Climbing for a Cause

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Living a Life in Full is the conversation you always wanted to have with that person who gave an amazing TED Talk or the author of one of your favorite books, or that inspirational Olympian you always wanted to know more about. It's graduate level conversations with those making

a difference in the world and in the lives of others.

This show brings you new ideas and approaches so that you can live a life in full. I'm your host, Dr. Chris Stout and I hope you enjoy this episode. Welcome to another episode of Living a Life in full. I'm Dr. Chris Stout, your host and today's episode is brought to you by the ATI Foundation. ATI Physical Therapy's philanthropic efforts extend their commitment to quality care outside clinic walls by giving back to communities. They touch the lives of thousands of people each year through their ATI Foundation. The ATI foundation is an independent 501 charitable organization that gives help and hope to children with physical impairments. Since 2003, the foundation has raised over $4 million to assist children with physical impairments in our communities. Often the beneficiary families have mounting debt and are overcome by financial and physical obstacles. Through the work of the clinical and corporate team members, they raise funds to purchase medical equipment, pay medical bills, remodel families homes to accommodate their child's special needs. But more importantly, they give families hope by offering a better quality of life for their child. To learn more about the foundation and ATI, please visit atipt.com welcome everybody.

This is an experiment. This is the first Living a Life in Full live broadcast on Facebook. So welcome. I'm very excited. I'm your host, Dr. Chris Stout and I'm here with Dylan Bates from ATI and Matt Smith, also from ATI. If you don't know, Dylan is the Chief Executive Officer of ATI Physical Therapy and Matt is Senior Vice President of Growth and development for ATI's Western region. And they're both embarking on a two pronged challenge. Number one is to summit Mount Kilimanjaro, the tallest mountain on the African continent and one of the Seven Summits. And using this as a fund and awareness raiser for the ATA Foundation. They have a $1 million target. Welcome, gentlemen.

Thanks, Chris.

I want to do at least two deep dives on this episode. I want to talk about the climb and I want to talk about the cause. But before we get into that, I want to also get to know you guys a little bit better and our audience to get to know you a little bit better. So I want to hear about your origin stories. Dylan, I'm going to start with you. You started at UW La Crosse as a graduate in physical therapy, and now you're the CEO of the largest single brand physical therapy, sports medicine, orthopedic rehab workers comp company in the world with clinics coast to coast. And as of whatever time it is right now, how many do we have?

I think the number is close to 790.

Amazing.

So it's pretty, pretty wild.

That is incredible. So take us on that journey. How do you go from UW La Crosse to pushing 800 clinics nationwide?

Yeah. So, you know, I enjoy telling the story. I always somewhat had an entrepreneurial spirit. Grew up in Southern Illinois down in Carbondale, small town. Actually started a landscape business when I was 15. Might have been driving my dad's truck when I had a permit, not a full license. Don't tell anybody. Yes, we're on Facebook.

Too late.

But so, you know, I always kind of had a zest to go, go out and make things happen. Competitor athlete, you know, by background, played basketball and baseball growing up. Got to play both in college. Got recruited to play basketball actually at University of Wisconsin. Lacrosse actually had a pretty significant set of injuries growing up and so had some great physical therapists. And it piqued my interest. And so I wanted to combo continue to play sports as well as pursuing physical therapy. And so UW lacrosse offered both, ended up there, had a great experience, great physical therapy program, and got done with school and moved to the big city of Chicago. Kind of wanted to start my own thing, but realized pretty quickly you need money, you need to know doctors, and you need to kind of get a lay of the land and get your feet under you. And so I ended up taking a staff physical therapist job with ati, your first job. So I actually worked for a stint as a private physical therapist for an author. Actually did some traveling. Pretty cool. And then had to get a real job a few months afterwards. And so I answered an ad in the Chicago Tribune old school style with the classified section, you know, hard copy newspaper. I was at an Einstein bagel shop in Wrigleyville and found this small little ad for a staff therapist job in Willowbrook, Illinois at ati. And so I walked in and Greg Steele is the founder of ati. And you know, there was just this palpable energy in that building. It was primarily a workers comp clientele and it was just very positive, you know, good energy. Patient to patient interaction was solid. And Greg had set a really nice tone. I said, hey, almost from minute one. I, you know, love to be a part of this thing, you know, so we, I started there and you know, we just had the mantra and the internal challenge of lighting people up every day. You know, be the bright spot. People are coming to us. You know, they're banged up, they're in pain, they're in a time of need. And so we owed it to them to make it a special part of their day in an otherwise pretty tough time. And so we had a lot of great success, a lot of very loyal customers. You know, we didn't have a marketing team, we didn't have a sales team. You know, our patients, you guys were it, right? Our advocates, you know, they were out telling the story and had the opportunity about six months after I started in Willowbrook to go open our second clinic ever. And it became a really special place. You know, it's a big small town. Joliet, Illinois. Word of mouth really matters. Blue collar town. And I remember distinctly it was December 11, year 2000, which is the first day of operations down at Joliet. And remember my first patient. And no kidding, you know, it was just a really special experience to be able to set the tone from day one. And we hired a number of awesome clinicians that came on board that became leaders of future clinics and over the years put down a lot of infrastructure and I think some pretty good strategy in terms of what other folks were doing in the industry. We tried to take it up a notch and take it to the next level. And it created opportunities for so many hard charging, you know, really top notch professionals that were drawn to the culture that we were creating. And you know, we got some funding along the way with a couple private equity transactions. And so they invest in a number of businesses and they've got experience in terms of when to make certain investments and lay down the right infrastructure to be able to actually get better as you get bigger. And sometimes that doesn't always happen, you know.

