From the Hawaii Tribune-Herald, Wednesday, September 27, 2006 9:45 AM HST - by Bret Yager

By the end of the week, wheelchair athlete Sean O'Neill hopes to be pushing his chair in a grueling ascent of the mist-wrapped slope of Mauna Kea.

"Mauna Kea is the biggest mountain on the planet and you have a wheelchair ramp all the way to the top," Sean says. "Here you can start at sea level, That's the beauty of it. That's the draw."

The East Lansdowne, Penn., resident, brother of famed climber Timmy O'Neill, plans to forge his way from Hilo to the summit in one push. It's 43 miles, which is 13 miles longer than the longest push he's ever done, with over twice the elevation gain. He knows the five miles of steep gravel at the top will be a killer. He knows it'll be the hardest thing he's ever done, by far.

But that's the point. Sean has spent a life facing challenges, failing as well as succeeding, and learning a few lessons about doing it right.

"It's about doing it neatly, respectfully instead of sloppy, doing it with style, with less stress to others" he says. "These are the ideas that come to you when you're 40."

Life on two feet ended for Sean 15 years ago with a foolhardy leap from a Mississippi River bridge into the barge lane, a badly miscalculated jump that paralyzed him from the waist down.

Back then, it was all about the thrill without a sense of consequence. Today, he's keeping the sense of challenge while trying to make up for some of the anguish he's caused his family.

If you talk to his brother, Timmy, who has set a few world records of his own for speed climbing and is a leading climber of his day, Sean O'Neill just may have the grit to pull this one off.

"He's a maverick wheelchair athlete," Timmy said in a telephone interview. "I know of no one in the wheelchair world who is as driven as he is. If you measure from the ocean floor, Mauna Kea is the tallest mountain in the world. This is his personal Everest."

Sean plans to stuff his pack with Power Bars, dip his wheels in the Pacific and head up Saddle Road on Thursday or Friday, depending on weather. He'll go in the rain if he has to; he'd rather not. A soaked cushion would add five pounds of weight to his load. No matter what the weather, he'll be dealing with the utter exhaustion of what he figures will be at least 30 hours on the road. There is also the altitude change and dehydration. He's worried about wrecking the tendons in his hands, arms and shoulders, which he needs if he wants to even get out of bed or go to the bathroom.

It's a calculated risk, he says.

Mentally, he breaks the trip down into two components, the first leg to the visitors center at 9,300 feet, and everything else above that. Either portion by itself would be the hardest thing he's done. He'll count the pushes, he says. It'll help take his mind off the pain.

If he doesn't blow out his arms and shoulders on Mauna Kea, he plans to head over to Maui for a try at 10,023-foot Haleakala. He and Timmy plan to up the ante even further in October with a one-day ascent of the Zodiac route up El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, an 1,800-foot sheer face. If successful, it would be the first such ascent in a single day by a paraplegic.

But first, Hawaii's own inscrutable peak.

"The greatest hurdle for Sean is going to be the distance," says Timmy, who has bagged a number of first ascents in Patagonia, including a west face climb of Tonta Suerte on famed Mount Fitz Roy and 3.5-hour jaunt up The Nose in Yosemite, which takes most climbers three to five days.

Sean is staying in budget digs here in Hilo. There is no big entourage, no TV cameras, no hard bodies in designer sports gear. His sole support staffer so far is Raul Perena, a Hilo-based climber and short filmmaker who will record the summit attempt. Sean says he could use volunteers to drive or ride along with him to light the way and make sure he doesn't get hit by a car.

"If you're going from sea level to the top, that's a true 14,000-foot ascent," says Perena, who heard about the paraplegic athlete while climbing with Sean's celebrated brother and has filmed several of his pushes. "We don't think anyone has done something like that before."

If the Mauna Kea effort seems a bit fly-by-night, it is, Sean admits. That's his style. To his credit, Sean has done his conditioning and his homework, including two years worth of pushes up to 30 miles long in New Hampshire and Colorado. His laptop is full of spreadsheets detailing distances, times and altitude gains of past efforts so he knows how fast he can travel on different grades.

He's realistic about what he's up against. If he can start at 5 mph and make the first 28 miles in 15 hours, he'll be happy.

According to his calculations, Saddle Road is 28 miles averaging a 4.5-percent grade with 6,600 feet of altitude gain. The road up to the visitors center is another six miles with an 8.3-percent grade and 2,600 feet of altitude gain.

"I don't think Saddle Road will be too crazy," he says. "That's doable. Physically, I'm ready for that."

That first leg would put him at about 9,300 feet, 34 miles from the ocean. Then, it's soul time.

"It gets really personal and special after that," Sean smiles.

The next portion of the ascent is five miles of gravel road with a 15-percent grade, tapering off at the last four miles with a 4.2-percent grade on a paved surface.

"I may or may not get to the top," he says. "If it has gotten unsafe and I'm drooling on myself, it'll be time to stop."

For irony's sake, he carries a copy of "Walking," by Henry David Thoreau.

"It's just great fun, a celebration of life," Sean says. "How many people push wheelchairs up Mauna Kea?"

Timmy groans when he learns that his brother will be facing five miles of very steep gravel near the summit.

"He may be chasing windmills," Timmy concedes. "But chasing windmills is better than being afraid to chase anything."