Speaker 1: As a guide and hunter, I've spent thousands of days
Speaker 1: in the field. This show is about translating my hard
Speaker 1: won experiences into tips and tactics they'll get you closer
Speaker 1: to your ultimate goal success in the field. I'm Remy Warren.
Speaker 1: This is cutting the Distance. Welcome back to the podcast, everybody.
Speaker 1: I was looking today and it looks like we're actually
Speaker 1: on podcast episode eighty six. That is, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of nuggets of hunting wisdom in there, and I think
Speaker 1: just based on a lot of the podcast feedback that
Speaker 1: I've got, you know, there's been a lot of people
Speaker 1: that have found success by using the tactics in there,
Speaker 1: and just like anything, you can take this knowledge and
Speaker 1: be successful, but there's a little bit of it that's
Speaker 1: on you. So when it comes to this week's podcast,
Speaker 1: I'm basing it off of the idea of training and
Speaker 1: when you think about hunting out West, one major factor
Speaker 1: in success is really your physical preparedness. The ability to
Speaker 1: hunt hard, day in and day out, go that extra mile,
Speaker 1: pack out an animal where others might think it's too far,
Speaker 1: and that just gives you an edge. One question I
Speaker 1: get asked a lot is how to prepare for a
Speaker 1: hunt in the mountains, especially from people that maybe don't
Speaker 1: live in the mountains. While I'm not a personal trainer
Speaker 1: or fitness expert by any stretch of the imagination, what
Speaker 1: I am an expert in is carrying a heavy pack
Speaker 1: around in steep country, packing out meat long distances, hiking
Speaker 1: and hunting the back country day in and day out.
Speaker 1: In my opinion, while there's no replacing training by doing,
Speaker 1: I spent a lot of time this past year kind
Speaker 1: of building out an actionable formula to help you get
Speaker 1: ready to hit the mountains. But first I want to
Speaker 1: share a story of a day where I got into
Speaker 1: a lot of elk and put in a lot of miles.
Speaker 1: Most of the time I've spent hunting and just being out,
Speaker 1: either solo or on a hunting trip, I've always had
Speaker 1: this mindset that nothing's too far. I just go where
Speaker 1: I need to go now. I also haven't really had
Speaker 1: to train for that because I just as a professional guide,
Speaker 1: I'd spend most of my year, the majority of my
Speaker 1: year hiking around with a weighted pack on with a
Speaker 1: day pack, backcountry pack, whatever. What I do every day
Speaker 1: is carry a pack around and hike and so just
Speaker 1: by doing that day in and day out, it just
Speaker 1: becomes natural, and distance and other things never really enter
Speaker 1: into my mind. Now, there was a time where I
Speaker 1: will look at the mountain and say, oh that maybe
Speaker 1: should I go up there? Oh this is a far
Speaker 1: spot whatever. Oh maybe I look across and other's elk
Speaker 1: over there, but they're way over there. And then my
Speaker 1: kind of entire realm of thinking shifted. Very early on.
Speaker 1: Nobody ever talked about how far do you go when
Speaker 1: you hunt? Or what's difficult? How how would you push
Speaker 1: you know, nobody ever, I never heard any hunting articles
Speaker 1: about pushing yourself while hunting. And I was reading it
Speaker 1: was actually on a long drive from Nevada to Montana,
Speaker 1: and I had a book on tape. I've listened to
Speaker 1: a bunch of books on tapes, and this is actually
Speaker 1: like a CD. You would come in a CD pack.
Speaker 1: I would put it in the CD thing and drive.
Speaker 1: And the one that I got was the Lewis and
Speaker 1: Clark Journals. But it was the journal is kind of
Speaker 1: adapted into a story. I can't even remember the author.
Speaker 1: But as I listened to that while I was going,
Speaker 1: you know, it just really was like by opening to
Speaker 1: what people went through, and how far these guys would go.
Speaker 1: They were dragging boat ten miles, twenty miles, you know,
Speaker 1: hiking twenty miles a day or ten miles a day
Speaker 1: through rough country. And I'm thinking, man, this was a
Speaker 1: group of tough ombres, like these dudes really got after it. Now.
Speaker 1: I don't know how accurate things were or whatever, that
Speaker 1: that's beside the point. It really inspired me to think, Man,
Speaker 1: if guys a hundred years ago would tramp through these
Speaker 1: same mountains and go through the same landscape and explore
Speaker 1: through some of this stuff and just cover some good distances,
Speaker 1: I should surely be able to do it with my
Speaker 1: modern technology and the type of boots and clothes that
Speaker 1: I have, the gear that I have, and way less weight.
Speaker 1: And I don't know what happened, but it's just like
Speaker 1: this light bulb moment of thinking, yeah, nothing really is
Speaker 1: too far. I shouldn't really limit myself when I'm hunting.
Speaker 1: And kind of from that moment forward, I really just
Speaker 1: never thought about it. I just pushed the thought of
Speaker 1: something being too far out of my mind and just
Speaker 1: kept hunting harder and harder and harder. And through that
Speaker 1: process I've found a lot of success, and I found
Speaker 1: that success is a lot easier to come by. Over
Speaker 1: the years, I've really found that most of the time,
Speaker 1: just being able to go that extra distance, by being
Speaker 1: able to get somewhere quick, by being in good physical
Speaker 1: conditioning good physical shape, the duration of the hunt or
Speaker 1: the ease of hunt is actually easier. By hunting harder,
Speaker 1: you find a lot more success that way. I actually
Speaker 1: it was probably about nineteen or twenty and I had
Speaker 1: a GPS um. It was kind of like the first
Speaker 1: like GPS unit that I had, and I figured, you know,
Speaker 1: people would always ask how far do you think we went?
