Last year I climbed the CN Tower (which means going up the 1776+ stairs).  I never really told the story of what happened, but basically it was a difficult mental and physical test. I had to take quite a few rest stops on the way up to catch my breath. In the end, I had a lousy time of 44:56. I am sure I can do better.

How bad is 45 minutes?

http://www.wwf.ca/HowYouCanHelp/CNTowerClimb/2007/results/resultsPublic-overall.txt

I finished 4023 out of 4222 total climbers. Or 1911 out of 1964 male climbers. Oh my god.

One thing that slowed me, I'm sure, was climbing all the way to the top with a partner. Now my climbing partner is in better shape than I am, but she had more difficulty as we got to the top whereas I wanted to keep going.

Two people climbing together is not just as slow as the slowest member, its a lot slower when one person wants to stop and the other person doesn't. I changes the momentum, turns what could have been 20 minutes of intensity into 40 minutes of alternating intesity and rest, which is a different workout. I'm sure we both could have done a lot better if we just met at the top.

I'm planning to do it again this year. But I will climb solo and do it in under 30 minutes.