Why Luca scaled the Mount 40 times in a day
Many a Mount Maunganui resident has climbed the local maunga and enjoyed the views from the top.
But very few people will have run to the top of the Mount 152 times in 50 days, including 40 times in one day alone.
That is the impressive feat which Luca Ahumada-percoco achieved recently.
The 27-yearold moved to New Zealand from Argentina a year ago and has fallen in love with the country, as well as the opportunities for adventure it provides.
“I came here on March 13 last year and started working in Tauranga,” he said.
“I had never run before, apart from a couple of 10km in my home country, but as time went by I felt like I was lacking something.”
He did some browsing online and came across the Wild Things trail running group on Facebook. He was inspired.
“It showed all the different things they were doing around the country and I wanted to try it myself. I started running and in August I ran 22km, including up the Mount once.” Ahumada-percoco became fascinated by how far he could push himself and started slowly increasing his distances, introducing more and more ascents up the mountain.
A love affair with running up Mauao began to blossom. “Every time, I would go up more times. In October, I ran 30km including five times up the Mount. I was gassed after that. “I just kept going and in December I went up 10 times in one go. I was dead after that also.”
In January, he came across the idea of Everesting. This involves picking a hill, anywhere in the world, and completing repeats of it in a single activity until you climb 8848m — the equivalent height of Mount Everest.
Ahumada-percoco decided on 152 times, the equivalent of four times up Mount Everest, in 50 days.