Speaker 1: How far do you think we went? And everything up
Speaker 1: to that point, I always just measured by map miles,
Speaker 1: you know. It's just like, oh, we went two miles,
Speaker 1: you know. I knew how far things were on the
Speaker 1: map on the grid. I didn't ever factor in the
Speaker 1: walking around and the additional moving and just be like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: a few miles whatever. So I had this GPS you
Speaker 1: can track exactly how far you went. There still was
Speaker 1: not the technology to track your elevation gain or any
Speaker 1: of that. It was just purely as the crow flies.
Speaker 1: Matt miles calculated throughout the day, so I think it
Speaker 1: was the first day of the season, first to September,
Speaker 1: early season long days. I'm gonna go into my favorite
Speaker 1: spot spot that I've been scouting out and had some
Speaker 1: good success the past season in their archery. So I figured, okay,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go in there and give it a go.
Speaker 1: So I hike and start a few quite a few
Speaker 1: hours before sunrise, really early in the morning hiking. Get
Speaker 1: in there. As the sun rises, I let out a
Speaker 1: few bugles and I see some elk in the bottom
Speaker 1: of this canyon. Now I'm at the top of the mountain.
Speaker 1: It's probably a two thousand foot elevation drop from where
Speaker 1: I climbed up two to now where the elk are.
Speaker 1: I end up dropping down trying to get into the elk.
Speaker 1: It doesn't work out. They end up going into the
Speaker 1: bedding area. Then I look back up where I was
Speaker 1: that morning and smelt come out there, So okay, cool.
Speaker 1: So I go back up hunt those elk. End up
Speaker 1: blowing those elk down towards where the other elk wt
Speaker 1: like just they got my wind wrong there below me.
Speaker 1: I actually had a shot at one of the bulls.
Speaker 1: It was like a small five by five, but there's
Speaker 1: just like this giant six by six in there, and
Speaker 1: they weren't really running hard. They were just kind of
Speaker 1: moving around and the timber and snuck in on him.
Speaker 1: I wanted to shoot that big six by six passed
Speaker 1: up the five point, and then they kind of caught
Speaker 1: my wind and ran down. So I'm like, okay, well
Speaker 1: I'll go down. So I go down, circle around the
Speaker 1: mountain and then start working into where I think the
Speaker 1: other group from the morning was bedded. I end up
Speaker 1: sneaking in there there's a lot more cows than I
Speaker 1: was expecting, and bumped them out crop. So now they're
Speaker 1: running back up the mountain pretty much where I came from.
Speaker 1: So I decided, I'm like, well, it's hot out, I'm
Speaker 1: just gonna see if I can. Like I kept seeing,
Speaker 1: it's just this long line of elk, So I'm like
Speaker 1: kind of like just dogging him, chasing them essentially, but
Speaker 1: they don't really know where I'm at. There just running
Speaker 1: their escape road and it's uphill and I'm noticing, like
Speaker 1: these elk they've got their tongues hanging out, their overheating,
Speaker 1: they're hot. I'm like, man, if I can beat them up,
Speaker 1: to the top. I know where they're gonna go, like
Speaker 1: I know where those other elk were. I know the
Speaker 1: elk in this area well enough I think I can
Speaker 1: actually cut them off. So I end up having to
Speaker 1: like run through the bottom. They see me across the canyon,
Speaker 1: but I'm gonna go up the other side of the mountain,
Speaker 1: around the mountain and then cut them off at this
Speaker 1: little saddle where I think they're going to go through.
Speaker 1: And I'm just like going as fast and as hard
Speaker 1: as i can go. I'm just like cruising. I'm tired,
Speaker 1: I'm gulping water, and I could see those elk across
Speaker 1: the way in this big burn like tongues hanging out, sweating,
Speaker 1: and they're still moving. So I get up around the backside,
Speaker 1: drop down, run around the winds good, get to the
Speaker 1: saddle and I'm busting through these little trees and here
Speaker 1: comes the first few elk of this group, and I'm like, whoa,
Speaker 1: this is awesome. So here they are, tongues hanging out,
Speaker 1: just veins popping out. It was a hot day and
Speaker 1: they've been pressured pretty good to run up the mountain.
Speaker 1: I'd sprinted around, got into position, and now I'm in
Speaker 1: the right spot and they're filing past me, single file,
Speaker 1: like fifteen yards. Cow cow, cow, I mean one of them.
Speaker 1: I feel like I could just tackle this little calf
Speaker 1: that comes by. It's just whooped, right, it's going through
Speaker 1: the cow cow, and I'm just waiting. I'm like, I
Speaker 1: know this bull is gonna walk out. So they're walking through,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, this is incredible. I actually had a
Speaker 1: little camera in my pocket, a little film camera, so
Speaker 1: I pull it out and I start snapping a couple
Speaker 1: of photos of these elk like walking by, just tired.
Speaker 1: I was like, I actually ran these elk down. This
Speaker 1: is crazy. So I'm snapping a few pictures of these
Speaker 1: cows and put the thing back because I'm like, all right,
Speaker 1: there's quite a few of come by. The bulls got
Speaker 1: to be here pretty soon. Wait wait, wait nothing nothing, nothing,
Speaker 1: nothing all right. So I go to the edge and
Speaker 1: look and I end up catching the bull. The two
Speaker 1: bowls that were in that group had split off from
Speaker 1: the herd like halfway down. I think they just got
Speaker 1: too tired, like they couldn't keep up with the cows.
Speaker 1: Maybe was their heavy antlers. Maybe they're like ah whatever,
Speaker 1: and they were actually going back down the mountain into
Speaker 1: a big thick patch of timber. Now, while I didn't
Speaker 1: catch up to those bulls, I did feel like I've
Speaker 1: done something pretty crazy where I really got after it.
Speaker 1: I really pushed myself, got into position and essentially cut
Speaker 1: this herd of elk off and I got that picture.
