Yesterday, I decided to take advantage of the weather. Since we had a few days of warmer temperatures and a few days of rain, the snow has melted away. Time to hit the woods!

I haven't had the new pack on for a training hike. (Trying the pack on and wearing it around the house doesn't count!) So I loaded it up, put it on, and hiked around some of the mountain bike trails in the area. My base weight (pack, tent, sleeping bag, sleeping pad, ground pad, first aid kit, clothes, guide books, hygiene products,trekking poles, and camping supplies) is 20.6 pounds. A little heavier than I had wanted, since I still have food and water to add to the pack. But I'm sure I'll figure out what to get rid of once I hit the trail.

I gotta tell you, it felt GREAT! 

The first thing I noticed were all the downed trees. There were alot of them.

I mean alot of them! I did a lot of climbing over trees. And climbing under trees. I was rather impressed with myself that I was able to scramble under trees like this one without disrupting the pack. (This tree was alot lower to the ground than the picture suggests. Trust me. Be rather impressed with me, too.)

Not this one, though. I had to do a bit of bush-whacking to get through this mess. I'm not that good!

In addition to a nice obstacle course, the woods provided me with other sources of entertainment and inspiration:

The last remnants of winter.

Next to the first signs of spring.

A few rocky hills. 

Some birds and animals (No pictures of them. They were too fast!)

And a few more downed trees.  (Plus my finger. What the heck is that doing in there?)

After the hike I felt great! The boots felt good, the pack felt comfortable, and after just a tiny bit of adjusting, no pinching or pressure areas. 

And best of all, I'm feeling a little less panic-y about the trail.

Now if I can just get the apartment packed up and the remaining work responsibilities taken care of! 

In terms of physical conditioning, the biggest part of my training would, of course, be endurance work. This challenge is the mack daddy of any endurance event I have ever attempted. Way bigger than a marathon. Way bigger than a Tough Mudder. Way bigger than a tri. And it's pretty much all endurance.

In terms of training specificity, it would make the most sense to train for hiking by -- hiking. But winter in New England paired with my weird work hours makes hiking a bit of a challenge. Sure, there are some die hard hikers out there who would gladly trek through 2 feet of snow in the dark for training purposes. I opted for the wimpy version -- treadmill and other cardio equipment.

I essentially had 4 types of cardio workouts:
1) Long flat runs
2) Short, fast runs 
3) Hills
4) Weighted workouts

The long flat runs I tried to make 7 or more miles. I didn't worry about  speed (I never do!) I just wanted to get moving and get some miles under me. The short fast runs (Or shall I say, short and slow but slightly faster than the long run pace) were 3 or 4 miles. An after work get a few miles in workout. The hill workouts were done outside weather permitting. If the weather sucked, I did this treadmill workout. And the weighted workouts were done with a 15 pound weighted vest. I often combined the weighted workouts with the others, so maybe a weighted incline treadmill workout or a weighted short run. I didn't do long runs with the weighted vest, but often I would go on long walks with the vest.

I tried for a minimum of 4 cardio workouts per week, sometimes more, though there were, admittedly a couple weeks where I had a less, depending on how I felt or if I had to stay late at work.  But for the most part, I treated them as the prep work for day after day of the ultimate cardio experience. 

Am I ready? Truthfully, I'm not sure I am. But I also think I could workout religiously for the next 6 months and still not feel ready. I'm just gonna have to go for it.

Outside of the logistics of planning a 5-6 month long hiking trip, there is the daunting task of getting in shape. It's by far the biggest challenge I have ever undertaken. And unlike marathon or triathlon training, there aren't an overabundance of training plans for thru-hiking readily available on the internet. I was just going to have to take my existing experience with endurance training and cobble something together.

Outside magazine's December issue had an article about incorporating Crossfit into marathon training. It even had a 12 week training plan to follow. There were some parts of the plan I really liked, like the idea that going big to build muscle would help you for long distances. And, of course, lots of core work is always good. But as time progressed, I noticed that I was spending an awful lot of time on plyometrics and sprint training and very little on endurance work. And the more I read up on Crossfit, the more it appeared to me that the Crossfit gurus just don't appear to like running. At all. How else would you explain the push to train for a marathon by running as little as possible? Or training for a thru-hike by keeping cardio short and fast? So after four weeks I decided to pull out the aspects I liked about the program (strength and core work) and scrap the rest. 

Then I mixed up my own mish-mash frankenstein thru-hiking training plan. 

My plan consisted of of 6 main factors:
1) Endurance work
2) Strength training
3) Core 
4) Flexibility
5) Equipment workouts
and what I call 6) The "Suck-It-Up-and Deal" workout......