Hiking/approaching vs running?

damn, nick's zone 1 pace is really fast.  i use a heart rate of approximately 135 as my zone 1 target, and jogging on flat ground with no pack at approximately sea level my 10 mile pace is about 10:45 (using wrist watch HR monitor) to 11:00 (chest strap) per mile.  I have definitely improved a lot though, when I first started a couple years ago, i had done very, very little cardio in a long time, and it was hard to even slightly break into a jog without going over 140 bpm.

one thing that is pretty amazing, obvious when you really think about it, but easy to sort of forget about is how sensitive the human powered machine is to the gradient they are operating on.  when you are watching an HR monitor pretty closely it really demonstrates this.

3 things from tftna have helped me

1.. long z1 workouts
2.. heavy weight z1 hill climbs (60+lbs)
3.. light weight long z1 hill climbs (30lbs)
I usually strap my mtb on my pack for additional weight for the climb,  then ride my bike down.  Lather,  rinse,  repeat

Fast cycling and running for z3, plus weights training. 

David S wrote: 
I usually strap my mtb on my pack for additional weight for the climb,  then ride my bike down.  Lather,  rinse,  repeat

I haven't heard of this method before! I like the idea. I am going to try it.

Edit: I cant post anymore today, but to David could you share details on how you rig it to your backpack or back? Couldn't agree more about zooming down! Also bombing hills on mountain bikes is fun!

master gumby wrote:

I haven't heard of this method before! I like the idea. I am going to try it.

Hiking down hill sucks! Zooming down on a bike is nice and actually, much better for training. You get down faster, your heart rate is still elevated from climbing, and you get more laps in.

That... is actually a pretty neat idea.  Having a downhill ride to look forward to sounds fun.

slim wrote: damn, nick's zone 1 pace is really fast.  i use a heart rate of approximately 135 as my zone 1 target, and jogging on flat ground with no pack at approximately sea level my 10 mile pace is about 10:45 (using wrist watch HR monitor) to 11:00 (chest strap) per mile.  I have definitely improved a lot though, when I first started a couple years ago, i had done very, very little cardio in a long time, and it was hard to even slightly break into a jog without going over 140 bpm.

one thing that is pretty amazing, obvious when you really think about it, but easy to sort of forget about is how sensitive the human powered machine is to the gradient they are operating on.  when you are watching an HR monitor pretty closely it really demonstrates this.

It *used* to be really fast. That was when I was spending a ton of time doing longer days in the mountains, looking back 5 years ago on the 4th of July weekend I did the west face of NEWS on a Friday, came back west and did the east to west ridge of forbidden car to car the next day, then went home on sunday and still did a 5k jog that night. That was about the volume I logged at least 3 weekends a month all spring/summer.

Now that I decided to just focus on actually getting halfway decent at rock climbing I haven't been doing any separate aerobic capacity training (other than approaching crags) and man does it show. I went up to CBR a few weeks ago and was so depleted when we got to the route that all my power was gone. My pace was horrifically slow on the uphill. That really showed the negative side of training, when you don't keep it up you WILL loose it and trying not compare to your former self is tough. Good news is that it's much easier to gain back the second go round than it was the first time.  

Yep, your training has to be specific to what your doing. Reading Training for the New Alpinism really helped me. I do a lot of hiking in our local mountains, especially Baldy, Wilson, and Iron which makes the approach for climbs a breeze. I’m never out of breath for alpine stuff.

I carry a ton of water to simulate weight from gear. If I get too tired I just dump the excess out. Only problem is tap tastes bad. If I take filtered alkaline water, it tastes great but I feel bad dumping excess out.