Common Cardio Mistakes For Mountaineers

In this episode, we explore some of the most basic (but most common) mistakes I see from mountaineers with their cardio training.

Episode Chapters:

0:06 
Common Cardio Mistakes for Mountaineers
5:00 
Lack of Variation in Training
6:36 
Managing Intensity Effectively
7:55 
Importance of Backup Plans
9:28 
Being a Slave to Your Tracker
11:16 
The Role of Fueling in Performance

Episode Transcript:

[0:00] All right, hello, hello, ladies and gentlemen. So in today's episode,

[0:03] we are talking through common cardio mistakes for mountaineers. And we're going to be talking through a few very common mistakes that I see from mountaineers when it comes down to their cardiovascular training. Things that I've seen over the years again and again and again, which do definitely hold back a mountaineer's performance, results when it comes to this type of training, and ultimately, you know, their chance of success on the mountain. Now, none of this is too crazy, but it is definitely worthwhile going through and covering just to make sure you're not falling into these traps. So with that being said, let's get into it. Now, mistake number one, when it comes down to cardio training for mountaineering is not having a long-term plan. And this is specifically for people who are leading up to a particular mountaineering expedition. And essentially when we are training, it is really, really, really important to have a plan in order to get the balance between ensuring that you're ready for your adventure and you're where you need to be before you head off and not going too quickly with your training.

[1:10] Because on one side of things, many mountaineers go into their training absolutely blind. They just don't know where they're going with their training. They start a certain amount of hiking, certain amount of running, certain amount of cycling, whatever it may be. And they're just like, hey, I'll take it week by week and just kind of see how I go. And I'll slowly progress things. And on one side of things, when people do this, they end up just having way too slow a buildup in regards to their training. They end up just being completely undershot of where they need to be. And they.

[1:46] At a really lower risk of succeeding in their adventure. Now, a classic example of this is a mountaineer who reached out to me a few months ago, and they were about six weeks out from a big mountain climb. So this wasn't someone I was working with directly, just sort of someone who reached out for a chat. Their particular climb required about like an eight to 10 hour day summit day. It's getting up to very high altitude. It was a big mountain climb and required people to carry about 20 kilo pack at some points in the trip, not so much on the summit, but certain points in the trip. So pretty big and challenging adventure. Now this particular person, they kind of explained their situation. They had a bit of an injury history and they're a little bit worried about aggravating these injuries. So during their training, they've been very, very conservative with their training as they built up to be careful because they said they didn't want to get injured, which is perfectly fine. It makes sense. But the problem is when I heard from this person, they were six weeks out from their climb.

[2:41] And realistically, they were so far short where they needed to be in regards to the pack weight they were training with, the elevation they were training up to, or the time spent moving. They were nowhere near any of these metrics, and there were only six weeks until their trip. And they had thought they were doing the right things in their training to build up and look after themselves, but because they hadn't planned ahead, because they didn't have a long-term plan, they were just so incredibly short. They just had no idea where they were. So that's one side of things where just not having a plan gets in the way of you being clear where you need to be. Now, on the flip side of things, I've had mountaineers in the past who haven't had a plan and have gone the other way.

[3:25] And they've ended up building up their training just way too quick. And six months before their actual expedition, they're all of a sudden already up to their full pack weight. They're already up to their full elevation. They're already up to their full time spent moving. They're hitting all their metrics six months before, which sounds good in theory, but then you've got to ask yourself, what are you going to do over these next six months? Are you going to keep on building up your pack weight and your distance?

[3:52] I don't know. There is a limit to that. Are you going to just maintain this for six months? Well, maintaining big long distances with a full load month after month after month after month, it's just not ideal. And so many people fall into an issue of picking up aches and pains and injuries when they're just overtraining like this. So on the flip side, we see people preparing and peaking way too early. Having a long-term plan with your cardio of just making sure we build up to where we need to be before the trip, but not building up so quick that we have to sustain that for months and months and months, it's really important. And it doesn't have to be complicated. You don't have to plan out everything ahead, but literally just look at your longer cardio, your hiking or your running, and put a rough draft of what you need to do. Say two to three weeks before you head out on your expedition, what are you going to peak with? What is your longest hike, your heaviest hike, what that's going to be? And then just come up with a rough plan between now and then. It can be so simple, but it is such a valuable thing. So that's mistake number one, not having a long-term plan.

