Your 10 week hike training planner and how to use it

So you’ve worked out where you currently are with your Hiking Fitness, in relation to:

• Exercise
• Surfaces & Climbing
• Hiking experience
• Carrying weight (backpack)

FOR WEEK ONE, it’s time to plan forwards and work backwards with your Training Planner (click the link below to download your PDF).

Here’s the steps for this week:

• IDENTIFY WHERE YOU WANT TO BE IN 10 WEEKS TIME
  • Perhaps you have a scheduled multi day hiking holiday at that time or soon after that you need to boost your hiking fitness and skills
  • Maybe you are returning to hiking and your goal is to hike a local trail of 5km or 10km
  • Maybe you are simply wanting a pathway to longer term hiking fitness
• WRITE IT DOWN.  AND BE VERY SPECIFIC
  • ie my goal is to walk 10km a day each day for 5 days on a bush trail that is rocky underfoot carrying a 5-7kg backpack and wearing my Summer Hiking clothes.
  • OR my goal is to be consistently walking 5km, 3 times a week, including hills and being able to recover my breath quickly.
• COUNT & PLAN BACKWARDS.  
  • Identify where you are now and where you need/want to be in 10-12 weeks time.
  • Look at your diary of your work schedule, your current commitments, key dates such as birthdays or holidays etc. And factor in a rest day or two.
  • Look at where you currently have space in your calendar to devote time to YOU and YOUR hiking goals.

Right now, that’s all you need to do and on our next lesson we will go through how to build more into your plan.

Here’s an example of a training calendar (note this will be different to yours but gives you some idea of how to lay out your week)