On the Nose

I'm going to get plenty of hate mail for this, but what else is new.  Quinn Brett is paralyzed because of an attempted "speed climb" of El Cap via the Nose route.  Tommy Caldwell, who just broke the 2-hour barrier, is now apparently questioning the wisdom of speed climbing.  

I have a love for speed.  I really enjoy driving as fast as I can to and from Lyons, or to and from Loveland, ignoring the double yellow lines and darting around cars where I don't have anywhere near the safe cushion to pass.  But I just love taking risk.  So while I am breaking records again and again, including the almost unheard of 14 minutes uphill starting from the bear sculptures in Lyons to Bond Park (which has to be done at 2:00 in the morning to avoid the long strings of oncoming traffic), and people engaged in the same quest are injuring themselves (or others) again and again, and calling the EMTs into play when they could be somewhere else, at some point I have to keep doing it, because it's in my blood, but occasionally question if I should be doing it, given the increasing body count, and the rising tide of outside voices that ask, "What exactly does this accomplish, besides demonstrating that you can push yourself to take more risks than others, and are currently luckier than others?"  But only the good die young, right?  And there are always reasons to hold fund raisers, and we hardly blame patients for bringing catastrophic illness or injury onto themselves - Bareback and bull riders, motocross racers, Jackass participants who ride shopping carts down mountains, etc., etc.  What is the reason of living if you can't convince others your accomplishments are more significant than theirs?