Speaker 1: I went and have that picture printed, and to this
Speaker 1: day it still sits on the little fridge in my
Speaker 1: cabin um as a reminder of that that first time
Speaker 1: where I really he just like got after and essentially
Speaker 1: chased a group of elk down. Now it's like three
Speaker 1: o'clock by this point, I'm like, okay, well I've really
Speaker 1: tossed the salad in this zone. So I decided to
Speaker 1: get on the ridge, hiked down and go to like
Speaker 1: the other side of the basin for the evening. In there,
Speaker 1: it's just like I see a group of elk, I
Speaker 1: get after the elk, and UM don't end up getting
Speaker 1: on anything. I actually remember I got a little too
Speaker 1: aggressive with the calling. I snuck in there. There was
Speaker 1: a bull bedded and I just decided, hey, I'm going
Speaker 1: to start off like real fired up, give him some bugles,
Speaker 1: break a tree. Before he really got fired up. I've
Speaker 1: learned a lot about elk hunting since then, but you know,
Speaker 1: and he ended up just rounding up the cows and
Speaker 1: going away and into an area and then it got
Speaker 1: dark and that was that. It's like sweet, So now
Speaker 1: it's dark, and I've got a long walk back to
Speaker 1: the truck, so probably maybe six six miles back to
Speaker 1: the truck something like that, maybe a little further, probably
Speaker 1: a little further. So dark walk back to the truck,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, oh gosh, man, I am freaking tired.
Speaker 1: How far did I go today? So I pulled out
Speaker 1: my little GPS thing and it was like thirty nine miles.
Speaker 1: I was like, you've got to be kidding me, you know.
Speaker 1: I I thought about it. I'm like, well, okay, there
Speaker 1: was a section where I was running a long ways
Speaker 1: I did, and then I started thinking about, well, I
Speaker 1: did six miles before the sun came up, and six
Speaker 1: miles or more after the sun came down, and did
Speaker 1: the running in the middle of the day, and then
Speaker 1: went and checked all these other spots and was constantly
Speaker 1: moving around and it was a long day. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't know what times. That time of your sun
Speaker 1: up is probably like five am and probably gets dark
Speaker 1: around so really just doing a couple of miles in between.
Speaker 1: There those miles added up and it really opened my
Speaker 1: eyes saying wow, like that was I mean, that's that's
Speaker 1: an extremely long day I was. I was doing a
Speaker 1: lot of moving, I wasn't doing a lot of glassing
Speaker 1: or being very patient, but it really opened my eyes
Speaker 1: to saying wow, when I took that idea of something's
Speaker 1: too far out of my head and just started to
Speaker 1: hunt and was in really good shape, it was just
Speaker 1: the miles didn't matter. I just kept getting on elk,
Speaker 1: chasing elk, being in elk and having those encounters, and
Speaker 1: of course it led to over the years, just that
Speaker 1: philosophy has led to a lot of success. Now, I'm
Speaker 1: not saying thirty some odd miles is a is a
Speaker 1: normal day, and that's not even including the thousands of
Speaker 1: feet of elevation game. You know, some days might be
Speaker 1: a couple of miles, some days might be more. But
Speaker 1: just being in shape, being ready, and being active plays
Speaker 1: a huge part in my overall hunting success. Now, of course,
Speaker 1: I told the story of what I would probably consider
Speaker 1: that the biggest day I've ever done, Like single day
Speaker 1: while hunting. You know, when you're out there, you want
Speaker 1: to be hunting, it's not and you aren't trying to
Speaker 1: run a marathon. You aren't trying to get in the
Speaker 1: most miles. You're just getting after animals. I honestly think
Speaker 1: the days that I probably put in the most miles
Speaker 1: is chase antelope because I'm doing a lot of stocks,
Speaker 1: covering a lot of distance. Is pretty flat, you just
Speaker 1: cover a lot of ground. I don't think I've ever
Speaker 1: even come close to that day any other time, and
Speaker 1: it made me think. You know, I get asked all
Speaker 1: the time like, well, how far do you go in
Speaker 1: a day? Especially you know as an outfitter a guide,
Speaker 1: people say like how far should I expect to go
Speaker 1: in a day of hunting? And and really it could
Speaker 1: be some days two miles or a mile and some
Speaker 1: days maybe twenty. But what I decided to do this
Speaker 1: year was I kept record of all the miles that
Speaker 1: I went. And this is like guiding. This is with
Speaker 1: you know, hunts on my own, this is sometimes with
Speaker 1: clients that might be older and not in great shape whatever,
Speaker 1: and just average those out. And actually the averages surprised me.
Speaker 1: So archery elk season average nine point zero three miles
Speaker 1: per day. Now, you gotta think about it. You think, well,
Speaker 1: that sounds like a lot, and it is a lot.
Speaker 1: And at the end of those days, you're you feel
Speaker 1: fairly tired, you feel fairly you know, you're like, wow,
Speaker 1: I put in some miles. That's the average. So there's
Speaker 1: days that are higher and there's days that are lower.
Speaker 1: I think archery season, you gotta remail or two. The
Speaker 1: days are really long, so there's a lot of daylight,
Speaker 1: there's a lot more moving around. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: getting into an area and coming back out or or whatever.
Speaker 1: You've got a lot of daylight to make it happen. Now,
Speaker 1: for rifle elk season, this is during the guiding season
Speaker 1: with clients some of them are older. But really actually
Speaker 1: this last season everyone was successful. So it was like, okay,
Speaker 1: how many miles to kill a bull elk? Some guys
Speaker 1: did it in a few days, some guys took longer,
Speaker 1: but um, we average six point eight two miles per
Speaker 1: day during the rifle season. Now, those are shorter days,
Speaker 1: and you also got to remember, hey, there's there's more
Speaker 1: things involved, like snow, other factors. Throughout that last season,
Speaker 1: the lightest day I did, I didn't actually have like
Speaker 1: notes on oh maybe I only hunted half the day
Speaker 1: or whatever. But the lightest day was four point four
Speaker 1: six miles and the longest was thirteen point six five miles.