Yeah, you lose the secret sauce.

Yeah, watered down. And so we made a really, you know, very specific effort to ensure that we stayed the course in terms of what made us special. At Clinic one. How do we replicate that time and time again? And I think we've done a pretty darn good job. And I'm blessed to, you know, lead the organization, but I'm one of hundreds of leaders. You know, we've got clinic directors every day that open the door of their clinic and set the tone. And we take care of, you know, over 23,000 patients a day.

Unbelievable.

And there's about 70,000 active patients that say they're, you know, going to ATI right now and some sort of course of care. And so the influence that we have is pretty, pretty big. And we take that very serious. And it's a very special, organic story how it's happened and just feel really fortunate to be a part of it.

That's fantastic. Wow. And I think we'll circle back, you know, to some of the other kinds of leadership things as well, too. So that's great. So, Matt, you were in a little bit warmer climate. You graduated also in physical therapy, but from University of Utah. So catch us up. Since graduation day.

That was 1984. So I'm dating myself here, wanted to get out of this. I lived my entire life in the cold and the snow in northern Utah and Salt Lake. And so it was time for me to get out of the cold and the snow, live in Japan for a couple years up on the northern island of Hokkaido, which is close to Siberia. And actually, I got more cold and snow than I ever did in Utah. So I was anxious to graduate and head south, Was headed to Southern California, but I was broke and my sister lived in Vegas, so I decided to stay there. Place to stay and eat for free for the summer.

Perfect.

And then Vegas was just taken off in the 80s. And so if you wanted to work hard and put the time in, you could be successful. So I was blessed to hit a city on a real growth trajectory and worked for a company for. Actually, I was with him about 18 months, and I was the director of rehab at a hospital. And spine surgeon called me down to the OR one day, and I was frightened. Bob Berry, I remember it to this day. And so I thought I was in big trouble. And he. He said, what are you doing here? And I said, well, I'm the director of rehab. And he said, no, no, no, I want you to quit. We're going to build a big spine clinic. I want you to come in and take over all the spine, you know, rehab and set programs up, not as an employee, as a. So that was 18 months out. I put together a company and so that was my foray into private practice about 18 months out of PTC.

See one, do one, teach one.

Yeah. Sold a couple clinics in 1995 during the feeding frenzy of M and A, and a few years later ended up being the president, CEO of the Sahara Hotel and Casino, which is logical career. Yeah, very logical career.

No landscaping in your background, though.

So I quickly learned gaming, food and beverage, hotel management. And so I did that for a couple years. But, you know, you're working. You're working day shift and graveyard and swing, and it. It takes the life out of you. And it's a. It's a business that's about taking from people. You're not giving. You're not giving anything away. Whereas in healthcare, it's just the opposite. You know, you're taking care of people. You're. You're. It's a business of giving, hopefully. So after two years, I want to get back into healthcare. And so started up again in January of 2000 and then built that until I met Dylan Bates and Ati in 2015. March 20th is when we consummated our deal and relationship. And it's been. It's been a grand time associating with a great company, great people.

That's great. And rumor has it that you've also been referred to as the unofficial mayor of Las Vegas.

Well, I think that may be coming from Dylan Bates. What that means is I've been there a long time, and I've had the opportunity to take care of a lot of, you know, a lot of professional athletes and entertainers and executives. And so that's afforded me, you know, some great opportunities. And so I guess I'm not sure what being mayor means, but it means I've been there a long time, and I know a lot of people.

You've made your mark.

Yeah, that's right. People know. You've done well. You've done good.

Yes, thank you.

Good. So, Matt, to stay with you, you were really kind of the spark for this idea. And as I understand it, you sort of have this habit or tradition on, like, your big birthdays, on birthdays with fives or zeros, that you want to have a big celebration. Tell us, before we get into the Kilimanjaro, when did that start? How did that start?

You mean just the Kilimanjaro specifically?

No, the fives and the zeros making a big.

Well, you know, good question. I think probably my. My wife and I, just years ago, we decided, yeah, I mean, you can celebrate every birthday if you want. But we thought the zeros and the fives were significant milestones. And I like, you know, Dylan calls this the second anniversary of my 30th birthday, which I do appreciate, I do appreciate that 60 doesn't sound so good,

but second anniversary sounds good.

But I've. So I've been to, I've been to Africa a couple times and it's a special place. As you know, there's no place like it on, on earth. And to, to, to do something special there on my 60th, so I did the, the biggest bike race in Africa. And when I turned 55.

Wow.

Where was that?

It's so you start in Cape Town and you. It's 105 miles. You go down the Indian Ocean side, then you come up the Atlantic and I flew down. We had no air conditioning that night. I wanted to get over with because I was headed to the wine country like the next day. Get my priorities. Yeah, right. So I tell you what I mean, I suffered like, I've not suffered. It was hot. And you think it's going to be flat down there? Well, it's not. You know, when you get down by the Cape, you're climbing, you're climbing, you're climbing. And I got, I got a couple flat tires.

Oh.

Lost the peloton a few times. And so I was just sat out there by myself with that hot wind coming in and anyway, I was miserable.

Yeah.

Just miserable.

Yeah.

