[madanyang]

Hi,

In the coming day I will be doing Steep Uphill workout as part of the 24 week Mountaineering plan. As I will be doing a lot of them including the Z3 version, I am looking the best possible training option and here are my alternatives.

1) 40 minute drive away small hilly location:
The distance covered is 2 km with an elevation gain of 287 meters. I normally do this in 30 minutes while staying under AeT. It takes me roughly 20 minutes coming back to the starting point with a nice easy downhill walk/run.
So with the first workout being 1 hr 20 minutes, I would need approximately 2hrs 10 minutes to finish the work out, and of course I would need another 40 minutes to drive back home.

2) Stair Master option:
As there aren’t any high rises with stairs to use, Stair Master is the other option. I would need 15 minutes to bike to the gym and then basically do the workout

3)Treadmill with 15% grade:
Again the gym is 15 minutes bike ride and then workout

As you can see with the increase in workout time in the future, option 1 becomes slightly time consuming.

Which option would you choose if you were in similar situation ?

Thanks

Topic

[madanyang]

madanyang on February 25, 2019 at 10:49 am #16991

Looks like I forgot to add steepness for option 1 small hilly location it is 14% so not much different then the treadmill option

[Anonymous]

Anonymous on February 25, 2019 at 2:42 pm #17002

Give the options you present here I think you will be best served by the stair machine. 14-15% is not steep in terms of mountaineering. It will be hard to elicit the LOCAL muscle fatigue limitation you need in order to maximize the training effect. By steep we mean a minimum of 20% and better yet up to 40-50%.

Scott

[madanyang]

madanyang on February 26, 2019 at 12:40 pm #17018

Thanks Scott. I was leaning towards the stairmaster option as well but with so much discussion going on how stairmaster is taking the gravitational weight off from the movement I wasn’t so sure.

I guess in my case doing the Gym based muscular endurance as outlined in https://uphillathlete.com/mountain-climbing-strength-workout-muscular-endurance/ would be a better option rather rather doing the weighted climbs on the stairmaster.

Thanks again

[Mike_Oregon]

Mike_Oregon on November 4, 2019 at 9:59 pm #31168

I have similar problems no close steep spots, although I do have a great training climb about a 1 hr drive but I can’t work it into my schedule on Wednesdays. I love a little southwest of Portland if anyone has good ideas of locations! My question is would 18” step ups be better than a stair climber, as boring as that would be?

[matthewsbc]

matthewsbc on November 6, 2019 at 2:04 pm #31387

Most of the treadmills I’ve seen max out at 15%, but the ones at the nearby golds go up to 30%. Depending on what you have access to in terms of gyms, it might be worth checking around to see if any have that type. 30% is pretty solid for a treadmill workout, definitely feels way different that 15%.