Started training for Mt. Whitney hiking this year

I got a permit for Mt. Whitney hiking in June!

   Finally, I made a reservation for the overnight permit for Mt. Whitney hiking this year.   The entry date is about a month from now.  Due to an injury in January this year, my daily training was slowing down for a few months.  When I went backcountry skiing in the end of February, it was really tough for me.  I guess my fitness performance might get lower if I do not daily exercise for a few weeks due to my age.  After that I resumed my daily training and I am still on the way to recover to my previous performance.

   The last a few months since March, I have been doing “Elliptical” training in a gym and I just resumed “Treadmill running” and “Stair Master” since May 1^st.   I am still having hard time to do 1 hour treadmill running with 5 miles per hour pace and doing stair master with 75 steps par minutes for an hour.

Training Menu for the next 30 days

  Here is my training plan for the next 30 days:

1.       Elliptical with various stress setup for 1 hour with build-up style, the target heart rate started from around 100bpm and  165~170bpm at the end.

2.       Elliptical with long interval, 6 minutes resting and 6 minutes high intensity, total 5 sets

3.       Stair master with 75 steps per minutes for 1 hour

4.       Elliptical with various stress setup for 1 hour with build-up style, slightly slower than #1

5.       Elliptical with short interval, 1 minute resting and 1 minute high intensity, total 30 sets

6.       Treadmill running for 1 hour with 5 miles per hour and possibly 6 miles per hour with 6 degrees slope

7.       Rest day, either after #3 or #6 depending on my condition

   My maximum heart rate during the menu will reach around 160~175bpm based on my experience in the last few weeks and the average heart rate would be around 150bpm.  Last year, I had a similar menu before going hiking.  So I have a confidence I will be all right during the hiking this year as well.

   This menu can cover stress for cardiopulmonary and leg strength for ascending.  For a training of trail running, might need to consider for descending.  I guess it is better to do something, but it could be all right without it because the impact for descending during walking is much less than running.

Maximum heart rate limit during the hiking this year

   Last year, I set the maximum heart rate during the hiking to 155bpm ~ 160bpm.  As I mentioned a couple times, I felt it could be a bit high based on the experience last year.   This year I pick 150bpm which is the average heart rate during the daily training.  It is probably reach close to 160bpm in some sections such as a section between Outpost Camp and Trail Camp with camping stuff.  I probably need to accept such situation as an exception.   But I will try to maintain lower heart rate, therefore, I might need to stop walking when the heart rate is beyond 155bpm something like that.  Then I want to see how it work during the hiking this year.

   I am really looking for a good method to define the maximum heart rate and managing the pace based on the heart rate during the hiking.  So every hiking, I will try to collect more data to prove my concept at least myself.  This is the topics for my next book I really want to publish.  Let’s see how things go!