Towering challenge

Aoife Sheehan after a previous Sky Tower Challenge. PHOTO: SUPPLIED
Aoife Sheehan after a previous Sky Tower Challenge. PHOTO: SUPPLIED
Ahead of her third Firefighter Sky Tower Challenge in Auckland this Saturday, Queenstown firey Aoife Sheehan can’t wait to bust out another 1103 steps wearing about 25kg of full kit including breathing apparatus.

And she’s determined to register another personal best.

She and Tanya Stone, back for a fourth time, are the only Queenstown brigade vollies in this 21st event which, each year, raises more than $1million for Leukaemia & Blood Cancer New Zealand.

The 31-year-old — who’s also an airport firey and St John first responder — took about 25 minutes in her first year then about 18 minutes last year.

"This year I want to get sub-16, sub-15 would be brilliant.

"It’s my job to be, like, fit and healthy and strong, so, yeah, it’s just another marker."

Sheehan’s been training with a weighted vest up Bob’s Peak’s Tiki Trail, up the Man St carpark stairs and on a gym StairMaster.

She’s also got fit doing regular gut-busting combat challenges — she went to the worlds in Tennessee, in the United States, last October, with two other local fireys, and has qualified again to go to Texas, in the US, this October.

The challenge is also "a really nice social event".

"But then knowing we’re fundraising for something that directly affects people I know, it just means the world."

Participants, she says, are encouraged to raise about $1700 each.

She’d got to about $900 last week ahead of a morning tea fundraiser she’s putting on for fellow airport staff this week.

 

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