elevation gains

[marmot]

regarding elevation gains, i found this pretty interesting, an interesting fact is that denali requires more than 3 vertical miles of climbing from the base.
all about huge elevations gains, and elevation gain rules and some examples of big gainers:
http://www.cohp.org/records/elevation/e ... lists.html

Mauna Kea in Hawaii is 13700 feet elevation gain, but then again, badwater to whitney is 14700 feet of elevation gain (net). The only difference is that some people hike to mauna kea in one day from the ocean base.

Cy and Zippetydude, we need to go to hawaii and do that!

[Cy Kaicener]

Marmot - Mt Everest has been climbed from sea level and so has Mt Aconcagua which is around 23,000 ft. In our neck of the woods Mt Baldy has been climbed from Heaton Flats at 1500 ft. There is a website called from Sea to Summit which you should see. Lets go from c2c to s2s
http://angelfire.com/or/petermarsh/sts.htm
http://angelfire.com/or/petermarsh/stsclimbs.htm

[zippetydude]

Sounds like fun! I've also thought about something close by - going from the low point of the PCT near Snow Creek up through Mission Creek and up Fish Creek trail to the top of San G. I did the first 10 miles of it a couple of years ago, just scouting it out, and it was perfectly graded. I think it works out to about 29 miles all together, so it would be smooth but a pretty good distance.


Some fun group run / hike would be a great idea, though. I'm thinking about popping up to Whitney one day before the snow comes if I have a chance - just a quick one day turnaround. There's almost always a few dayhike permits available at the Visitor Center, though to get an overnight backpacking trip requires a bit of luck through the lottery.

To keep it simple, maybe we could get a group dayhike going sometime next summer. Maybe even camp at Whitney Portal a day or so in advance and swap stories of mountain adventures.

Sound interesting to anyone?

z

[Perry]

Sounds great! I'm going to do the mountaineer's route before it snows. Maybe we could camp out. I have a few stories, but I'm sure somebody else has better ones. But the most exciting ones are usually made up.

[AlanK]

We have had some group hikes on http://www.mt-whitney.info/. They turned out to be good events. It's worth doing!

[zippetydude]

Perry: I haven't done the mountaineers route. Is it simply a rougher trail - like Skyline maybe, or does it require actual rock climbing techniques, ropes, etc?

Alan: We almost passed each other when you were up on the JMT, I was just a few days later. I just got back Sunday and saw your posting on the SG bulletin board. I was up in Tuolumne, but did various trail runs out along the JMT. By the way, I did one going to Clouds Rest and Half Dome on the way down to the valley. Yipes, I kind of have a thing about heights, and I would classify both as Near Death Experiences. Beautiful views, though. Have you been up to either or both? Incidentally, it looks like you guys did some serious mileage when you were out there - do you run some of the trail?

z

[AlanK]

z -- We had to put off Half Dome until next time. We walked the entire trail. We covered the ground by hiking all day -- about 10 hours on a typical one.

I have some thoughts regarding caloric intake and level of effort. I will probably post them sometime because I think it could lead to an interesting discussion. Basically, when I do a day hike, I'm fully charged. But I was not eating nearly enough on the JMT hike to replenish glycogen stores. (The packs would have had to be heavier for that!) I think that led to a somewhat lower level of effort than I can sustain on a day hike. I have at least a couple of pounds of fat to burn, so it was not as if I was going to run out of low grade fuel. I'm not sure that Eric noticed this because he's a lot lighter than I and ate almost as much. The bottom line is that I am interested in how trail runners handle eating on long outings like the JMT.

[zippetydude]

I'm with you on the glycogen stores - have you heard the adage, "Fat burns in a carbohydrate fire" ? In other words, metabolism of fat calories happens only if there is sufficient carbohydrate store to sustain the process.

I ran into the problem, typically called "bonking" in trail running, early on. I got some advice from trail runners, and I've never had the problem since. Ultimately, you want to get a steady stream of carbs flowing into the system the whole time you're moving. For most, this is fairly easily done by mixing maltodextrin into a gatorade type drink, and using that as most of your fluid intake. On a run of less than an hour, water is fine. But for 20 to 35 miles, I drink constantly, and only a very little bit is straight water. The result is that I never feel tired, I seldom feel hungry (although I do supplement with gels and the occasional Cliff Bar) and I don't dehydrate. It has made all the difference in the world. You can get maltodextrin at GNC or Vitamin Shoppe, etc.

Incidentally, there's a new finding on nutrition that a few grams of protein seem to help also on sustained energy and metabolism, though the physiological mechanism is not yet known, so for gels I now use Accelgel. It has 5g of protein, and tastes delicious. The only problem with these, as opposed to other gels, is that my kids are constantly trying to get me to let them eat them, because they taste so good. I like the strawberry-kiwi the most.

If you try this out, I think you'll get the result you're looking for, and you may surprise yourself on the second half of the hikes.

One other thing: I'm not really built like a typical runner. I lift weights every other day and do other sports as well, so I'm not of the light, thin build that most runners are. Because of this, I may need more calories than a thinner person would. If you're 130 lbs, you might go with a bit more water. Since I'm 179, I burn a lot of calories and find it really helps to have a significant intake the whole time I'm moving.

z

[AlanK]

z -- Your experience is consistent with mine. I don't have probelms on day hikes, but I believe that is due to keeping the carbs flowing (in addition to starting with a "full tank").

On the JMT, we were averaging 25 miles per day. I found the going easy in the mornings. We typically walked from 7:30 until 12:30 with a couple of short breaks. In the afternoon, the pace slowed somewhat and we took more breaks. It wasn't just that walking all day makes one tired. We're used to that. I think the issue was that I never had a "full tank" of glycogen stores in the mornings because I was not taking in enough calories. By the afternoon, I was running on something far short of high octane fuel.

This was not a big surprise and it did not cause major problems. I knew in planning for our food that I was not going to be taking in as many calories as I burned. The reason was that we were only willing to carry so much weight. I correctly figured that I could deal with that for a week. As I said, we enjoyed the hike a lot.

I learned a lot from this hike and am always interested in improving things. For that reason, I appreciate your post.

[Perry]

Whitney MR is class 3 without any snow or ice. Earlier in the summer people run into ice after a good snow year, so it can be an ice climb or a class 4/5 variation to avoid the ice. The ice climb I've heard is very dicey no matter which way you go. About one person dies every year on the MR.

I've set my best running times using a maltodextrin/fructose combination, with the emphasis on the maltodextrin. Research supports that as well. There is something there about protein too, but I've not experimented with that. That's mainly for the really long stuff, so that would apply to Alan's JMT outing but not my "short" workouts.

If you're limited by weight, then it's more effective to use the carbohydrates later on. After you are already warmed up the muscles rapidly absorb glucose from the bloodstream, so it's unlikely to spike blood sugar in most people. Later in the workout the body slightly shifts more towards fat-burning as the blood glucose level drops. But in a marathon it's good to drink sports drink at the first aid station and continue because it's there and you don't have to carry it. If you slam a bunch of GU's at the beginning of a workout, that will spike blood sugar and shift the body's metabolism towards carbo-burning, thus wasting the GU's you just ate.