Alpinist Vince Anderson explains his thought process for locating and building a belay while ice climbing. The process is much the same when determining where to belay on a multipitch alpine route. Among the factors he considers are how protected the stance is, how comfortable it is, and how solid the ice is for building an anchor. Once Vince decides where he want to set up his belay, he immediately gets himself secured: he gets his first ice screw in, which involves pinpointing a prime placement and choosing an appropriate-length screw. Watch the following for his full explanation and demonstration.…
Author: Steve House
When I was young I discovered climbing, through my parents. I was fascinated by the big world of mountains from day one. I can’t say I ever made a conscious decision to become a climber; I followed a path of fascination that developed into a love. Thirty years on and I’m still climbing and I still love it and I still create new, interesting adventures. Thankfully, I’ve also become a coach via the platform of Uphill Athlete. Besides the balance and strategy of creating workouts to mold an athlete to be her best, what most fascinates me about coaching are…
Calves burning, hips locked in hard against the ice, one arm locked off low as I swing an ice tool high overhead. I have trained for ice climbing since the first season I discovered it way back in 1988—training that has taken me to some of the wildest places on our planet. Ice and mixed climbing are core skills to alpine climbing, and fun in their own right. Before jumping into ice climbing training (and mixed climbing training), it helps to know what is involved physically. The quintessential ice climbing movement taxes the calf muscles, the shoulder girdle muscles, the triceps,…
#Alpineprinciples This video could save your life. Why? Because most mountain accidents happen on the descent. In "Fail Well," the third installment of the Alpine Principles video series, we discuss why failure is important and detail how to descend well. Topics covered include how to err on the right side of survival; what kills descending climbers; and how to think in terms of islands of safety. Success as an alpinist is dying of old age, in bed, surrounded by loved ones. Success on a climb is going up, making good decisions, and coming back down safely. -by Steve House Intro…
Climbing mountains is incredibly dangerous. I believe long-term success as an alpinist should be defined as survival to old age. Alpinism and all its component sports—rock, ice, and mixed climbing; ski touring; and ski mountaineering—are a continuous series of life-and-death decisions that begin with planning and end when you finally step off the mountain. Technical skills (rope work, belaying, etc.) and movement (climbing or skiing) skills are easily focused on. But when you look at what kills people, it’s usually not a bad belay or an inability to climb well. This is especially true when you look at accidents among…
This page is a curated collection of peer-reviewed research relevant to hypoxic conditioning for altitude—including normobaric hypoxic sleeping, intermittent hypoxic training, and related methods used by mountain athletes preparing for high-altitude objectives. Uphill Athlete’s understanding of hypoxic conditioning has evolved significantly over the past several years. We were initially skeptical of normobaric hypoxic methods based on the limited evidence available. Through ongoing coaching experience and research led by Martin Zhor, we have identified that individually dosed, daily-monitored protocols produce meaningfully different outcomes than generic tent use. We now offer Hypoxic Conditioning Coaching as a service. For the full account of…
The spring ski-touring season is close at hand. And as we’ve seen a surge of interest from our athletes, both coached and those following plans, in prepping for long ski tours across the globe, many have asked me for my hut-to-hut ski touring gear list. I developed this list over the past decade spent guiding hut-to-hut ski trips in Europe, such as the incredible HochTirol (High-Tyrol) Traverse through Austria’s wildest mountains and the much more famous (and much more crowded) Chamonix-to-Zermatt Haute Route. This gear list, like any such list, can be modified for your needs. I suggest fine-tuning it…
Before we talk about 2018 and what a new year means to each of us personally and athletically, I want to be clear about one thing: Anything I accomplished, any success I achieved as a climber, and indeed my very survival, was enabled by the training I did. I have no special athletic talent. In all likelihood, neither do you. And that’s okay. We’ve just completed our first year pursuing our mission to provide proven training knowledge to mountain athletes: coaching plans, training plans, phone consultations, numerous articles—144 and counting—and a rich intellectual framework based on 100-plus years of training…
In this video, Uphill Athlete co-founder Steve House demonstrates how to get off an ice climb with a naked A-thread rappel anchor. By "A-thread," he means the rappel will be oriented vertically, not horizontally. And by "naked," he means he will not leave any sling material behind. The advantage of the horizontal orientation is that if it’s snowing, the snow will slough out the bottom hole. He and Vince Anderson hit upon this solution after descending a lot of routes in storms with their V-threads filling up with snow. Steve begins by creating the bottom hole. After finding a flat…
This values list is meant to help readers align their personal and athletic values with their goals, as Steve House discusses in "Know Thyself," his New Year’s piece for 2018. "Identify your values," he writes. "And identify your goals. Then reconcile those two things; the goal must be the round peg that fits the round hole of your values. Square goals don’t fit round values no matter how hard you try. And your values, when you look deeply inside yourself, are immovable, for this moment in time." What Are Your Values for Your Sport? Authenticity Achievement Adventure Authority Autonomy Balance…