Speaker 1: We got to also remember that's just the miles. That
Speaker 1: doesn't really paint a great picture, because there are places
Speaker 1: where there might have been thirty five hundred feet in
Speaker 1: elevation gain and maybe a mile or two or other
Speaker 1: areas where it might have been more flat terrain and
Speaker 1: it covered a lot of a lot of ground, but
Speaker 1: maybe not as tough ground. There's days where you might
Speaker 1: go one mile that's a lot harder than ten miles,
Speaker 1: So there's a lot of variation. I've seen some really
Speaker 1: rough six hundred yards before we're looking across the canyon.
Speaker 1: That's a six hundred yard shot, and you think it's
Speaker 1: going to take me all day to get over there
Speaker 1: if we get that um But I think that these
Speaker 1: are some good benchmarks and some something to kind of
Speaker 1: think about, especially if you're if you're new to this
Speaker 1: type of hunting, and say, well, where should I be at,
Speaker 1: how how fit do I need to be? Do I
Speaker 1: really need to get in shape? For this. I think
Speaker 1: these are good benchmarks of taking myself that almost every
Speaker 1: week that we've gone out with a hunter or whatever,
Speaker 1: we found success, we've been successful. And this is how
Speaker 1: many miles and how many hours and whatever it's taken
Speaker 1: to get that. So paints a paints a pretty good
Speaker 1: picture there. Now. I think one thing you've got to
Speaker 1: think about. You go, okay, well there's all these miles,
Speaker 1: that's an easy picture, and you think about, yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: hunting in the mountains. There's gonna be a lot of climbing,
Speaker 1: which does get people. You know, it's tough, it's difficult,
Speaker 1: and I think that that part people go in with
Speaker 1: the mindset of yes. But the one thing they aren't
Speaker 1: used to, the thing that slows everybody down the most,
Speaker 1: the thing that I think is the biggest hindering factor
Speaker 1: on those even those four mile days, those shorter days
Speaker 1: just going up the mountain. The thing that I think
Speaker 1: people are unprepared for. They may be are prepared for
Speaker 1: the physical moving, going some miles hiking, part, what they
Speaker 1: aren't used to is the fact that when they're actually
Speaker 1: out hunting, they're doing that with a pack that has
Speaker 1: some kind of weight in it. And that is what
Speaker 1: slows you down. Now, you know, most people, they can't
Speaker 1: be in the mountains hundreds of days of year wearing
Speaker 1: a weighted pack, just getting used to it. So what
Speaker 1: I tried to do is I tried to create a
Speaker 1: system that kind of accurately prepares you for the best
Speaker 1: type of hunting movements. So when we think about am
Speaker 1: out there hunting, what headspace do you need to get into,
Speaker 1: and that's gonna be hiking with a weighted pack. So
Speaker 1: I wanted to kind of set up a system of
Speaker 1: weighted pack training. So these rocks, I think are gonna
Speaker 1: help get your body ready for the mountains and whatever
Speaker 1: the hunt's gonna throw your way. So here's how it's
Speaker 1: gonna work. I'm gonna kind of describe. I've been out
Speaker 1: kind of testing these things, kind of practicing some stuff,
Speaker 1: kind of seeing what really mimics that that movement and
Speaker 1: the things that I notice get tired when I'm out
Speaker 1: in the field. And then I wanted to try to
Speaker 1: translate that into something that's actionable where you if you
Speaker 1: live in somewhere that's flat, somewhere that's got no mountains,
Speaker 1: you can kind of put a weighted pack on and
Speaker 1: maybe do this stuff in a gym or on a treadmill.
Speaker 1: Maybe you could do it on like a stair climber machine,
Speaker 1: or if you've got some mountains around. I mean, obviously,
Speaker 1: in my opinion, the best way to do this is outside.
Speaker 1: That's actually how I do it. Especially with this last
Speaker 1: year not getting out as much, I've noticed I still
Speaker 1: need to stay in shape. And this is kind of
Speaker 1: what really is has prompted this is how do I
Speaker 1: stay in the best shape when I'm not hunting three
Speaker 1: days a year when I'm not you know, going to
Speaker 1: the South Pacific and hunting the mountains for tar when
Speaker 1: I'm at home, and then I've got to be ready
Speaker 1: starting August one to go sheep hunting, to take people
Speaker 1: l hunting, to do all this other stuff and keep
Speaker 1: that and maintain that physical capability. And so for me,
Speaker 1: I do it in the mountains. But I also wanted
Speaker 1: to translate that to maybe where you could do it
Speaker 1: at home or on something else. I think stairs is
Speaker 1: a great way to do this. I think, you know,
Speaker 1: some kind of machine with treadmill or whatever. So we're
Speaker 1: gonna start it out in three stages, and I'm gonna
Speaker 1: break it out here right now. So the first stage
Speaker 1: is going to be what I call the day rock.
Speaker 1: This is just kind of like getting your body going.
Speaker 1: This is the base level, and these little workouts are
Speaker 1: really just gonna be a short amount of time, but
Speaker 1: we're trying to kind of build up that that strength,
Speaker 1: that endurance, and that familiarity with wearing something that's uncomfortable
Speaker 1: and heavy a pack. Then we're gonna move graduate you
Speaker 1: up to stage two, which is gonna be the back
Speaker 1: country rock system, and then stage three is gonna be
Speaker 1: the packout system. So that's gonna be the heaviest weight.
