worry, you will walk down a couple flights of stairs and then you can take the elevator to the bottom. When you are done, you can enjoy the wine and beer garden, photo booth, and bands playing on the main stage.
Great event, lots of fun!

As a first timer to this and any stair climbing event, I had zero expectations other than to finish!
Overall, it’s a nice alternative to the usual 5K, 10K, or the mud/​obstacle type of charity events around town. You do NOT have to feel like this is only an event for the athletes! So don’t let that dissuade you from considering it.
They space you well enough apart so much so that you can pace yourself accordingly whether you’re a beginner or want to run up to your heart’s content if you’re the competitive/​experienced climber. Once you sign up, there’s a few practice climbs that are organized and open to all registrants. I didn’t take advantage of them because I didn’t want to battle the traffic into DTLA. So I opted to create my own training regimen.
The event organizers who I did interact with in general were pretty pleasant from registration to climb day. For a 4000+ participant event I would’ve expected more volunteers around to ask questions and tell people where to go especially when you have a ton of corporate sponsors. Oh well.
Contrary to what it states on the web site, you can register in person on the day before the event if you didn’t get around to registering in advance online. The «Day Of» signage was less than stellar. More than enough people were confused on where things were (i.e., bag check in) and where to go to start the event. There were tiny 8″ X 10″ maps that were hung in 2 places that weren’t that impressive. For the $ 125 minimum you basically get a T-​shirt like similar events. They give you goodie bags and plenty of water throughout the climb and once you get to the top. The bags were mostly filled with coupons to stuff instead of anything particularly exciting.
Food trucks, rock climbing, and a bunch of company-​sponsored booths were part of the «block party» with a booze area where you can use your beverage coupon to get a cold one post-​race. Not sure all of this was super exciting except maybe the food trucks so we could grab a quick bite post climb. There was also a stage for a band to play but didn’t really hear anyone play when we were there. Too bad.
Bottom line: do this for the feeling of personal accomplishment and opportunity to give back to the YMCA to support its many programs for the youth and elderly in the community.
There are similar stair events throughout the country so check it out. This is definitely on my calendar for years to come!

I couldn’t climb with you guys because I was already committed to my co-​workers but hope you guys kick butt! 23:08. I’m happy with that.

2012 marked my third stair climb. My advice, find a VIP team to join or force your office into sponsoring :) Makes a big difference!
The Y does a great job of offering training and practice sessions to get your legs ready for the event. The folks who plan, organize and make this event happen are SUPER-​DOOPER people. I mean super-​dooper.
All, in all it is a fun event people are really encouraging on the stairs and in about a half an hour — BAM — you are at the top and DONE!
So go for it! Get involved, get climbing and I’ll see you at the top in 2013!

It’s one of the most exciting events I’ve been part of. You get motivated to get in shape, bond with friends and make money for a good cause. What more could you ask for? Well, maybe some AC in the stuffy stairwells but otherwise, it’s amazing!

I did this on Sept 28, 2012. For anyone who knows me, this is a major feat. I’m an overweight, middle-​aged guy with thinning hair. But I put this on my bucket list, and practiced in the building (downtown LA) where I work. The sense of accomplishment was amazing! Now I’m looking for taller buildings to conquer.

Great way to raise money. To see all the people who came out for the event was amazing. Watching all the people coming out after their climb was entertaining. Some people didn’t look they even climbed 1600 plus stairs and others were dying. I’ll be back next year.

If you live in LA and you love a challenge this is for you… even thought it is only once a year you need to sign up in the spring and it goes to a god cause!

1,005 feet high up, 1,679 steps 75 floors yes this was a challenge and I did it with ears poping, heart beating (fast), sweat running everywhere and just about out of breath, this Unilocaler did it in 33mins. I take my hat off to my self for finishing, the view from the top was just unbelievable at night, there were water stations going up I think 4 but the water was not ice cold, more like room temp. I needed ICE COLD WATER! You have to take 3 set of different elevators to get back down, Love this event, A big shout out to Katie at the Unilocal booth too along with the other food trucks and vendors.

Great event for a great cause. If you did it, you deserve a pat on the back (I know for sure I was feeling it by the 30^th floor). The event is huge though so expect a decent wait (can’t have everyone rushing into the stairwells at once). My only wish would be that they have music playing or something in the stairwells.
My best advice for those who just want to make it:
1) take your time
2) don’t forget to drink water (no matter how heavy it feels to even hold a cup. The goal is to finish, not kill yourself.
My best advice for those who want to get great times:
1) Practice!
2) take every other stair step (half the number of stairs climb)
3) keep going
4) don’t look at the floors
5) try not to get dizzy spinning around but when you find yourself turning a different way around the bend – you are almost there!
At 75 floors you get to the roof and don’t hold your breath for the view. It’s actually 5 floors down where they have spacious windows and lots of food, fruit, and water. Several elevators later, find yourself enjoying a nice cool beer (or glass of wine) compliments of Stair Climb. Overall, it’s doable for people of all ages given you don’t feel pressured to hit that 10 minute record. I saw young and old and it’s no big deal if you take 45min+ either!
P. s. Props to the firefighters and police officers who did the climb in gear! They came later in the night.

Great event — rock climbing wall, drinks, food, live music, vendors. It always runs on a delay, but if you come in expecting that, it’s not a big deal. Not your usual 5k, you really feel like you’ve earned your medal when you get to the top.