[4:57] Mistake number two is not having enough variation. A lot of mountaineers have a tendency to find one or two workouts, which they feel is very, very specific, they very much enjoy, and they just do it to death. For example, I've had a mountaineer talking with previously who had been doing box step workouts with a heavy pack, which are great for mountaineering. Really, really good. Get some elevation exposure. Very, very specific. But they've been doing the same workout for 12 weeks in a row.

[5:28] Now, the issue with this is just if you are repeating the same thing over and over and over, you're doing the same angles, the same issues, and just continually loading it up, there is going to come a point where either your body and progress slows down because it's just not enough of a new stimulus for you, or you begin to pick up aches and pains from just doing the same repetitive things. A lot of mountaineers fall into this trap, whether it's with box step sessions, hill sessions, stair sessions, stair master, whatever it may be. they find these things, Mountaineers need an element of variation. You don't have to change every single workout, but typically I would usually say every eight weeks or so, you probably want to change something. Change the box step session to a stairmaster session. Change the stairmaster session to a hill session. Change the hill session to a stair session. Change that to a treadmill session, whatever. There's so many different options where you can get similar outcomes, but just getting a bit of variation over a long-term plan, very, very, very important. Don't just stick with the same thing indefinitely because there will come a point either the effectiveness will reduce or you will pick up aches and pains.

[6:36] Mistake number three is not managing intensity. You know, as a mountaineer who's listening to this podcast and maybe does a bit of research on training for mountaineering, you probably know making sure you are training the right energy systems at the right intensity is probably pretty valuable. A lot of people talk about using heart rate training and and sticking to zone two training to make sure you're working with that. That's one way of managing intensity. You don't have to use heart rate training, but it is important that you have a way of managing your intensity. So you can be confident that your low intensity sessions are low intensity and that your higher intensity sessions are high enough intensity. That is very, very valuable. If you're just going in blind and just having a vibe in regards to your training, yeah, it's probably not a great idea. Now, how can you manage intensity? You can use heart rate training, work in a zone two or zone four or zone five, whatever it may be. That's fine. You can use breathing. That works well enough. You can use nose breathing or getting a little bit out of breath or absolutely gasping for air. That works well enough. You can use rating of perceived exertion and using a scale of one to 10 on how difficult certain things are. And if you learn about that and apply that well enough, that can be pretty close, But just have some system of managing your intensity. Because if you're just going into cardio blind, you know, might not be ideal.

[7:55] Mistake number four is not having backup plans. Now, what I mean by that is typically when we are looking at longer cardio, there is always going to be something we are needing to do longer as a mountaineer. Some people do this as hiking, some people do this as running, maybe outdoor cycling, whatever it may be. Every mountaineer needs something long in their training. But the tricky thing with these is it's very, very, very susceptible to outside things getting in the way. For example, when I'm recording this, people are going through winter, summer. In the summer, some people are really, really, really struggling and getting their long hikes in. Some people in winter are really, really struggling and getting their long runs in. It's just not realistic. Or you may just be in a good season, but all of a sudden there's rain, or there's snow, or whatever it may be, or you're traveling, whatever it is.

[8:45] The mistake i see people is if they have this plan and something gets in the way then they end up just missing out on the session or just kind of like losing momentum or whatever may be realistically have backup plans for your sessions no okay i've got a long hike i got a long run i do each week if the weather's no good what am i gonna do am i gonna go to a gym and do a session on the treadmill am i gonna change it to another day am i gonna do something around the neighborhood What am I going to do? May not be quite as good as the original plan, but have something you just fall into naturally that won't take a huge amount of mental effort, won't take a huge amount of organization. So you can just fall into that and just keep on rolling. Sounds simple, but it is very important.