Speaker 1: So Stage two, the back country is gonna be a
Speaker 1: little bit slower, longer, and heavier, and then the stage
Speaker 1: three is just gonna be all about getting used to
Speaker 1: that really uncomfortable heavy weight. So let's jump into these
Speaker 1: these three stages and then what you can do at
Speaker 1: home to kind of build up. Now, when I think
Speaker 1: if you think about breaking down a hunt into things
Speaker 1: that you encounter, right, so day one of the trip,
Speaker 1: you're going into an area you're gonna exploring, You're chasing
Speaker 1: elk Andre, Chasing meals your eye, whatever you're chasing, it
Speaker 1: doesn't really matter what's something you're gonnaen counter. Well, you're
Speaker 1: gonna have your pack on it's gonna probably be a
Speaker 1: day pack. You're gonna have your water in there. You're
Speaker 1: gonna have your spotting scope, you know. Um, you're gonna
Speaker 1: have a lot of a lot of gear. You're gonna
Speaker 1: have your bow, rifle, whatever you're hunting with, some food,
Speaker 1: and you'll probably be going from the truck coming back
Speaker 1: every day, so you don't need all your overnight stuff,
Speaker 1: but you also have a few more creature comforts and
Speaker 1: things specific for hunting. So you're also gonna have your
Speaker 1: your game bags you're spotting, you know, just your tripod,
Speaker 1: just a bunch of different stuff, your camera, whatever. You're
Speaker 1: gonna be probably hiking all day. You're gonna be doing
Speaker 1: a lot of stopping and glassing, getting to vantages, stopping, glassing,
Speaker 1: and then moving. So it's something where you're gonna need
Speaker 1: that endurance. But I also wanted to think about ways
Speaker 1: that we can kind of burn out, the things that
Speaker 1: start to burn out, So where do you start to
Speaker 1: feel this pack? Also, on the day hunt, you actually
Speaker 1: put in probably more miles than you do on the
Speaker 1: back country hunt. I think because you're you're covering a
Speaker 1: lot of distance, so we want to be kind of
Speaker 1: ready for that and also kind of build our bodies
Speaker 1: and get them used to recovering quick as well as
Speaker 1: getting used to the kind of the uncomfort level and
Speaker 1: where those pinch points are once we start hiking. If
Speaker 1: I also break down a hunt, how does it normally start?
Speaker 1: I think every time I leave the truck, I'm walking uphill.
Speaker 1: I don't know how it happens. It seems like every
Speaker 1: hunt you go on, you leave the truck walking uphill,
Speaker 1: and you walk back to a truck uphill, um the
Speaker 1: uphill both ways. Things is real. It's it means that
Speaker 1: I leave hiking up. Somehow I dropped below the truck
Speaker 1: throughout the course of the day, and now I'm hiking
Speaker 1: back up to the truck. That happens to me more
Speaker 1: times than not. So we want to be trained for
Speaker 1: that uphill hiking. So here's what we're gonna do. I'm
Speaker 1: breaking this down stage one the day rock and we're
Speaker 1: gonna call like a prescribed weight. I think that your
Speaker 1: goal for this stage is going to be thirty pounds,
Speaker 1: and then with that thirty pounds, what we want to
Speaker 1: be able to do is our first our first intro
Speaker 1: to it is gonna be fifteen minutes. And I think, well,
Speaker 1: thirty pounds fifteen minutes, Okay, that's easier. Some people might
Speaker 1: say that sounds hard. You can start out with lighter
Speaker 1: weight before you even move on to the next one.
Speaker 1: You want to be able to do these in that
Speaker 1: thirty pound range fairly easily. Um, And what we're gonna
Speaker 1: do is we're gonna use fifteen minutes as kind of
Speaker 1: like our first workout period. And what I like to
Speaker 1: do is I like to start out saying you're on
Speaker 1: a machine. Let's say you live somewhere flat. You're gonna
Speaker 1: do this on a treadmill, or maybe you're gonna do
Speaker 1: this in the hills, whatever. You just find something that
Speaker 1: matches this. So, whether it's treadmill, whether it's a mountain,
Speaker 1: whether it's a stair climber or running stairs, whatever, whatever
Speaker 1: it is, find something that mimics these things that I'm
Speaker 1: talking about, because what we're trying to do is we're
Speaker 1: trying to build that muscle memory in a short amount
Speaker 1: of time the kind of will translate into taking on
Speaker 1: the mountain over a longer period of time. So however
Speaker 1: you can do this, you guys can figure that out. Now,
Speaker 1: this first fifteen minute one is going to be putting
Speaker 1: on that weighted pack. And what I want you to
Speaker 1: just start out going uphill at a you know, you
Speaker 1: can start out at maybe like a moderate pace. I
Speaker 1: want it to be like kind of start getting your
Speaker 1: body warmed up if you've got to do something else
Speaker 1: to warm up first grade, and then just start walking
Speaker 1: and start hiking it like a higher pace. Now, what
Speaker 1: we're gonna do is we're gonna use speed and incline
Speaker 1: to kind of mimic duration. So in a normal hike,
Speaker 1: you know, you get tired, you can stop. What we
Speaker 1: want to do is we want to build up this
Speaker 1: muscle and the feeling of everything, but without stopping. So
Speaker 1: we're gonna kind of fatigue things faster. So as you
Speaker 1: start going, you're gonna started if you're on a trademill,
Speaker 1: lets say it's got one to ten, maybe started at
Speaker 1: two incline and just start kind of walking for a
Speaker 1: couple of minutes to get your body going. Now you're
Speaker 1: gonna start ramping it up. I want you to start
Speaker 1: ramping up the speed to that point where it's like
Speaker 1: you couldn't hold a conversation with me. You're you're kind
Speaker 1: of at the speed where you're like, I'm not running,
Speaker 1: but I'm definitely moving, And I want you to kind
Speaker 1: of now pick that elevation up to maybe say it's
Speaker 1: a treadmill, maybe let's hit it at fift so you're
Speaker 1: using an incline with a good speed where you're like
Speaker 1: you're just able to keep up. You know, you wouldn't
Speaker 1: be able to hold a conversation with someone. You've got
Speaker 1: that weighted pack on and you're moving. Now for the
Speaker 1: next half, let's say we hit our seven and a
Speaker 1: half minute point. Now we're gonna ramp it up. We're
Speaker 1: gonna start kind of pushing everything into those muscles, and
Speaker 1: we're gonna start the climb. If you're on a treadmill,
Speaker 1: you're gonna hit that to the highest incline that it's got,
Speaker 1: and you're gonna try to maintain that fast speed for
Speaker 1: as long as you can. Okay, So you want to
Speaker 1: be holding at that speed where it's like, okay, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna burn out. I would say now within three minutes
Speaker 1: or so, you want to start feeling everything burning where
Speaker 1: that pack is on your body. You want that to hurt.