So, so that said, you know, Africa is a special place. And Kilimanjaro, it's the highest freestanding peak in the world. Highest peak in all of Africa. And so I told my wife that I wanted to, I said, are you okay if I'm gone for my 60th birthday? And she wasn't happy. But when I told her what it was, she was like, that is really cool. So, yeah, she's been very supportive. And so I had to, I had to rally some, some, some friends and family to, to help me up this thing and so mentioned it to, to Dylan and another gentleman, John Nelson, who's going to go with us. And they didn't hesitate. They said, let's do this thing. So it's about a year ago in Telluride maybe.

Yeah, right.

Is that right? Yeah, we, we talked about it and you know, Dylan, Dylan had an ankle, you know, about this big.

I was wondering, is this part of your rehab program that Matt prescribed?

Dylan, you know what your. I don't know if he should be treating anyone anymore if that's what he recommends. So, yeah, it's part of the price. This is hopefully a capstone on the rehab. So one year, one year later.

Isn't that amazing? So now let's segue in. I just, as a bit of background, I like to climb. I've kind of semi retired from that. So I tip my hat to both you guys with this. But one of the things that I always felt like with climbs was that the training process. So you guys are a little bit of an exception to this, of doing things together. But I always found, like, I was kind of training by myself. And like you this morning, you're up at the crack of dawn, you're hammering it, you're doing what you can to get, you know, done and ready. Work and travel can kind of get in the way of that, make it a bit more of a challenge. And the workout's sometimes a little bit harder. But I also felt like, you know, I'm kind of, you do it with a team, you do it with an expedition group. So that's good and camaraderie, but a

lot of the training.

And really for you yourself, it's an individual kind of thing. And way back when, when I was doing these climbs, it sort of occurred to me that I should sponsor something or I should do something about it, because it's all me, me, me, me, me. So just speaking to myself, so we started something called Summits for Others. So we would do these climbs and we would sponsor things. And it the idea then for Climb for Kids. Tell us about the genesis of that, because it sounds like it might be somewhat of a parallel or how did that happen?

Yeah, it gets spot on. You know, the ATI foundation, we've had it going since 2003. Started with very humble beginnings. It was a 5K in Joliet, Illinois. I mentioned earlier, you know, a special community in the history of, you know, ATI physical therapy. We were seeing so many families come in with children that had physical impairments. And the community had been very good to us. And we said, hey, there was one individual child, pediatric cancer. And we, you know, he was the beneficiary of our first event. And we said, hey, let's make this a real foundation. And so in 2003, we started. It got off to, you know, just a real basic start. But over the last few years, it's really picked up steam. 2017 was the first. First year that we went over a million dollars raised. And so when to your point about training, you know, first couple weeks, it does get a little lonely, and you sit there and say, all right, why am I doing this? Well, number one, I'm doing it to support my guy in his second anniversary of his 30th birthday. And we said, and I can't remember exactly where I was, but I said, boy, let's, let's pull the foundation of this thing and, you know, let's tie a dollar figure or a penny or 10 cents or whatever per foot of, you know, elevation. And so I ran it past Matt and he said, heck yeah, let's, let's, let's make it happen. And so, you know, we ended up pulling the marketing team and the foundation crew in my office and the name Climb for Kids came about and it just started developing from there. And then I can tell you, as I've been training, and we've actually had some great training together in the mountains out in Colorado, we've been talking about it that, you know, the highest I've ever gone is just under 14,000ft out in the Telluride region. But to go another 5,000, almost 500 more on top of that is. It's a big deal. And so just, I think having some of the extra motivation, knowing that there's a lot riding on it, the fundraising so far is going great. And I think the million dollar number, while it's a big goal, I do think it's attainable. And I love to see our clinics getting after it and the enthusiasm, the creativity and, you know, just efforts that we're seeing roll in are really special. And so even in our training, we were talking about how that's just this extra layer of motivation. That's pretty cool.

That's fantastic. How about for you, Matt,

Regarding just

the experience and making it something like you've had your birthday aspect of it and doing something special and then adding this extra component of foundation support.

Well, Dylan brought it up and I said it's a great idea. And of course, we all know Dylan. He does things in a big way, no half measures. Yeah, no, no, no, no. So it's actually, I think, much bigger than I had anticipated when we first talked about it. So, yeah, we're in full, you know, mode right now, trying to get as much money as we can. And not just before, but we want this thing to carry on even after.

Yeah, I mean, the foundation will live on the other, other climbs after this. I can't wait to hear what that's going to do.

Yeah, we already said we might need to pick a big thing every year.

Well, you know, I think the aspect of that in terms of this initial early interest in great early success is also, you know, speaks to other people, you know, getting it and appreciating, you know, what it takes to do that and appreciating then what those. The good that those dollars go to do from 5Ks to Kilimanjaro is really, you know, an impressive kind of thing. So I think you've captured a lot of people's imaginations with it. I. Because I'm kind of a OCD quant kind of guy, wanted to tell you, in case you didn't already know this or we can. Our listeners can. And viewers can see this. It's around 62 miles round trip. And the old classic thing in climbing is when you've made the summit, you're halfway done.

Yeah.

