High Sierra Topix

Hi All,

I had originally planned to spend B-day no. 65 the "preferred" way in the High Sierra (at a place with big goldens) but an ominous weather report cancelled that. So no. 65 won't be one of the memorable High Sierra ones like no. 10 (Sawtooth Pk and Monarch Lake), no. 49 (Tunemah and basin below Tunemah), no. 55 (Algers to Dana Meadows plus Koip and Kuna Peaks), no. 59 (first father-daughter trip Stony Ridge L and vicinity).

The High Sierra was a special place for me growing up and remains so as I have transitioned to official senior status, which for us mountain-oriented people is probably connected to when we get that senior national parks etc. pass. Over the years I've been a part of the Topix community we've all shared the joy of the High Sierra and we've also seen quite a few of the members age, too. Sadly, we've also lost some of our community, too.

Given that there are quite a few of us "senior" Topix I figured I'd add a few training notes that could belong in the "Bootcamp" forum (as an update to "ascending and descending") but I figured, I'd share a few notes, given that I began the day with one of my neighborhood hikes. All of us respond differently to training, have different health issues (including various joint issues and such), and I think it's clear that folks, regardless of how they train seem to age on different trajectories---of course we see this in professional sports. We all know that Father Time is undefeated and that no amount of training will return a 65-year-old to 25-year-old prime condition, but....Training helps and it helps folks of all ages.

This season has been a huge reminder of that for our family. It was back in 2022, when I was probably having extra conditioning issues owing to testosterone suppression that accompanied prostate cancer treatment, when Lee suggested I start figuring out some climbing exercises. He suggested running up hills but part of my issues in 2022 was that my knees didn't like running, so I figured to carry a fairly heavy (30-50lb) pack up neighborhood hilly streets. That made a huge difference by the end of 2022. In 2023 Dawn was ahead of me on the lead off of the 100+ degree ascent out of Hetch Hetchy but clearly went out too fast so that I had to wait up a few times in the final approach to Lake Vernon. But in 2023 Dawn was still training hard and she was very strong. This year has illustrated that even strong young adults (she's 18) need to train if they want to keep up with a senior citizen who IS training and training hard. Dawn ran track in her senior season in high school but has not really worked out since the season ended. I've kept up the regular hill climbs, which began as 1 hr 40 min sessions but got as low as 1 hr 20 min (because of increase in speed) prompting me to add more climbs and distance to the neighborhood hike. In addition I worked in the ramp-up of "easy" (dayhike or easy backpack) to "moderate" (backpack) leading to what would normally have been a "warm up" trip to Thousand Island Lake from Rush Creek. That trip showed the value of all that training. I was the strongest I've been in at least 15 years and probably more. In addition to pace a test is whether I can take the steep uphills on my toes with a full pack--I was able to sustain that throughout the 3500' of gain to Thousand Island and I really can't recall the last time I was able to do that (probably back when I was in my 30s or 40s). Dawn without the level of training she's had in the past was laboring. Sure she was stronger than most on the trail, but I had to do the ascent at about 60-70% to not separate too fast and too much.

It would have been great if our long trip went a week or two after Thousand Is (trip was 6/30-7/2) but we headed for Japan for a family vacation 7/10-23 and the big trip doesn't go until 8/12. So, I've trained since returning from Thousand Is and resumed training after coming back from Japan. If the hill climbs are an indicator the conditioning seems to be as good. I've now started running all of the steepest uphills and felt compelled to add weight to the pack because I figured I wasn't working hard enough with that load. So, my 65th birthday did lead off with one of those neighborhood hikes this morning and I did in fact take it faster than I have to date. Dawn has not trained since Thousand Island, so I'm a bit concerned. I've substituted a Wednesday dayhike (also trying to fit Lee's schedule) in lieu of the rained out overnight trip and I hope Dawn does go on that (she won't go on my neighborhood hikes with me). For me I'm concerned it won't be a rigorous enough tune up, so I'm looking to add a bit of unnecessary weight to my large daypack (I use a 60L internal frame pack as my main daypack). I'm thinking of taking my soft cooler bag with a bit of blue ice and some cans of quality craft beer--hazy for Lee, West Coast for me.

Anyway, training can help all of us enjoy the High Sierra more, be they young or old, so that was how I began my 65th birthday before getting back to scholarly pursuits. But now it's time for a quality Friday beer. I will then start cooking a family favorite that was inspired by a now-closed Quincy restaurant Judy and I visited so often on our "season openers" and "season closers". Aug 2 is not only my birthday, it is also the day I met Judy (on my 27th birthday which is the most memorable of them all), so that day is doubly celebrated in our household.

Best wishes to all of the Topix Community.


GB

Happy Birthday GB!

Happy Birthday from the Harlen Clan.

I am now sorry that yesterday I may have unwittingly interrupted your birthday beer drinking with more inane fishing questions. Per usual, you replied with pages of helpful information, which was way beyond the call, but very much appreciated. [if you restored your storied Fishing Website, there would be less of our infringement on your free time John.]

Regarding training, my best form of training is to go on as many Sierra trips as I possibly can, as I do nearly nothing for training while at home, though I am a fairly active worker. Because of your earlier post about training, I have done a few of your recommended full pack hikes in our local parks, so thanks for the inspiration. We wonder how many days per week you do your own hikes, and are they interspersed with other workouts-- stadiums/ halway stairs? The odious weight room? Stretching-strengthening? .... and of course, the standard 12 oz curls.