Speaker 1: We're just mimicking that fatigue that you're going to find
Speaker 1: later in the day in a shorter amount of time,
Speaker 1: because we're kind of increasing the intensity of everything. So
Speaker 1: you can ramp up the speed on that treadmill or
Speaker 1: whatever and just keep pushing. You want to, you want
Speaker 1: to really feel it. And now you don't want to stop.
Speaker 1: But if you have to slow the machine down, go
Speaker 1: for it. You want to just keep moving. So where
Speaker 1: you're like constantly at what you think is your max,
Speaker 1: you're like, oh man, I'm I can't go any harder.
Speaker 1: But you're just like constantly keeping it at your max
Speaker 1: at that incline, and you can just keep gradually dropping
Speaker 1: that speed down, dropping that speed down, um, but not stopping,
Speaker 1: even if it's a really slow pace. We want to
Speaker 1: just go. We're just basing this off of time, not
Speaker 1: a certain distance. So you've got your fifteen minutes of
Speaker 1: that and then op rest whatever. Now I would say,
Speaker 1: if you're if you're if you've got thirty minutes to
Speaker 1: give to this, now jump on and do that same
Speaker 1: thing again in that same pace. What we're gonna try
Speaker 1: to do before we move on is we're gonna get
Speaker 1: really comfortable at this point where you've got your time
Speaker 1: up and you've got your you know, so you're going
Speaker 1: further distances each time you do this, and you're building up.
Speaker 1: What you're gonna start noticing is the parts of your
Speaker 1: body that burn. You're gonna your lungs are gonna start
Speaker 1: feeling it, your legs are gonna start feeling your legs
Speaker 1: are gonna start feeling heavy. The portions where the pack
Speaker 1: is resting is going to start feeling heavy, and that's
Speaker 1: what you want. And then what you want to do
Speaker 1: is just track your own progress and say, okay, I
Speaker 1: started out here. Maybe make some notes as you do this,
Speaker 1: say I started out here, here's how far I went
Speaker 1: on the machine, or here's how far I did in
Speaker 1: the stairs, this is what it felt like. The time
Speaker 1: will be the same, but the distance will be different.
Speaker 1: And then or maybe you're out on a mountain and
Speaker 1: you're doing it and you're like, okay, I was going
Speaker 1: really slow at the end. Remember, you just want to
Speaker 1: keep pushing yourself at that acts level every time. So
Speaker 1: it's very like you're your own coach on this one.
Speaker 1: But what you're gonna do is you're gonna notice over
Speaker 1: time you're gonna be able to do it a lot easier.
Speaker 1: The pack is gonna kind of, in many ways feel lighter.
Speaker 1: Those points where it starts to feel um. Your shoulders
Speaker 1: are gonna start to feel it first time. Your your
Speaker 1: back's gonna start to feel it, your legs are gonna
Speaker 1: start to feel it. You'll start noticing that you can
Speaker 1: go further, you can do these easier, And it's building
Speaker 1: up that muscle memory for the exact activity we're doing,
Speaker 1: hiking in the mountains with a heavy pack on. Once
Speaker 1: you've got that, now you can move to stage two.
Speaker 1: So the stage two is going to be our backcountry rock.
Speaker 1: This is just gonna be slower and heavier. We're gonna
Speaker 1: try a longer time period for this. So what I
Speaker 1: want to do is now starting out. You know, you
Speaker 1: want to work into everything. If you've never done anything
Speaker 1: like this, don't throw on a thirty pound pack and
Speaker 1: try running on your treadmill because you're probably gonna hate it.
Speaker 1: You're probably gonna get injured, you're probably whatever. You want
Speaker 1: to build up to these things. You want these things
Speaker 1: to just come naturally. And I wanted to be something
Speaker 1: where you're like, hey, I can do this. You know.
Speaker 1: It's like I said, the first one could be fifteen
Speaker 1: minutes out. What we're doing is you should have kind
Speaker 1: of mastered that first stage. Now we're gonna move on
Speaker 1: and we're gonna add some weight, so it's gonna be
Speaker 1: the backcountry rock. We're gonna go. Prescribed weight here is
Speaker 1: going to be from thirty five to sixty pounds. We're
Speaker 1: gonna try to max out up at that sixty pound range.
Speaker 1: If you've got the time. You can either do this
Speaker 1: in fifteen minute intervals or thirty minutes. And what we're
Speaker 1: doing here is you're still gonna want the incline. You're
Speaker 1: gonna want that up, but we aren't going to be
Speaker 1: necessarily pushing, especially starting out, pushing it like with the
Speaker 1: speed like we did on the last one. You want
Speaker 1: to slowly burn into it. And that extra weight should
Speaker 1: you know you're gonna kind of keep it right around.
Speaker 1: I would say, let's say, like starting out, you're gonna
Speaker 1: want to work yourself at like because you've got that
Speaker 1: heavier pack on, but you still want to be moving
Speaker 1: at a good pace and kind of activating your muscles,
Speaker 1: burning things a little faster and just getting used to that.
Speaker 1: Now additional weight, let your your muscles kind of stabilize
Speaker 1: building up to it. Eventually we'll do this same one
Speaker 1: that weight, very similar to we did the day hunt
Speaker 1: where we were picking up the speed and everything, but
Speaker 1: I want you to work slow into it. So you
Speaker 1: start out on a moderate incline, your work away halfway
Speaker 1: up to halfway, and then the second half is going
Speaker 1: to be kind of like a more full incline if possible.
Speaker 1: If you're in the hills, just pick a good hill,
Speaker 1: pick a good uphill incline, you could do a steady whatever.