So you always got to get back and get back safe. Back in the CRO magnet era when dinosaurs were still walking around there. When I climbed it, one of the fascinating things is just you go through all these ecosystems. I mean, it's sort of like it was, you know, like 80s at the bottom and then starts to get cooled off and then kind of gets to be tundra, and then, you know, it's like, you know, sub zero Fahrenheit, you know, when you're at the summit. And I think that makes a very interesting kind of, you know, aspect to the climb. Whereas other places, it's always cold or it's always whatever. And to put it in context, we're in Chicago today doing this downtown. And the tallest building here is the Willis Tower. And if you were to take the number of Willis Towers and stack them on top of one another to hit the summit of Kilimanjaro, it would take 13 and a half Willis Towers to do that. So from Flatland to Kilimanjaro is what that would be. So, yeah. So do you guys have a climbing background? You said you've been 14,000ft, but is this first one of seven summits, the first big deal summit, or what's your resume?

It's a big one for me. Like I said earlier, I think I've been right, scaring 14,000 on some hikes. You know, just day hikes, you know, four or five hours out in Colorado. But, yeah, this will be the first, you know, real climb, you know, getting to 19,000, 3, 4, 1. So, you know, a little nervous, but I think we're doing the right things, taking it very serious and, you know, looking forward to, you know, putting in the work so that hopefully come, you know, time to be on the mountain, you know, we're well prepared.

That's good. How about you?

Yeah, no, I've, I, My background is in cycling so bike raced many, many years. I bike raced in Russia. I've never climbed or hiked much at all other than that. My mom's in Wyoming so I've been to 11,000, you know, in cycling. It's basically a non weight bearing sport and so I have the aches and pains of back and hip and knee and ankle but the training has been phenomenal. I've actually this is something I will now adopt and be part of my exercise program because it is, it's. I always used to kind of laugh at hikers, you know, but now I really truly appreciate the hiking, the climbing and the fitness that you get from it. It's amazing.

Carrying a pack and whatnot.

I hope it's not a sign. By the way, here's some background silence going on downtown Chicago. We're talking about being prepared for this climb. So for those listening, I apologize for the background.

Sorry about this. Yeah, it's, it's real and it's.

Hopefully that's not an omen, right?

That's right.

So what's the coldest you guys have been to? So 1411 for height. But like what coldest temperatures have you got other than Chicago?

Maybe this morning we were hiking what two weeks ago in Colorado and it was sub zero and we've listened to the right type of gear to get and I think we're all decked out and so I think we are prepared to go from 80s to sub zero.

It is, that's just so critical. So you both have families, what do they think about this? I mean you said your wife is in support of it but is there like I used to climb internationally until we had kids. My wife said, well you're not climbing internationally anymore. So I'm sort of envious that you get the support that from your wife to be able to go do this. But what's it like for you guys with families and kids?

Yeah, my wife's been incredibly supportive. You know, it's hard to get motivated to stay in shape, just going to the gym and jumping on a treadmill or what have you. So she likes the fact that I'm getting in great shape. My kids are intrigued. My 8 year old knows enough about Google and you know how to look up stuff. So he saw a couple articles that got him a little scared. Oh you know, things happen on mountains. But overall they're very intrigued and supportive and excited about it. So I don't think they really understand what it is, but they're.

If you have the time after you do it, then come back and give a talk at your kid's school. That's an awesome, fun thing to do. So how about for you, Matt?

Yeah, I mean, my wife's been. She's great. She's an athlete. She would do it, but she's got pretty bad osteoarthritis in her knee. But she was Nevada athlete of the Year in high school years ago, so. So she likes. She likes challenges and she's excited. She's actually gonna fly in on the 20th when we hit, when we come back to the bottom. So she's gonna fly in. We'll do a little safari. Yeah, safari for four days and see if we can find some African game out there in Tanzania.

Oh, that'll be perfect. Well, good for you. Oh, that's.

That's my kids. My kids just think Dad's doing another dumb thing in his life.

Volunteer to come climb or anything. So I guess just to maybe our public service announcement with this sort of a thing, like, have you guys been reading up on Cute Mountain Sickness and hape and haste and those kinds of things. So, yeah, when I did it, there was a French expedition team, and they had. We were at 16,000, the last kind of, like, base, campy kind of thing, and someone got sick. And it's sort of like, you know, I've not experienced this by virtue of a person, but by virtue of hearing stories that it's really, you know, you can be very, very fit. But, you know, acclimatization is a random thing. And some people have climbed Mountain X and been fine and been in great shape. Climbed again two years later and, you know, gotten hit by something. So do you guys. Are you aware of Diamox?

We are.

I highly recommend Diamox next to caffeine is my drug of choice.

We did a little test drive, actually, a couple weeks ago when we were training, so no real side effects. I hear it can definitely help. Yeah.

Yeah.

I've just. I've never done any altitude stuff without it, so I can't give a, you know, comparison or anything. But, I mean, it's just, you know, I've had, like, dull headaches and you just, you know, it's hard to sleep at 16,000ft under whatever circumstances. But it's just. I highly recommend it. Downside of side effects isn't such a big deal. I also highly recommend. And maybe you guys already thought about these kinds of things, but the American Alpine Club, they will Come helicopter you out of a place if need be. So I always give a plug to the American Alpine Company because they're really excellent with evacs. But you guys are part of an expedition team, though, right? So tell us a little bit about that. How does that work?

So there are 10 of us. There'll be a gentleman from Nashville, three from Chicago, and then six from Las Vegas. And not that I planned on having doctors along, but three of my good friends who accepted the Challenger. Physicians.

Brilliant. Yeah, doesn't hurt.

