Introducing ’The Training Diaries’ where Jennifer Falkoski will be documenting her training to prepare to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro in September in an effort to raise funds for our Guardian Scholars program. Help support our climb to elevate scholars.

Follow Jennifer & Chad on Instagram: @forwardstepsco

Jennifer and Chad are at the gate for their flight to Johannesburg!!
The gear is laid out and ready for the Kilimanjaro summit!

posted on Sept 2nd:

Training has been tough! In order to be prepared for the climb we needed to be able to climb 1000 vertical feet/hour for three hours….and we did it! We got there by climbing several mountains in Colorado including some 14ers and did Redcloud Peak and Handies Peak back to back to mimic the first two days of the climb. I also worked with a PT and strength trainer to help with some knee issues. But we’re ready.

Redcloud Peak – 14,037′
Handies Peak – 14,058′

posted on August 16th:

We’re doing three 14ers in two days- Redcloud Peak and Sunshine Peak on Thursday and then Handies Peak on Friday.

posted on August 23rd

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Forward Steps (@forwardstepsco)

Mount Audubon – 13,229′

posted on August 13th:

Sleeping Indian: it was very smokey, which really aggravated my asthma. We were both exhausted and got a later start than we needed to, so we went up 3100 feet, had lunch and came back down. Beautiful trail full of wildflowers.

Mount Huron: an early thunderstorm chased us off the mountain 300 vertical feet from the summit. We were sooo close, but had to turn around. Jogged down 1700 feet to treeline- it was tough but we made it down safely. This was actually the second time we tried to summit Huron. The first was in 2022, but our dog, Timber, wouldn’t cross a scree field and I took a bad fall on an exposed ridge and almost fell down 1000 feet. We’ll be back to tackle Huron another day.

posted on August 8th

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Forward Steps (@forwardstepsco)

posted on July 17th (filmed in June)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Forward Steps (@forwardstepsco)