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Butcher's Dog! Regular
outdoor fitness tips from the canine on creatine. Cold wet
nose and glossy coat guaranteed.
Get Fit For Winter
Mountains
Winter mountains are like old time bus
conductors and parkies - brutal and unforgiving. No really,
winter walking and climbing is tougher for a number of
reasons:
• You'll most likely be carrying
more on your back
• The ground is more likely to be
soft and energy sapping
• Crampons add around 10 per-cent
effort to walking, which is why you shouldn't use them
unless you really need to
• Shorter days mean the pressure is
on to move faster
• Cooler temperatures mean that
you're burning more energy just staying
comfortable.
Being fit in these conditions isn't just
about being more comfortable in the hills, it's also, in a
very real way, about safety. So how do you kick your butt
into winter shape?
What You Need...
Your main requirements are a combination
of good cardio-vascular fitness and localised muscle
strength and endurance. If you're mainly walking, ascents
and descents are the real killers - climbs, particularly
with a heavy pack, will give your heart a good kicking as
well as punishing leg and back muscles. If you're climbing
or mountaineering, you'll also need good strength and muscle
endurance in your upper body too. Placing axes repeatedly on
steep snow and ice will take its toll both on your arms and,
in particular, calf muscles.
Background
If you've been mountain walking regularly
over the summer and autumn months then you're already pretty
well prepared. Long days in the hills should have built good
basic fitness, but the extra demands of winter still mean
it's worth investing some extra time and effort before
winter really starts.
Outdoors Training
Running, and running hills in particular,
is far and away the most effective outdoor training
activity. Using the major muscles of the legs means that the
cardio vascular system gets a thorough work out and
crucially the hilly element will work the ascending muscles
on the way up and, particularly, the hard to activate
descending muscles - notably on the front of the thigh - on
the downs.
Don't get obsessed with running hard, for
mountains, running steadily for longer periods is the key.
Start off with a 30 minute session three times a week
leaving a day's rest between each run and aim for a pace
where you're not consistently out of breath. Don't worry if
that means a fast walk up steeper slopes. Build up the time
you're running, but not by more than 10 per-cent per week or
you risk stress fractures. Your progress will be fastest
over the first four to eight weeks, which means now -
November - is a good time to start, because you'll feel real
benefits by January. As you get fitter, designate one run as
your longer session and gradually extend it, while keeping
the others relatively short, say 40 minutes.
Once you're reached a decent level of
fitness, it's easy to get bored. Try Fartlek training,
literally it means 'Speedplay' which involves varying your
pace over the course of a session from slow jogging through
to sprinting, striding and even walking. You'll be training
your heart to work in all its ranges - like a car engine
revving - and helping it adapt to, say, sudden, short, steep
sections on a mountain ascent. Running off road, if you can,
will also help with your balance and strengthen the muscles
and tendons in your legs as you work to keep upright on
uneven ground.
The one downside with running is the
impact on joints and muscles, you can reduce this by
sticking to soft surfaces as much as possible and investing
in expert advice and a good set of shoes from a specialist
running shop. Stretching after your sessions will help
reduce soreness the next day.
• for excellent specialist running
advice and shoe reviews, take a look at the
Runner's World web
site.
Another excellent work-out is mountain
biking. It's not weight bearing in the same way as running,
but off road biking in hilly terrain will act rather like
Fartlek in giving your heart and lungs a good thrashing
without joint impact. You'll also strengthen your upper
body. If you do bike, be aware that it can shorten your
hamstrings unless you stretch properly
afterwards.
• for more mountain biking
information see our sister site BIKEmagic.com
Indoor Training
If you're stuck in the concrete jungle,
there's always the gym. Broadly the same principles apply to
the cardio vascular machines. The two we'd suggest are
treadmills and stepper or stair climber machines.
With treadmills, use the gradient
adjustment to simulate hills and be aware that the lack of
resistant on the 'flat' setting means that you should still
set it up a few degrees even for a flat workout. For less
impact, try a stepper or stairmaster, which has similar
cardio vascular benefits and also uses the same muscles as
walking uphill in a similar and transferrable way.
For more advanced fitness, speak to the
pros at the gym about heart rate monitor training. The
controlled environment of indoor training makes it easy to
hold a particular pulse rate consistently.
The other plus with gyms is access to
weights machines that you can use to strengthen specific
muscles or muscle groups. Again consult a gym professional
for specific advice, but we'd suggest a combination of a
main leg muscle group exercise like squats or leg press,
with more specific exercises like leg extensions - they
strengthen the muscle that stabilises the knee joint - and
calf raises. Tend towards high numbers of reps, 15 or so
plus, that will build localised endurance without adding
bulk.
Swimming adds variety but isn't weight
bearing, so we'd tend to concentrate on more specific
activities. Finally, if you're a climber, a combination of
indoor climbing wall training and upper body weights, think
tricep endurance for ice axe placements and pull-ups
for, erm, pulling up will help your upper body
strength.
Stretching
See my previous article below, but
regular stretching seems to reduce after-exercise soreness
and there's also some evidence that it reduces the
possibility of injuries, though there's also evidence that
it doesn't. Take your pick...
Last But Not Least
Remember that simply sitting still in
winter burns more calories than in warmer weather. Make sure
you eat properly and regularly and have adequate warm and
spare clothing. And remember folks, alcohol is bad for you
in cold weather cos it dilates your blood vessels and
dissipates body heat. Pass the brandy...
The Butcher's Dog.
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Jon Doran