[9:29] Mistake number five is being a slave to your tracker. What I mean by this is a lot of people these days have these fitness watches and fitness trackers. And a lot of these fitness watches and trackers will track your recovery. And they'll say, hey, today you're really, really recovered. You're good to go to train. Sometimes it'll say, you know what, you've really under-recovered. You shouldn't train. And they kind of give this direction in regards to what you should be doing. In theory this stuff sounds good in practice it can be hit and miss because a lot of these trackers are very very very not accurate for how you're actually feeling and some people will wake up and they'll be like oh my gosh i'm knackered i'm tired i'm exhausted but their tracker will say oh you know you should be training you're good to go and they'll just push through and deal with a session and just not feel great. When in reality, if they just listen to their body, might be better just to rest or pull things back for the day. On the flip side, the amount of people who get these readings where it says you're under-recovered, you didn't sleep well, you know, it was really, really poor recovery score, and it says you shouldn't train today. But they're walking around, they're absolutely fine. And they're like, well, I could have trained or whatever it may be.

[10:43] The trackers, they're not amazing when it comes down to this. It's much better. If you use these, fine. But just ask yourself the question, if you're looking at your readiness to train and your readiness to go and do a cardio session, go and do an interval session, whatever it may be, how do you actually feel?

[10:59] Ask yourself that. Don't look at the tracker. If you feel okay to train, go train. It's fine. If you feel like you need a rest, maybe have a rest or maybe pull things back. Don't be a slave to your tracker. Don't get sucked into those numbers or sucked into those recommendations because it's not a great long-term approach for a mountaineer.

[11:17] And the final thing I want to cover, the simple mistake, is not thinking about fueling. I don't know why so many people do this, but when it comes down to longer sessions, hiking, longer runs, longer cycles, you can survive by not eating anything. It's perfectly possible. You can survive by eating barely anything. But if you want to perform at your best, you want to be making sure you're on top of your fueling. You want to be making sure you're refueling your carbohydrate stores. You want to make sure you're refueling your energy stores. You want to make sure you're putting a bit of intention around this. And this is one of the most simple things you can do to get better performance out of these sessions, to reduce fatigue, help you push further, help you push longer, help you push quicker. But so many people just don't even think about this, or they're like, I'll just have a banana on the way or something like that. Put a bit of attention into this. On one end of the scale, you can go down and figure out numbers and figure out exactly how many calories you need per hour and how many grams of carbohydrates, or at the very least, just come up with a bit of a rough plan.

[12:17] Plan out your fueling before your sessions, during your sessions if you're doing longer ones, and even after your sessions. Simple, simple, simple stuff, but it can make a dramatic difference to your performance during your cardio and also how you bounce back afterwards. Put a bit of thought into it.

[12:33] So there we go, guys. That's all I'm going to cover today. Today was pretty short and sweet, but I did want to cover these because I do see them all again. Just in recap, make sure if you're a mountaineer and you want to get the most out of your cardio, make sure you have a long-term plan. You know where you're going over the long-term with that. Make sure you're getting some variation in your sessions and you're just not doing the same workouts month after month after month. Make sure you have a way of measuring your intensity so your low-intensity sessions are low-intensity and you know if your high-intensity sessions are high-intensity. Make sure you have some backup plans, especially for sessions which require you to go outdoors, which may be impacted by weather.

[13:12] If you're using a tracker to track your recovery, do not be a slave to that. Just be a little bit more in touch with your body and ask yourself how you're feeling. And when you're looking at cardio, think about fueling before, during, after. Makes a bit of a difference. So with that being said, I'm going to wrap things up here. I'm not going to, not too much more to talk about. Last thing I will say, as I always say on this podcast, is if you are a mountaineer and you're interested in getting some personalized and specialist help with your training. If you want to learn a little bit about our online personal training for mountaineers, you can go to summitstrength.com.au slash mountaineer. On that page is a big video talks a lot about our program. And if it sounds like something you want to explore a little bit more, there's a link on that page. You can book a free call with our team and we can have a bit of a chat from there. So if you want to learn a little bit more, go to summitstrength.com.au slash mountaineer and we can take it from there. So thank you for listening. Hope you've enjoyed it and we'll talk to you very soon.

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