Are you tired of feeling sore, out of breath, and lagging behind on your hikes? These common hiking training myths might be the culprit. Here’s how to fix them easily and so you can get more out of your hikes!
I frequently get hikers asking if these tips apply to them. Yes, they do! Whether you’re young or further along in years, beginner or seasoned hiker, anyone hitting the trails this season can benefit from these exercises.
Mistake 1: Incorrect Step-Up Exercises
When most people think of exercises in the gym that mimic hiking, they start with a step-up.
They’re not wrong. The front step-up does help you build muscle in your lower body. But in the gym, we want to build the muscles that we're actually going to be using out on the trail.
By doing a lateral step-up instead of a front step-up, we are now activating our adductors, our glute medius, and the muscles that help us dorsiflexion at the ankle. This simple movement change will better strengthen the muscles that stabilize the knee while hiking on uneven terrain and reduce the amount of soreness you feel on the trail.
Top Tips for Lateral Step-Ups:
Weight your front leg more.
Make it feel like your back leg is hanging, and not working.
Move really slowly on the downward portion of the step-up. No flopping down after you step up strong!
Gradually increase the depth of your step-up.
Don’t Forget: Train Your Range of Motion
Resistance training through a larger range of motion will help you build more muscle and strength compared to a limited range of motion. The stronger you are through a larger range of motion, the easier each and every step will be, even on rocky, tough terrain.
How to Increase Range of Motion for Lateral Step-Ups:
Making the step taller.
Sinking your hips down low into the beginning position before we start the rep.
Mistake 2: Overdoing Reps in the Gym
You may have heard to only work on strength-endurance by doing more than 12 reps of each exercise while moving really slowly. After all, it takes hundreds and thousands of steps to go each kilometer when you're out on a hiking trail!
This belief could be holding you back. Studies show that strength and power training will help you more by reducing the energy cost, a.k.a. the amount of energy it takes for you to make each step.
While we do want to work on our strength-endurance before we go out hiking, we also want to build our strength and power.
The stronger you are, the smaller percentage of your one rep maximum lift each step is when you're out hiking. You can see this in my rep chart from my last post, How to Train for Hiking The Easy Way.
How to Build Strength and Power:
Build strength by doing exercises in the 5 to 8 rep range and taking lots of rest.
Power comes from short, explosive movements with really, really long rest. Think four rep maximum and tons of recovery time.
The focus on strength will actually make bigger changes in strength to your muscles, tendons, bones, and ligaments, meaning that you feel durable even in the last kilometer of the day.
The focus on power will help your mind-to-muscle connection. At the end of that long day, you're still going to be able to make the micro-adjustments you need to stay balanced and have pep in your step.
Mistake 3: Neglecting Foot Strength
Your feet have 29 different independent muscles in it, all of which help you have better balance, traction, and alignment when you're hiking.
Busting this last myth actually made a huge difference for one of the participants in our Couch to Summit program, which is a free WILDR 4-week program.
It made such a big difference for this participant that she sought me out on Instagram and sent me a message telling me her balance felt better, her feet didn't hurt at the end of the day, and she felt more confident on the trail, all because of the foot strengthening sessions.
Watch when I balance on one foot in the video below. Micro adjustments are happening at the foot and ankle, meaning that my body doesn't have to rely on larger movements higher up the chain to keep me steady.
Weakness or tightness in the feet can mean that there's pain, fatigue, and soreness not only in the foot and the ankle, but also in the knee, the hip, and even the back.
Not only that, but these muscles can get worn out even when they're locked inside a hiking boot or supported by a foot bed.
But that doesn’t have to be you. Try out these simple foot-strengthening exercises in the video below:
You can incorporate some of those exercises into the parts of the day where you're otherwise sitting idle, like at a stoplight or waiting to pick up the mail.
Truth be told, fixing these three common mistakes is the first step to be ready for your next hike. But to really get the most out of your season, you'll want to make the most of each session by having a larger plan.
Ready to take your hiking to the next level? Watch this video on the WILDR training system or join our 8-Week Hike-Ready Program.
I hope you have a WILDR day!
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