Two million is a lot of anything, and as vertical feet climbed and skied in one year it stands as a singular representation of endurance and fortitude. Put another way, Greg Hill is one badass ski mountaineer. With a day to spare and accompanied by family and friends, he capped his year-long effort on a peak near his home in Revelstoke, B.C. with a casual 10,000-footer and looked as if he could go another two million without breaking stride.

“I thought I was going to be fine,” Hill wrote on his blog, “and that this imaginary 2 mill line wasn’t going to be so real. But watching it tick over, thinking about all the time and effort that has gone into that tiny number, and all the fantastic support that my friends and family have given me over this ordeal, it all summed up into me crying at the finish. So much was invested into this silly goal that finally achieving it was overpowering and having [my wife] Tracey there to witness the final moment, with friends and champagne, it was incredible.”

Adventure Journal caught up with Greg shortly after his achievement.

This was a very public quest. Did you feel any outside pressure to perform?
This was a very personal goal, one I had dreamed of for years. If it had not been something I had concocted, it would have been easy to stop at some point. But since it was my idea, my quest, I could not give it up. The public aspect of it may have helped me push through some of the harder parts. I have never been one to talk about something before I had accomplished it, but to make this a reality I had to publicize it as it happened. In the end as I approached the two mill I was getting lots of encouraging comments on my blog, people from all over the world sending me some psych. This helped me stay psyched as the end approached.

This is one of the huge issues in running a blog and also being an adventurer. You have to constantly check to make sure that you are doing something for yourself and not the blog — with the inherent dangers of the mountains, decisions have to be made for the right reasons. To push the limits of safety simply to get a good shot or good blog entry is a recipe for a huge disaster.

Any avalanche scares?
No scares, as in being in the wrong spot at the wrong time. But I did ski cut quite a few slides. I am very attentive to avalanches and their cycles and try and approach mountains in such a way that I do not get “scares”, but that they happen when I expect them and where I expect them. In Canada we had a period of high avalanche danger when all sorts of events were happening. I had to pay serious attention to all my decisions.

How many vertical feet are you climbing in an hour on average?
Average for the whole year was 1,240 feet up and down an hour.

How about when you’re pushing it?
When conditions are ideal I can fairly easily average 2,000 feet up and down an hour, that is for long periods of time, like five to six hours (and 24 hours years ago), but in short burst I can average 2,500 feet up and down an hour.

What was your biggest day?
23,070 feet.

Biggest month?
December, 237,280 feet. The smallest was June, 95,270 feet.

How did your gear hold up?
I used four different skis, all of them could be resurrected with a good base grind. But they definitely got used heavily. I used two different pairs of boots, the TLT5′s and the Carbon 4′s, the sharp volcanic rocks in South America really ate away at the Vibram soles.

How about your body? Any nagging injuries or illness?
Body was surprisingly good, various aches and pains that usually disappeared after some stretching. My IT band would flare up every once in awhile and my glutes got pretty tight but overall it held up. Illness, I got a cough in June when I arrived in Chile and it pretty much persisted right up until today. In mid February I crashed and cracked a few ribs, which meant that for the next 5 weeks every time I bent down to do my boots up I would cringe with pain.

How much of the time were you breaking trail?
Quite a lot for the beginning but with friends and re-using skin tracks I would bet that the number is not that high, let’s say 300,000.

What was the longest stretch of days you didn’t ski? Did you ever freak out that you were behind schedule?
Nine days, June 1-9. I wouldn’t say I ever freaked out but it did affect me in late June when I all I wanted was to be touring but all sorts of factors were preventing me. As positive a person as I am the frustration did build. I fell behind schedule on June 1 and only briefly got ahead on October 10, so I got used to not being on schedule. I simply focused on not letting it get out of control. Since this was a personal goal of mine I tried as hard as I could to keep it from affecting my family but there is no doubt that my mood was a little off while I was struggling to keep up.

How much powder did you score?
I would imagine somewhere around 1.2 mill, that was what was so great about finishing in December. Instead of pushing hard at the end of a season and getting subpar turns I was getting epic powder turns. Absolutely all of December each lap was wicked, always inspiring me to go for one more run.

What’s most satisfying about the accomplishment?
So much of this mission was satisfying. Each new summit, wild descents, the constant exploration. But in the end the most satisfying thing was the completion of a 10-year-old dream. I dreamed of two million feet in 1999, spent 10 years honing my skills, learning to move safely through the mountains, developing the endurance to pull off consecutive big days and then finally years later watching my watch tick over. It was the culmination of so many years and so much commitment that I was overcome by emotion and able to share that moment with my wife, family and my friends.

Do you feel like you gave anything up to do it?
I gave up the ability to simply relax and enjoy the moment, constantly needing to ensure that I was still aiming towards my goal. Not to say that I did not enjoy it, I simply did not stop to do so. I balanced my family life as much as I could but suffered on that end, not quite as much kid time as I enjoy.

Is there a “next” or are you just going to take a well-deserved chill for a while?
There is always a next, but it will not be a number obsessed mission. I feel like I know my personal limits in a day (50,000) and now a year. I have a huge list of ski mountaineering objectives that I will continually work on, it’s a lifelong goal of adventure and exploration. In the immediate future I will relax and re-earn the brownie points I lost all year.

Photos by Tommy Chandler/Backcountry.com

Tagged as: backcountry, endurance, skiing