Jenn Geneve brings new meaning to doing her daily crunches.
But the Port Moody woman isn’t working out her abs: She’s within 100 days of completing her year-long quest to climb the Coquitlam Crunch every day for a year.
Geneve’s goal wasn’t quite that ambitious when she started last Aug. 21 because her gym was closed by public health restrictions and she was getting bored.
Then, she thought doing the Crunch for 50 days in a row would be an achievement.
But once her kids got involved recording each day on a whiteboard in their kitchen, Geneve said, the stakes increased considerably.
In fact, it was her daughter who suggested she aim for 100 Crunches once she’d completed 50.
When Geneve reached that milestone, she upped the ante to a full year.
Geneve said she was already noticing the physical benefits from her climbs but it was also important she set a good example for her kids, ages eight and 10 years old.
“I wanted them to see I could do something hard.”
Two-thirds of the way to her goal, Geneve said she’s made the Crunch part of her daily routine.
And while she sometimes climbs early in the morning or later in the day if a climbing companion is available, she mostly heads for the hill after dropping her son and daughter at school.
She walks from her home near Eagle Ridge Hospital then ascends and descends the entire 4.4-kilometre path up to Westwood Plateau from Lansdowne Drive or she’ll run four laps of the staired section before walking home.
The round trip, about 6.9 km, takes her about an hour.
Geneve said she’s hiked in scorching heat, rain, snow, sleet and hail. She’s encountered deer, rabbits and birds swooping around her feet but she’s yet to run into a bear.
Still, Geneve said she’s learned not to pack anything metal in her pockets because it will buzz from the electromagnetic energy of the high-tension power lines overhead.
She admits she’s also gotten addicted to the daily stats she logs with a fitness app on her phone, and having the streak get this far has become an additional motivator to keep it going.
But mostly her quest has helped her get through much of the stress and uncertainty of navigating all the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It’s a mental health thing,” she said. “I can count on myself.”
