90-Day
Pre-Expedition Training Program
by Brian Prax
It
stands to reason that your enjoyment of a climbing trip is significantly
influenced by how fit you are on that trip. You greatly enhance
your probability of success, increase your safety margin, decrease
your chances of becoming ill or injured, and are not totally wasted
at the end of the day if you are in better shape. Therefore, we
at VisionQuest Journeys strongly suggest that you optimize your
fitness level.
Brian
Prax is our Staff Personal Trainer, and is considered an expert
among mountain athlete trainers. Read more about Brian's
training methods and philosophies.
You
can contact Brian for more training tips, or have him design a
custom training program to fit your needs and goals, training@visionquestjourneys.com
Weeks 1-3
Gain Base Fitness Level
3-4 days per week cardio training (run, hike, bike, swim, xc ski).
Do these at a moderate level of exertion for increasing lengths
of time per session, starting at 45 min, increasing over the 3
week period to 2-3 hour sessions. Take a day off in between sessions,
but no more than 2 days off in a row. 2-3 days per week
strength training with focus on legs and torso. Things like squats,
lunges, leg press, hamstring curls, calf raises, and stair master
at slow speed with a pack on are a good place to start. Do 2 –
4 sets per session of as many repetitions as you can do to the
point of fatigue. Adjust the weight/resistance so that you are
doing around 30 repetitions by the time you reach fatigue. Take
between 1 and 3 days off between sessions.
Weeks
4-8 Increase Sport Specific Fitness
Gradually increase to 5-6 days per week of cardio training, with
minimum of 2 hours per day with occasional 4+ hour sessions. Make
training more specific to what you will be doing on the trip =
going up and down hills with a pack on. When this is not an option,
continue with things that use the muscles in a similar fashion
like biking and getting on the stair master as opposed to running
and swimming. Keep up the same strength training, increasing the
weight to the point where you achieve fatigue at 20 repetitions.
Strength training can be phased out if your other training is
very sport specific and you gain strength from it (e.g. the ole
up and down the hill with a pack thing– great strength and
cardio at the same time).
Weeks 9-11 Maintain
High Fitness Level
Most people can decrease their exercise frequency to 3-4 times
per week at this point and maintain if not still gain fitness.
This is a great time to put in 1 or 2 days per week of almost
all day (6+ hours on and off) training sessions to get your body
ready for all day every day on the trip.
Week 12 Taper
Take it easy this week and let your body fortify itself. Train
by doing 2 days of easy 1-2 hour cardio workouts and eat a lot
of what you are supposed to be eating. Get used to hydrating as
much as you can and kick back and get excited about your trip
and how much more fun you will have now that you are fit for it.
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