So, needless to say, we've had a lot of discussions about medications and what to take and Diamox and, you know,

say, complaining of us. You've been getting shots and stuff, too. So tell us about, like, yeah, vaccination,

all the fun travel meds, shots, typhoid, yellow fever. Actually, nothing's required in Tanzania, but I think, you know, you want your hep a darn good, you know, yellow fever. Get a flu vaccination.

Yeah.

What else? I think. And then, you know, if you're worried about malaria, you can take Mallory, on, which I think you start maybe two days before and finish two days after. I've been twice. I've not taken Malaron, but I might just because I don't want to get sick yet. One of the physicians, Dr. McKenna, he. He landed in. In Kilimanjaro and got like three mosquito bites in as he was going to get his DEET luggage. So I'm like, so it does give me. But I think, I think that, you know, that covers most the vaccination.

It's just. It's just, you know, smart. I mean, just, you know, because you got enough stuff and physical challenges and whatnot, that last thing you need to worry about is, you know, getting sick by virtue of, you know, three mosquito bites right off the back kind of thing. So training wise, maybe step us through. You know, Dylan, you had made mention before we started recording that you've been losing some weight, but, you know, what kinds of. Is there a stand? And you said you're going to keep to your exercise regimen, but even though you've been like a cyclist, so what guy, what have you guys done to tweak your exercise, tweak your diet?

Yeah, I've just stepped up cardio big time. A lot of incline, treadmill work. I've got a 36 liter pack, kind of a day pack that we'll take. I've been loaded up with, you know, 20 to 30 pounds and going for an hour at 15 degrees incline and catching up on some TV shows along the way because hard to stay focused when you're on treadmill for an hour

other than how bad it feels.

Yeah. But yeah, just eating clean, you know, a lot of salads, a lot of good, healthy lean proteins and you know, definitely drop, drop some pounds and feeling lean and feeling strong. So excellent. You know, just got to keep it up.

That's good. How about for you, Matt?

Well, you know, fortunately, Vegas isn't known for its world class climbing. We have other things that occupy your time on the Strip, however, living there. So we can get up to 12,000ft up on Mount Charleston. We. And you know, today it's 76 in Vegas. I mean it's just, it's gorgeous right now. So, you know, we can go out for, I mean, Mount Charleston's 18 miles. We've done that a few times. So 10 minutes from, 15 minutes from where we live, we can be up, you know, doing a 3,000 foot up and down climb and wow. Yeah. Back home by 10 or 11.

That's a little more than the Midwest.

Yeah. No kidding. Wow. I had no idea. I think that's.

Yeah, Vegas has got world class climbing. In fact, you'll see a lot of the Europeans will come over and spend winters in Vegas just because the, for that, it's probably the top three or four places in the world, actually.

I remember years ago I went to Vegas and then drove through like where they run bad water and then, then did Whitney sort of like you know, going from the lowest to the highest, you know, again, ecosystems and things like that. But I didn't realize you could do that so close. That's fantastic. So what's our countdown? When is, when do you leave?

Dylan departs Chicago on the 10th. I depart Vegas and so we'll see him in Amsterdam to catch the flight down. There's that one flight, as you know, Chris, that takes you down.

And I'll make sure that if we, because we were going to see each other in Amsterdam, I'm going to make sure he gets on the plane and that we don't stay there too long chaperoning.

So that's good.

Fortunately, I've been there a couple times.

Well, I tell you it again, dating the million years ago that I did it, there was no airport, international airport in Kilimanjaro. So I flew into Kenya, into Nairobi, and then went down what used to be this horrible stretch where they knew that like nefarious fellows there knew that climbers with lots of gear and whatever were making it and they would, you know, you're like in the frickin Serengeti and they would like throw stuff around and you know, your bus would stop and then you go to get the stuff out and then they would come and hit you in the back of the head and take your pack or whatever and kind of in of your climb. And that over time in the late night or early 90s became too much work. So they would just like shoot at the buses because that was much easier to do to hit a tire, cause someone to stop. So it's sort of like the anxiety of kind of just going from Nairobi to getting to the Moshi region and stuff. And the base is also kind of like this. Your adrenaline was up before you even set foot on the mountain. So I want to kind of start to wrap up. We actually have some listener questions, so I thought it was fun. We'll get engaged with folks. So these are from our audience. For both of you. What are you most nervous about, if anything?

I think you said it earlier, you can be really prepared, you can be in shape and you can get sick. And I think we've all talked, you know, there's a competitive group of guys, but when someone gets sick, there's only so much encouragement and or, you know, giving someone a hard time. It's just, you know, it's something you can't really push through if you have real symptoms of mountain sickness. So it's something that we've committed to each other that will watch out for each other. And it's always nervous that you do all the training and we got a lot riding on it with the foundation dollars we're raising. You want to get to the top, you want to be really smart and safe to. That's right.

Yeah. I agree with Dylan 100%. It's what happens at 13, 15,000ft. I mean, there's world class triathletes that have not made it to the top because they get into trouble. So we're going to be smart about Diamox and lots of water. I think that's my biggest concern is just myself and all of us making it to the top.