Speaker 1: You just want to make sure that you've got that
Speaker 1: uphill going. And then as this becomes easier, you're going
Speaker 1: to increase the intensity with your speed, so kind of
Speaker 1: picking up the pace like we did in the last one.
Speaker 1: You could do these in fifteen minute or thirty minute intervals.
Speaker 1: And one thing that I like to do too on these,
Speaker 1: on these heavier packs is just say, Okay, i've got
Speaker 1: thirty minutes. I can go aways in thirty minutes, but
Speaker 1: I'm gonna pick a pace where I know that I
Speaker 1: can kind of maintain a good pace. But throughout the
Speaker 1: entire thirty minutes with this heavier pack on, and that's
Speaker 1: a great way that kind of gets those those endurance
Speaker 1: and muscles built. I feel like it really mimics that.
Speaker 1: Like you're out there and you're when I'm backpack hunting,
Speaker 1: I've got my back pack on. It's like, hey, I'm
Speaker 1: just getting into camp. So you've got that heavy pack
Speaker 1: and you might be going for three four hours steady
Speaker 1: steady clip you know, half hour time half or donner
Speaker 1: time whatever. You're taking a few breaks in there, and
Speaker 1: then you know you're probably setting up camp and then
Speaker 1: lightning your pack from there. So it really is going
Speaker 1: to mimic that heavy pack in that getting used to
Speaker 1: that additional weight and building that muscle for climbing. Once
Speaker 1: you feel like you've mastered that, then we're gonna bump
Speaker 1: it up again and we're gonna we're gonna hit what
Speaker 1: I would call the pack out portion. And this isn't
Speaker 1: gonna be something that you're gonna do a lot. But
Speaker 1: I always find it funny how you know, guys go
Speaker 1: on these big hunts, they've done whatever they've they've got ready,
Speaker 1: and it comes time to carry something out and they've
Speaker 1: never put that much weight on their back. The last
Speaker 1: place you want to learn to do this is in
Speaker 1: a mountain ten miles from the truck. But that's exactly
Speaker 1: what we do. I mean, it's just like we're all
Speaker 1: guilty of this. So it's one of those things. If
Speaker 1: you can practice this at home, I think that you're
Speaker 1: gonna be a lot better off. I know, back in
Speaker 1: the day, when I was going to school in the
Speaker 1: spring and summer semesters and then I would just jump
Speaker 1: into the fall guiding, I was like, man, I would
Speaker 1: stay pretty fit. I'd do a lot of other exercises
Speaker 1: I would. I would hike with my pack on, but
Speaker 1: before that first part of the season would kick off,
Speaker 1: I would always start with my really heavy pack to
Speaker 1: really mimic that that pack out, and I would work
Speaker 1: up to about a hundred and ten pounds, and most
Speaker 1: of that was like where I could walk. I would
Speaker 1: just walk that in the neighborhood whatever. So this portion
Speaker 1: just first, um, let's call this prescribed weight sixty five
Speaker 1: plus pounds, So we're going to try to hit that
Speaker 1: eighty pound or higher. You know, I don't want anybody
Speaker 1: to like injuring themselves, So work up to things you
Speaker 1: can do. How heavy have a pack? Should you be
Speaker 1: able to carry away about a hundred and seventy five pounds?
Speaker 1: And I regularly carry a hundred pound packs out. I
Speaker 1: don't like to, I have I do sometimes my body
Speaker 1: now feels it, and so I think like that seventy
Speaker 1: five pounds is like a pretty solid number. Pounds is
Speaker 1: like a pretty light number, solid number for a pack
Speaker 1: out to feel good and not not really like tear
Speaker 1: up every joint and all this other stuff. So we're
Speaker 1: gonna start thinking about that. What this is gonna be
Speaker 1: is this isn't like a speed thing. This is just
Speaker 1: getting used to that heavier weight. So these are gonna
Speaker 1: be longer if you can. You can start out with
Speaker 1: fifteen minutes, work up to thirty minutes whatever. Let's start
Speaker 1: on flat and we're just gonna start getting used to
Speaker 1: the weight. This is something you could do in your neighborhood,
Speaker 1: walking outside, maybe give yourself a half hour and just
Speaker 1: just kind of walk around and start building that your
Speaker 1: body used to carrying that heavy pack. Your body, all
Speaker 1: those little muscles that keep you stable in unstable terrain
Speaker 1: with that weight, just being able to to work those
Speaker 1: out now before you head out in the mountains. Then
Speaker 1: you're gonna progress this to being able to doing some
Speaker 1: sort of slight incline and also, if possible, if you
Speaker 1: can get out a decline. So if you're doing stairs,
Speaker 1: this is one you want to be super careful in
Speaker 1: the decline. But most packouts, like you're hiking up from
Speaker 1: the truck and packing down at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: it's the down hills stuff that really wears you out.
Speaker 1: Being able to control yourself with weight when you do
Speaker 1: this one, don't be afraid to use like some trekking
Speaker 1: pools something to help stabilize and you know, not burn
Speaker 1: those muscles out, especially if you're in the mountains doing
Speaker 1: this one. You want to just be super careful, no injuries,
Speaker 1: but you do want to get your muscles in your
Speaker 1: body used to carrying that heavyweight. So this is our
Speaker 1: stage three. We can start this on flat ground. We
Speaker 1: can take that time that we did before and just
Speaker 1: start building up the weight that we're actually caring so
Speaker 1: um salt bags are great. Maybe two salt bags in
Speaker 1: your pack, building up to that eighty pounds, and then
Speaker 1: if you're feeling good with this, you can start adding
Speaker 1: a little bit inclined to that. I think by kind
Speaker 1: of following this this weighted ruck system, by building up
Speaker 1: and doing these different things, I would say the packout portion,
Speaker 1: you're gonna do a lot less you don't. This isn't
Speaker 1: something you necessarily have to do every day. None of
Speaker 1: this is. I think that outside of the ruck, if
Speaker 1: you're if you're into working out, or you've got a
Speaker 1: fitness regiment, which I think is awesome, you definitely should
Speaker 1: um outside of this rock, I think you want to
Speaker 1: work in other workouts that do similar things and build endurance.
