[madanyang]

Hi,

The workouts for hiking on hilly terrain in the 24 week mountaineering plan has some weird descriptions, at least I find them so maybe I haven’t understood the philosophy behind.

In the transition period upto the 4th week which is recovery, the time and minimum vertical gain increases nicely from from 2 hrs to 2:30 hrs with a vertical gain starting with 1000 ft to 1500 ft. So far so good. With the recovery week workout time is reduced to 2hrs but vertical gain goes up to 2000 ft.

Week 5 is min vertical gain of 2500 ft week 6 is 2000 ft. week 7 and 8 are with vertical gains of 1000 ft.
Through out the base period upto the conversion to specificty week 2 vertical gain is still min of 1000 ft then; except for the recovery weeks in the base period where the min vertical gain is 1000 ft,the minimum vertical gain is 2000 ft.

My question is shouldn’t in addition to the time volume of the workouts, the min vertical gains also increase as I understand from previous discussions in the forum elevation gain was an important metric to take into consideration. I understand the given gains are minimum but shouldn’t the minimums also increase during the training

Thanks

Topic

[Anonymous]

Anonymous on February 2, 2018 at 4:50 pm #7937

Thanks for writing in to clarify. You are correct that vertical gain is a critical component of these training plans for mountaineering. We write this plans for a very wide range of users and can try to make the flexible so that the individual can adjust them to meet his or her personal abilities. If we rigidly state a distance or vertical along with the workout time were run the risk of making that workout too hard for some and too easy for others.

That is why you will see in the instructions with all these workouts clearly states a MINIMUM suggested elevation gain. This leaves the stronger climber, or one with better access to vertical terrain the option of adding more vertical training into the plan. It should be obvious that the person who and train 5,000 vertical feet in a week will see bigger gains than one who can only mange 2,000 feet. But demanding 5000 feet from everyone might well overtrain some less fit climbers.

So adjust according to your capacity for this type of work.
Scott

[madanyang]

madanyang on February 3, 2018 at 3:42 am #7942

Thanks Scott for the clarification.

What would be the recommend percentage of increase of elevation in respect to the previous weeks? I mean is there a similar approach like the time spent at Zone1/Zone2 increases or decrease during the recovery weeks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous on February 3, 2018 at 3:43 pm #7953

Ideally one would progress the vertical each week in a similar fashion as one would with distance or time in Z1-2. But as with any progression of this type there is a great deal of individuality involved. Those with stronger legs and more background with lots of vertical will be able to handle more and faster. Assess your leg fatigue as you go along and don’t hesitate to use recovery periods to get your legs refreshed. It is easy to overtrain these muscles and dig yourself into a deep hole of fatigue that can take weeks to climb out of. Check your legs daily on a set of stairs. If they take more than 2 days of easy training to bounce back from a big vertical day then you are dancing pretty close to the edge and should dial it own a bit.

Scott