Yeah. And it's really. I mean, one of the things that I've learned is just, you know, honestly, slow and steady wins the race kind of thing. And there's sort of like what they. I don't know if they. You guys have talked about this, but almost like what they call like muffler breathing where you kind of create like a back pressure when you exhale and it helps keep more air in your Lungs and you know, just seeing tips and tricks and hacks like that, you know, I found, you know, super, super helpful. So one of the things I also want to give you guys since we're doing our first video when I'm going to give, give gifts and whatnot, this is my Swahili phrase book from circa 1992. So if you guys ever find yourself in trouble. And Matt was reading this earlier of how to summon a doctor. So those are good phrases to get to learn. So enjoy yourself with that. We'll be looking forward to a follow up. We need to do a follow up to hear about post and we can do it all in Swahili.

Find the cold beer at the finish line.

Amen.

And Chris, by the way, we're going up the Mashame route and I know there's, there's 11 day, there's nine day limoge show. And so epic is who we're going with. And I found them on a departures magazine which is American Express magazine. And you know, as we get older, we like the best comforts that we can, we can find. So I think we have the best outfitter to give us great food, thicker mattresses at night, full kitchen, bathroom set up, everything that we're going to have. But I chose this route because we've got CEOs, we've got busy, busy people, physicians without getting too crazy. So it's, it'll be section night, seven days, you know, round trip, which it has a success rate of about 66% is what I've read. So we're going to try and go 10 for 10 and getting up to the top here.

Excellent. Excellent. So obviously this is our first experiment with, with video. Are you guys going show to shoot video when you're going or any plans on any photo documentation or documentaries or anything?

Yeah, I was just showing Dylan this morning. There's a gentleman in Vegas who hikes and climbs and you can get these drones now that will follow you. It's, it's really a cool thing. Yeah. If you see the bit. So, so you just hike and climb and this drone will actually, you know, it follows you along like you're like your dog would. That's crazy. Yeah, we'll be, we'll be doing that and then we have a couple of GoPros. GoPros. Yeah, so we have a couple GoPros that, that. So we'll have plenty of stuff to, to edit and look at when we finish.

Are you guys like on like a sat phone or any kind of way like because all that will be fine once you get back. I'm just wondering if there's any live stuff or options for.

I'm not sure on that. Do you know.

Yeah, we have. Well, we're taking a sat phone. There's a friend of mine in Vegas who does Bhutan and all these crazy long climbs and hikes. So we're just gonna get a SIM card and take a sat phone up and order a cappuccino from Starbucks at the top. Hopefully it'll appear.

That's excellent. We'll keep. We'll post those on our websites and on Facebook as well, too. So we talked about altitude sickness, duration of training, I guess, obviously up and the day you climb. But when did you guys start your training in earnest? For specific. I know you guys are always in shape, but not necessarily for climbing. So how long ago did you start?

I'd say we kicked it off in October. We met in Colorado for five days, did probably 60 miles over that time period, and I think that was probably the time when I locked in and said, all right, this is real, and got to get moving.

That's awesome. Okay, so same with you. October. That's good. A person asks, are there smaller mountains that are needed for preliminary climbs? So it sounds like you guys have incorporated some of that in your training, right?

Yeah. Yeah. I've done a number of real hikes in Colorado, multiple hours and multiple miles in a day. Some real vertical elevation covered. So I think we're doing the right things. We have a couple folks from Chicago that have not really gone to altitude yet, so.

Yikes.

They've got to get moving.

They got to get up.

If you're watching, you know who you are. Let's go, boys.

Therapeutic shaming. So that's good. So, anyway, so how many participants, which you've already discussed. And then they also ask about Sherpas, which I know in. In Kilimanjaro would be. Porters will be on the trip. Do you know what your. Your team, your crew will be like?

I. Well, one of the reasons we picked Epic, I think it's going to be like 2 to 1. So we should probably have maybe 20 porters. But. So we have our day packs.

Right. But we'll.

I think we. We've got a.

What?

Ours is 36. 36, yeah. So that's. You're carrying your day stuff, you know, rain gear for the day. And then, as you know, the porters have these big bags. They carry them on their heads. It's unbelievable.

Unbelievable.

So we'll have our Duffel bag, waterproof. That have our other stuff. So we're switching in and out depending on, you know, you're in this tropical zone. We're in Lululemon. And then you're at the very top in about four layers. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And a balacava. And trying to stay out of the frost.

The. At least at the lower. I remember a lot of the porters just wearing flip flops. Yeah, just like unbelievable flip flops. And they're 5,000th summit, you know, attempt or something. So. So tell us again, how long does it take to get up? You're doing how many days up?

It's six nights. Seven days. Six nights.

Okay.

Yep. And there'll be one night on the way down. So it's five nights on the way up.

Gotcha.

And then we climb high and sleep low just to acclimatize.

Yeah.

Just before the final.

So how many hours per day do you have? Someone once is curious about, like, duration during those days?

First day, I think we go up to 9,000. That's going to be, I think, our longest day. That's going to be about 7, 7, 8 hours in the boots. And then we'll have days where we're done at 1:30 in the afternoon. So just depends on that. But longest, longest day. I think day one.

Gotcha. All right. And then once you're at the summit, then tell us about the descent and like, you know, what altitude and how many hours that is.

Well, we'll camp at over 15 and then we get up at midnight, so there won't be much sleep that night. So we take off at midnight. You're up there at sunrise. There's a big glacier up there. I don't know what condition it's going to be in. There's been a ton of snow. As we've gotten some of these live feeds, there's been a ton of snow. It's summer over there right now, so we're actually taking some gear to strap onto our boots for ice and snow. Should we get that? So we'll be going on just the edge of summer, fall and March. But you don't know on top of the mountain. It could be snowing and it could be beautiful in the sun. Shiny.

