PUBLISHED 10/12/2007
Seven is evidently Jeanne Stawiecki's lucky number. it was on her seventh attempt to quit smoking that she kicked the habit and took up running, which led to seven consecutive Boston Marathons. So two years ago, when Stawiecki heard that no woman had ever done the 7-7-7 challenge--run a marathon and climb the highest mountain peaks on each of the seven continents--she decided to test her luck.
Such a monumental task wasn't always within Stawiecki's reach. In 1988, the nurse anesthetist was a two-pack-a-day smoker, juggling 40-hour weeks at one hospital with 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. weekend shifts at another. "I had no interests, no hobbies," Stawiecki, now 57, says. "All I did was work and smoke. I turned 38 and I decided that I wanted to change the person I had become."
Step one: quit smoking. Fearful of the weight gain that often comes with nicotine withdrawal, she started running. "I went half a block and felt like I coughed up a lung." But she stuck with it, eventually building the lung power to run her first race, the 1994 New York City Marathon, which she ran in a Boston-qualifying 3:36. "When I crossed the finish line, I had this feeling of accomplishment," says Stawiecki, who will be running New York again November 4. "To have challenged myself and succeeded was intoxicating."
A New Way to Get High
Recognizing the mental and physical strength Stawiecki had developed as a runner, a colleague, anesthesiologist Mark Nawrocki, suggested she try his passion: mountaineering. Stawiecki overcame her fear of heights and quickly graduated from beginner climbs to some of the most daunting in the world. "She compressed in five years what many climbers take decades to do," Nawrocki says.
Stawiecki tackled the 7-7-7 challenge with the same gusto. "The idea that I could be first woman in anything was exciting," she says. She planned an ambitious itinerary--three climbs (she already had four done) and seven marathons in eight months--all while maintaining her full-time job at UMass Memorial Hospital.
She started in August 2006 with Africa's Mount Kilimanjaro. Two months later, she hiked Mount Kosciuszko in Australia, three days after the Melbourne Marathon. By February 2007, she had reeled off six more marathons, placing first in her age group in Chile, Miami, and Antarctica and second in her age group in Melbourne and Dubai. Still, one lofty goal remained: Everest.
"When I reached the summit, I fell to my knees and started crying," says Stawiecki, who completed her mission on May 22. "It was one of the most amazing experiences I've ever had."
This month Stawiecki will return to another towering icon, the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. When she runs through New York City, the woman who has touched the sky plans to keep both feet on the ground. "I'm going to take in all the sights and sounds," she says, "and think about how far I've come."
