18
WSU Currents
•
Fall 2012
Early April to late May is prime season on the 29,000-
foot Everest, when the weather is less severe and Sherpa
guides have established climbing routes. The
conditions remain
unpredictable, and
dangerous: during
the
2012
season,
there were about
500
summits with
ten confirmed
deaths.
Kasak’s team,
supported by a
coterie of guides
and porters, set
up a full physiological testing lab at more than 3 miles
above sea level. Despite the remote location on a glacier
surrounded by towering peaks – and the constant sounds
of creaking ice and falling rocks – Kasak says that the
base camp was “like a small city with hundreds of tents,”
that sheltered climbers waiting to scale Everest. “There
was everything from a helicopter landing pad to wireless
Internet,” says Kasak.
Getting there wasn’t easy, however. After flying first to
Kathmandu, Nepal, and then to a village on the slopes
of the Himalayas, Kasak and the Mayo group hiked 53
twisting miles to base camp. The trek took eight days, giv-
ing the team time to acclimate to the high altitude. Kasak
says that living conditions along the way, in isolated
outposts and ramshackle guesthouses, were Spartan. But
the distinctive peak of Everest was always just around the
next bend.
KASAK’S JOURNEY
towards physiology research
has been nearly as convoluted as the path ascending
to Everest.
As an undergraduate at Winona State, he was more
interested in a career in strength and conditioning with
a college athletics program or professional sports team.
Right after earning his degree in exercise science in
2009,
Kasak got his chance: a choice internship as a
strength coach with the St. Louis Rams.
“
I knew almost immediately that I couldn’t see myself
going in that direction, not in the long term,” says Kasak.
He returned home to Austin, Minnesota, weighing his op-
tions.
A few years earlier, to complete degree requirements,
Kasak completed a clinical experience in the same Mayo
lab in which he now works. Bruce Johnson had been his
advisor. Kasak revisited the lab – he says he’s uncertain
about what led him back there – and eventually ran into
Johnson.
Johnson offered Kasak a deal he couldn’t refuse: a
research assistant position in a productive lab, with the
opportunity to immerse himself in the nuts and bolts of
physiological testing, albeit unpaid. Kasak worked unpaid
for about eight months, putting in long hours and living
with his parents in Austin to make ends meet.
The risk paid off for Kasak. He first moved to a half-
time position in the lab and shortly after full-time. He has
now been working with Johnson and his group of doctoral
and post-doctoral students for about three years.
WHILE KASAK KNEW
that the focus of Johnson’s lab was
respiratory physiology under various conditions, he was
initially less aware that its research interests would send
him to exotic locations around the world. In addition to
working with the Everest climbers, the Johnson’s group has
also conducted testing in the Antarctic, Croatia, and the
Swiss Alps.
“
There’s no way to simulate the conditions of these
areas,” says Kasak to explain what he terms “adventure
physiology.” “Reproducing the reactions to trekking all day
at altitude, sleeping in harsh conditions, and then doing it
all again the next day. There’s only so much you can do in
the lab.”
The Mayo Everest Research Team did its best, how-
ever, to recreate its research lab at its Himalayan base
camp. Kasak and his fellow researchers set up in two
large tents, packed with the equipment they brought up
and powered by generators.
MAYBE THAT’S WHY
,
a few weeks later, Kasak seems
nonchalant when talking about Everest. He saw the
outside of the tents only occasionally while at base camp,
except for a few hikes on the glacier. “I worked all day,
every day, doing blood draws, body composition mea-
surements, stress testing, organizing data,” he says.
“
We even collected data while the climbers slept
to measure heart rate, blood oxygen, breathing, brain-
wave patterns. It could be mentally taxing and physically
exhausting.”
Kasak is unsure where he’ll spend his twenty-sixth birth-
day. Perhaps the question is a little unfair since he’s barely
had time to thaw from the zero-degree nights on Everest,
and the thousands of samples collected there await analy-
sis in his lab across the street.
He’s certain, however, that he’s found his niche
in research and is contemplating entering the University of
Minnesota’s graduate program in exercise
physiology. The next adventure awaits.
An imperfect cake
can be forgiven
when it was baked
at more than
17,000
feet.
The Mayo Clinic
team built a full
physiology
testing lab on
the shoulders
of Everest.
