Medal Round Coming Up

Namaste! Mark Tucker here, Dave is on his way up the podium for another rotation, it should be the last one before his summit push. Me, I’ll stay here in the lowlands at 17,000 feet  for now. Well, we  had enough of a snowstorm yesterday to keep us from moving forward, or I guess I should say upward but today . . . .nine Sherpa climbed from Camp II, advance base, up to Camp IV, the infamous South Col, which is our high camp.  With them they brought supplies of oxygen, tents, food, fuel. Another 18 Sherpa left base camp this morning to spend the night at advance base camp with the idea of a couple of back to back days of ferrying loads to the South Col, which should give us the needed supplies to start our summit attempts. Well the gold medal round is coming up quick, the compulsories are pretty much over, I still have a pretty good sized team in the game Most of them are into their resting phase prior to their summit push, four  or five days down here in the lowlands can really help recharge the batteries. Well what will come with the weather, route conditions, team health and the toughest judge of all, the one from Nepal, Mt. Everest. Can we medal?  Will we see a few more lucky folks allowed to stand on top even if they don’t have a torch with them? All for now.