Illinois teenager gets youngest woman to climb best peaks in all 50 states

Naperville’s Lucy Westlake climbed into the history guides this 7 days as the youngest female to summit the greatest position in every of America’s 50 states.

On Father’s Day, the 17-yr-old and her father, Rodney Westlake, ascended the closing 3,000 feet to the leading of Denali, the tallest mountain in Alaska and Lucy’s very last U.S. state peak to tackle.

A comparable quest by the father-daughter pair fell small in 2017 when they had to abandon their programs when their guides were enlisted to sign up for a Nationwide Park Support rescue to save climbers misplaced in whiteout conditions close to the best of mountain.

This climbing period on Denali would be the very last shot for the Naperville North senior to claim the title as the youngest feminine to climb all 50 point out highpoints.

Prior title holder Kristen Kelliher was 18 years, 1 thirty day period old when she summited Denali, then called Mount McKinley, in late May perhaps 2012. Lucy is 7 months youthful.

Rather of employing a manual services as in the previous, Lucy and Rodney Westlake opted to trek on their possess and joined up with climbers from Colorado. All but Lucy and her dad turned again.

“We started with 9, but finished with two,” Lucy explained. “It was both terrifying and thrilling to guide my dad on a rope, just the two of us, 20,310 toes to the summit of Denali. It was the fruits of 10 several years — learning, checking out, and growing collectively in the mountains.”

Lucy claimed when she lastly attained the best, she predicted more mountain to pop up. But it failed to.

“It was an incredible feeling. It was quite surreal becoming up there,” she said. “It was an remarkable expertise general it unquestionably taught me a large amount about myself.”

Accomplishing her aim with her dad on Father’s Day produced the quest even much more specific.

“Me and my dad have generally been climbing companions,” Lucy mentioned. “We’ve developed a whole lot with each other, not only like mountaineers, but I feel as persons far too.

“Men and women refer to us as the dynamic duo. I confess, we make a good crew,” she stated.

Lucy stated the pair labored so challenging and used so a great deal time and energy climbing Denali. Between the two outings, they spent 40 days residing on a mountain.

“It was remarkable remaining with him,” Lucy stated. “I could not have completed it with out him, and I do not imagine he could have carried out it with no me.”

Her desire in climbing the greatest mountain peaks began in April 2011 when her family members attained the best of Black Mountain in Kentucky (elevation 4,145 feet). Due to the fact then, her relatives planned holidays and side trips all-around her quest.

In July 2016 at age 12, Lucy finished the reduce 48 states with her father when they climbed Wyoming’s Gannett Peak, Montana’s Granite Peak, Idaho’s Borah Peak and Utah’s Kings Peak all in just a week and a 50 percent.

Lucy was the youngest woman and the two ended up the youngest father-daughter team to climb the reduce 48.

Since they’d presently crossed Mauna Kea in Hawaii off the list in February 2016, Lucy and her dad experienced just just one additional peak to climb: Denali.

The guideline provider the Westlake household prepared to employ the service of to climb Denali in 2017 stated they would only concur to consider Lucy if she could show she could face up to elevations higher than 18,500 ft.

In buy to verify she could, Lucy and her father climbed the 19,341-ft peak of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, investing seven days and 6 nights on the journey up and back.

Keliher stated she was amazed by Lucy’s tenacity and perseverance.

“Denali is not a mountain to be taken lightly and you need to have a great mix of bodily health and fitness, mental fortitude, time, dollars, and a excellent temperature window,” she stated. “It must have taken an incredible amount of dedication on her component to even want to consider once again and I am positive that attitude will just take her considerably.”

How prolonged Lucy’s file will stand is anyone’s guess, but “I hope her story evokes other younger athletes to get exterior and challenge on their own and probably share that with their loved ones as that was integral to my highpointing practical experience,” Keliher reported.

“Data are meant to be damaged but if or when somebody does split her history I hope she realizes it is really nonetheless a fairly incredible accomplishment,” she mentioned.

Lucy did not have significantly time to relish the exhilaration of climbing Denali.

As shortly as she was off the mountain, Lucy was in Eugene, Oregon, for the U.S. Olympic workforce trials for monitor and field as a teenager journalist.

A runner and triathlete, Lucy reported she’s one of 20 students covering the trials.

In the last few years, Lucy has checked two extra optimum continent peaks off her checklist: Aconcagua in South America in January 2018 and Elbrus in Europe in June 2019.

Although she went to New South Wales in Australia in January 2020 to climb Mount Kosciuszko, wildfires prevented her from obtaining near to the mountain.

Other than Australia, that leaves Mount Vison in Antarctica and Mount Everest in Asia.

While ending the seven summits are on the horizon, Lucy stated she’ll be paying out the subsequent couple months focusing her strength on making use of to colleges.

Lucy explained she believed she realized what pushing her entire body and mind to its restrict felt like, right up until that day on Denali, when she recognized there are no restrictions. “There is certainly so substantially a lot more within yourself than you can at any time consider,” she claimed.

“It will take an unbelievable volume of dedication to situation oneself for the prospect. Then it will come down to earning the correct decision at the ideal minute. And there is extremely tiny space for error,” Lucy claimed.