I remember our summit morning that I had. This is again, old school. I had a canteen and I had to put it, like, inside all my layers, otherwise it would start to freeze.

Yeah.

Then you have all these thoughts like, I wonder if my eyeballs could freeze. I wonder if you have to have

an insulated tube Right. Camelback. It will freeze. So we hit that, then we come back down, we load all of our stuff and then we'll head back down. Probably right back down to 9,000ft. There's two camps that we have options on. It's set up at 9,000, then we'll finish off the next morning and that's it.

And go find that beer.

So with your looking at the weather, do you know what the temperatures have been lately at summit? Does it say on where have you been checking out?

Yeah, it's been unusually cold and snowy up there. So they've had some zero minus ten degree mornings up there.

Yeah, you don't hang out there a whole lot. You gotta tag, get the photos and get going on the sun.

We've got our foundation flags and.

Oh really?

A couple other flags that we're gonna do some photo ops, so.

Excellent.

We'll have to get them out quick and.

Yeah, get the shots and get down. So. So you said how much is the weight of the gear that you guys will be lugging up? 30 some odd.

Oh, I don't know, what do you think, 15, 20 pounds a day? No, no more probably as the porters will be taking the rest.

Gotcha. Okay. And what kind of food, when you're on it, do you know, with the

steak, seafood, fresh la. I don't know. He keeps talking up this guide company. So it, it looks pretty nice though. So we won't. I don't think it'll be north of roughing it. So. I've heard good things about the food.

All right, good. You know, and again, it. I think it's maybe an individual difference, but, you know, I would just find that I'd lose my appetite, which would just like tick me off so much because I'd have like, you know, my weakness is Snickers. I'd be like, oh, you know, now I can eat my Snickers. It's like, man, that just sounds miserable, you know, so it's like once I got down lower, then it was great.

That's my exact go to food I'm taking. Is that right? Yeah, because I know I can always eat a Snickers.

Yeah, that's my feeling too. So that's good. So the final couple of questions from our audience are kind of a. I think make an interesting shift. I really, really like them. One person says, I would like to know how you will personally make use of this experience. Besides helping raise money for the ATI foundation, how will climbing Mount Kilimanjaro define you? Is this Only a big thing on fives and tens or is the start of something new for you? Both. As ATI continues to grow. That's kind of a deep one there.

So, yeah, it's a great question.

Yeah.

But I think it's inspired. Like I said, when we put this out there, you know, tying the foundation to it, we just recently equipped the clinics with a bunch of materials, and there's this beautiful panoramic photo goes up on the wall, and people buy stickers to sponsor the climb and so forth. But even before receiving the materials, they were all kind of homegrown, organic ideas. And it was really inspiring. And as a larger company now getting messages out about the vision of the organization and trying to get folks to really understand what we're trying to accomplish and to create meaningful rallying points. You know, sometimes from a corporate office, it doesn't always hit the high notes, but what I've seen with this is that this is something that everyone can understand and get behind. And it's just got a deeper feel to it and a really organic, real feel, good feel that's coming throughout the whole organization and beyond. We sent, we did some personalized video mailers to, you know, friends of ati, businesses that work with us vendors, and just personal friends that have been successful in business. And I had four. The first four contacted me and, you know, we. I started it and Matt quickly joined and said, I'm doing it, too. You know, we're kind of starting the fundraising with $19,341, which is the height of Kilimanjaro. And four individuals contacted me yesterday and said, I'm matching what you're doing. And so, you know, close to $80,000 just with four individuals. And so when we think about the million dollar goal.

Yeah.

And it's kind of a long winded answer to the question, but it's just really, this has inspired me to think about, all right, what's. What's on deck for next year? Because I think, like I said, it's just a great physical commitment and it's mentally taxing. It makes you stronger when you get through a tough workout, when you're not feeling the best or whatever it might be. And so I think having a goal each year and tying it to the foundation, something big, physical feat of sorts, I can see us picking another challenge and potentially this inspiring other people in ATI to say, hey, I'm going to do something big. I'm going to tie it also to the foundation. So we've talked a lot about that. So I think this will continue.

Fantastic. How about for you, Matt?

You know, living in Vegas, it's created some energy and excitement and I really like it. And I think it, you know, to see the CEO of the company talk about something that's the really the genesis of who we are and that's changing lives and helping people. And too often, I think as a big company, we get caught up in the metrics of business. You know, the charge per visit, visits per patient units per, et cetera, et cetera. And so sometimes that can fall on deaf ears because you hear it too many times from the same people. This, I think will resonate with the ops of our company in a way because our focus is not so much on that, but it's helping kids and helping grow our foundation, which we, I think we have what, 700 kids a year that we assist, but we have another hundred plus, you know, in the queue and we can't do that. We've got to. We need 200 more kids. We need to help all these kids. So I think this sets the bar for the future. And I can see I will not be going up Everest with. So I'm pretty much up for ever anything. Swimming with sharks in Australia, I'll do that.

I'm not going up.

I'm not going up.

We've got a lot of people that are going to give you some ideas,

I'm sure, and I'm dumb enough to probably do it well.