Once again, congratulations on 65x around the Sun. Ian.

Harlen wrote: ↑Sat Aug 03, 2024 11:07 am Happy Birthday from the Harlen Clan.
I am now sorry that yesterday I may have unwittingly interrupted your birthday beer drinking with more inane fishing questions. Per usual, you replied with pages of helpful information, which was way beyond the call, but very much appreciated. [if you restored your storied Fishing Website, there would be less of our infringement on your free time John.]
Regarding training, my best form of training is to go on as many Sierra trips as I possibly can, as I do nearly nothing for training while at home, though I am a fairly active worker. Because of your earlier post about training, I have done a few of your recommended full pack hikes in our local parks, so thanks for the inspiration. We wonder how many days per week you do your own hikes, and are they interspersed with other workouts-- stadiums/ halway stairs? The odious weight room? Stretching-strengthening? .... and of course, the standard 12 oz curls.
Onc again, congratulations on 65x around the Sun. Ian.
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Actually, answering fishing questions, hiking questions, and writing papers for submission to geologic journals is best done with proper pints (see Jackie Chan Drunken Master---this is the way of more than a few geologists). So 12 oz, 16 oz, or 18.6 oz (depends on where you are) curls are in fact good training, in my estimation. So it's not that drinking was interrupted. After all good craft beer or fine wine needs to be savored and not sent down the hatch too hastily. The calendar celebration was done with my own Belgian-"hybrid" (not really West Coast) Imperial IPA G-Series X (golden Belgian Imperial IPA; X means it's the 10th version I've brewed of this). The big celebration was mainly orchestrated by Lee from the kitchen end, and since the main course was leg of lamb, this had to go with red wine. Judy and I are huge Zinfandel fans, and among the many outstanding Zinfandel AVAs, my center of the universe is Dry Creek Valley. So we went with Petroncelli Mother Clone Zinfandel. First time I've had one of Pedroncelli's wines in about 10 years but they've never let me down. I think that one is in fact my favorite of theirs, to date.

Speaking of training, I think the best training what you and many others do: train for hiking by hiking. The most athletic of any of the hiking-fishing friends I know, who does >30 mile dayhikes, follows that time honored training regimen. When Judy and I were at the peak of our game--1997 "Year of 100 Lakes" being the signature year--we were following that game plan. But until recently (say 2021) none of us were getting out there that much, so the training had to be ratcheted up for me.

You had mentioned Sunol Regional Wilderness and that place is HQ, but not for training. That is my go-to research and teaching area. I teach two of our geologic mapping classes there, including our culminating class which is taught in southern Sunol RW. I have been expanding my own mapping and research east into Ohlone Wilderness and my eventual goal is to complete detailed geologic mapping all the way across to Del Valle--this is a target during my sabbatical semester (this fall). But when I do geologic mapping, I may hike a lot but there is a lot of non-hiking time to make various observations and record data, so a premium geologic area has too much in the way of distractions to be a good training area. Back during my pre-Fresno days in the East Bay I'd do off season dayhikes up Mission Peak. However that meant driving down from (in those days) Hayward, plus the parking on the west side for that can be a bit of a hassle. I might do two or three of those in during an entire "off season" after which things would thaw out and Judy and I would "train for hiking by hiking" in the Sierra. We'd ramp up from an easy overnighter to a two-nighter and usually do a pretty hard three or four night trip before the "featured" 7-9 day trip. This year if Dawn and I had been able to launch our big trip a week or two after Thousand Island from Rush Creek, we'd have been in prime form, but, owing to our non-hiking vacation and other scheduling we have a month and half break, hence the need for neighborhood training: I try to do two to three of those a week when tuning up.

In the meantime I'm packed for my Wednesday "tune up" dayhike somewhere in Mokelumne Wilderness. The only thing I haven't packed is my little cooler bag with blue ice and some craft beer.

Anyway, I hope I'll be able to give folks a useful and fun report that will either be Tunechuck 2024 (if Dawn goes), or Tunedardblackchuck (if I end up solo--this may be my most ambitious backpacking trip to date). That will get posted somewhere around Aug. 19 if its Tunechuck 2024 and around Aug. 21 if its Tunedardblackchuck.

In the meantime, I figure I go out there with the old athlete credo: "have fun, play hard, don't get hurt".

Best wishes,

GB (John)

Happy birthday and I hope you enjoyed the craft beer on your "tune up" hike today! I am curious if you spend any time resistance training? My milestone birthday of 40 is approaching in a few months (I know...youngster compared you "vets") but I have really transitioned the way I've trained since getting back at it last April.

In the gym, I start with mobility work, 10-15 minutes of cardio (stair climber), about an hour of resistance training performed as "supersets", around 3 minutes of intense cardio (usually endless rope) and back to steady state cardio either on the treadmill or stair climber for another 10-15 minutes. I've really focused on form perfection during routines and am able to keep my heart rate quite high through the duration of my workouts.

Unfortunately, my high energy Hungarian Vizsla passed away all too soon right before his 10th birthday this past year. He was my main motivation for 1-3 miles 5 am walks/hill climbs in my neighborhood and weekend pre-dawn hikes. Without him, I really don't have the motivation to go as much even though I live in an area with a myriad of opportunities (San Luis Obispo County).

Thanks for sharing your regimen, I hope to be in as great of shape when I'm eligible for Medicare!

Great stuff GB> I'd love to hear about your Mokelumne hike. I've done a lot of volunteer work there, but haven't made it up this year yet.