And I think I'm going to kind of paraphrase this last question from our listeners because I think you've sort of said it in a very meta kind of way, which is to me, it just makes me think of, you know, the ATI spirit, you know, what ATI is kind of all about. I mean, the, the aspect I think we think about the work with clinicians in the clinic, with patients, we think about the work of the foundation with needy kids and families. But there's also that interstitial connection between the colleagues at ATI and the inspiration I think you guys give them at, you know, at large levels and hands on in the clinic, shaking hands, talking to patients, talking to staff. And it's just, I think it's, it's very inspirational for people to see that, you know, you guys are really kind of walking the talk, that it's not just some, you know, cliche or something like that, but this is what the fabric of ATI looks like with doing what you guys are doing. So I really, really applaud you. So I don't want you to steal my thunder with this, because I'm thinking about Matt's 65th birthday, and I'm thinking MMA.

Oh, boy, oh, boy.

I don't know,

MMA. There we go. I don't like being punched or kicked. No.

All right. All right, well, we'll have to think of something else. So maybe just in closing then, can you guys talk a little bit about your vision for ATI Healthcare? The foundation just kind of, you know, from the perspectives that you have with where things are today vis a vis, you know, if you want to speak generalities in healthcare and where things are going or in particular with ati and that fit. What do you guys see from the positions you're in?

Yeah, I think physical therapy in general, I think, is in a great spot. I think it's, relatively speaking, in terms of cost versus impact. It's, you know, low cost, the great use of a healthcare dollar. We've done some really compelling work. Frankly, Dr. Stout's been in the middle of a lot of the work really proving the value prop of physical therapy and versus expensive surgical procedures. Imaging. You know, the opioid epidemic that's going on in this country is very real. And I think we check a lot of the positive boxes to counter some of that that's going on. And so I'm bullish on the industry as a whole. I think specific to ati, I think we're trying to lead the charge. You know, we often say every industry needs a leader. And I think we've been very thoughtful about, you know, really aggregating critical mass of leaders that really care about what we're trying to accomplish. We call it emotionally investing in our work. It's part of the ATI way. And, you know, I think sky's the limit. And I'm really excited we're having a leadership retreat. That's why we're downtown Chicago. We're hosting about 130 of our leaders from across the country to set the tone for 2018. And I think we've got some real momentum in the back business, and I'm looking forward to the future.

Great, Excellent. What's your vision, Matt?

Well, ditto what Dylan said. You know, three years ago, when I was looking at rolling up my company, I had offered some private equity and some VC firms and probably three or four of our competitors today, very large companies. So when I made a choice, it was. It was based on a company whose values and culture aligned with mine and my company. And I love to tell the story because I do M and A work. And so. And I realized that non Therapists can be CEOs of companies in the PT world. And there are, and they do a good job. But I will say it can't be overstated that our CEO is a pt, our coo, our compliance officer, a pt. We've got VP of contracting. As a pt. There's really just a sense that's a little bit different with our executive team and how we lead the charge and how we feel, really the profession, the industry and how we grow and develop. That I think that makes us unique. And I can't, again, you can't overstate how important that is and the value that brings day to day in the growth of the company. But I love our industry. I love where we're headed. Again, as Dylan said, a lot of the work that you're doing, the data that we see, you know, orthopaths and some of these really cool things that are going to be a paradigm change, I believe, the next five years in our industry.

Yeah, it's very exciting. It's really good to see that. And I think, you know, just to echo that, I think the, the deep bench of leadership and again, which you guys are, you know, know, great, you know, poster boys for. I mean, it's just, it really speaks to the ethos, the ATI way. And it's just, you know, it's something I think you should be very proud of. It's just, it's wonderful. So I'm gonna close up today's episode, but before we end, I want you guys, if you can, do some shout outs, you know, if people want to learn more about the climb, more about the foundation, more about ati, how they can donate, how they can be a part of it, how they can follow you guys, what are the places in social or what are best ways to be able to do that.

Yeah, and before I do that, I want to. I want to personally give a shout out to Terry Williams, who's the director of the ATI Foundation. Terry, if you're watching, how are you? But he's just relentless and, you know, he just gets after it every day and is passionate and a big driver of where the foundation is today compared to our humble beginnings of it. So thank you very much, Terry. But I think the best place to go. For info, we have a landing page. It's climbforkids.com Little play on Kilimanjaro. We do know how to spell. So. But it's actually, it's K, L, I, m, b, numerical 4, number 4, kids com and you can see the ticker going up in terms of how many dollars have been raised. And there's some videos on there. You can be anonymous, you can allocate your donation to said clinic or an individual or what have you. It's a very user friendly, friendly interface to do it online. I think that's probably the most user friendly place to go.

Okay, awesome. Excellent. Well, we'll have show notes for that. And I know that there's also a lot of activity that ATI has on Twitter, so there's a variety of ways that people can engage in social and obviously with our first experiment with the show being on Facebook Live, we'll also be on itunes probably next week. SoundCloud, Stitcher, Overcast, YouTube and LinkedIn and a variety of other socials. So feel free to share this episode and share the episode as podcast and video once we have it out next week. So I want to thank you guys again. This has just been an awesome experience and I'm really impressed and proud with the work that you guys are doing. And I can't wait to hear about the climb.

Great, great. Thanks again. Thank you.

Thank you.

Take care.

Living a Life in Full is a production of Stout Media, a subsidiary of Gordian Knott llc. Assistant Producer Gracie Wong Music Dan o' Brien Post Production Sam Rood Graphics Larry Newberry Executive Producer and Host Dr. Chris Stout to learn more, stop by our website alifeinfull. Org for show notes and please recommend us to your friends and leave us a review on itunes. Thanks.