Speaker 1: I personally do rowing, rowing machine in the springtime, I
Speaker 1: try to kayak as much as I can on the
Speaker 1: lake or whatever. Um So doing different kinds of uh
Speaker 1: endurance activities rowing, riding, maybe cycling, into stationary biking whatever,
Speaker 1: and then running. Um I like to run, some people
Speaker 1: don't like to run. Whatever, whatever you like to do,
Speaker 1: just doing some endurance stuff in the winter. I like
Speaker 1: to ski too. It's like it's a leg workout. It it.
Speaker 1: I go down and do a lot of turns and
Speaker 1: try to like burn my legs out in a short
Speaker 1: amount of time while doing something that I enjoy. But
Speaker 1: I add in a lot of these other workouts. So
Speaker 1: maybe you know starting out the day rock as a
Speaker 1: good one. It's like a good go to workout. I
Speaker 1: could throw this in any day, I could do it
Speaker 1: every other day, I could do it once a week whatever,
Speaker 1: and then mixing these other ones in as you graduate.
Speaker 1: And it doesn't mean that you have to, Oh, I
Speaker 1: got to the pack out stage, so I don't have
Speaker 1: to worry about the day stage one day rock. Now,
Speaker 1: this is just that's your more base, that's your go
Speaker 1: to building that muscle memory, building that act by doing, um,
Speaker 1: the thing that you're going to use the most, just
Speaker 1: having that weighted pack on and doing these hikes and
Speaker 1: if you can get out on the weekends, maybe you're
Speaker 1: going to shed hike whatever, Throw some weight in your pack,
Speaker 1: throw throw your gear in. What I do, honestly, I
Speaker 1: just leave my pack set up how I've got it,
Speaker 1: so I've got my water in there. I've got my
Speaker 1: bigger spotting scope I waited out. It's like thirty pounds
Speaker 1: worth of just gear that I probably don't need. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, you gotta remember you're gonna have your bow
Speaker 1: or your rifle. Another thing to think about is like
Speaker 1: maybe grabbing a five pound weight or a ten pound
Speaker 1: weight and carrying that in one hand and passing the
Speaker 1: weight back and forth. That's really good for mimicking carrying
Speaker 1: your bow, carrying your rifle. Building that. I know, when
Speaker 1: I'm self filming, I've got my bow in one hand
Speaker 1: and a camera in the other, I'm always carrying around.
Speaker 1: I've got twenty pounds between my two hands. It feels
Speaker 1: like not including what's in my pack. So building that
Speaker 1: the areas that are going to get fatigued while you're hunting.
Speaker 1: Training for that in the off season, so when you
Speaker 1: hit the mountains, your body is going to be familiar
Speaker 1: with this stuff. It's not like, well, where is this
Speaker 1: coming from. There's a lot of other workouts. You can
Speaker 1: do a lot of other exercises, but I think you
Speaker 1: should mix in. But you know, if all you do
Speaker 1: is run, all you do is ride or whatever, maybe
Speaker 1: you lift weights, whatever you do. If that's all you do,
Speaker 1: and then you get out in the mountains and you
Speaker 1: throw a heavy pack on and start hiking, it's gonna
Speaker 1: be a new workout. It's gonna be new to you,
Speaker 1: and you're gonna get drained, even though you're in really
Speaker 1: good shape. So the key here is just to build
Speaker 1: that muscle memory, build that familiarity with the act of
Speaker 1: doing what you're gonna do, so trained by doing and
Speaker 1: I think that by doing this, you're going to find
Speaker 1: that you'll be able to kind of plan your hunt
Speaker 1: less on how far something is, how hard it's gonna be,
Speaker 1: and you're just gonna your body is naturally gonna acclimate faster,
Speaker 1: your body is naturally gonna be able to hunt harder,
Speaker 1: and you're gonna find a lot more success. So this
Speaker 1: week I decided to do a little something different for
Speaker 1: this podcast because I thought, hey, I'm trying to think
Speaker 1: of ways that like make this more interactive for you,
Speaker 1: make it easier for you, and some of this might
Speaker 1: just be like, oh, this is very difficult to understand.
Speaker 1: So what I did, Um, I just uploaded it today
Speaker 1: on my Remy Warren YouTube page, so you can go
Speaker 1: to YouTube search Remy war and find my it's my
Speaker 1: own YouTube page, my own YouTube channel. What I did
Speaker 1: was I made like a fifteen minute companion video for
Speaker 1: this podcast. So we've got our stage one rock. So
Speaker 1: how this is gonna work is gonna be like, Okay,
Speaker 1: you decide, hey, I want to do this, So what
Speaker 1: I did was I just threw on a heavy pack.
Speaker 1: I got my camera, I got I actually had somebody
Speaker 1: come with me to film this as well. And it's
Speaker 1: gonna be like if you're on a treadmill, you can
Speaker 1: put this video up and essentially hike alongside me and
Speaker 1: gives you the times and the rates and in a
Speaker 1: little bit of like inspiration and how to do this
Speaker 1: while you're walking or hiking. So I'll tell you, okay,
Speaker 1: like let's bump the the speed up here, keep that
Speaker 1: speed going, increase that incline, and then you can follow
Speaker 1: along on this fifteen minute video as just kind of
Speaker 1: like an inspiration of here's what I do, and I'm
Speaker 1: gonna do this while I'm working out. I don't know
Speaker 1: if that's going to help, but I've seen like other
Speaker 1: things like this and thought, there's nothing like that for
Speaker 1: hunting that I know of, So let's this is just
Speaker 1: a way to kind of get that that rock training started.
Speaker 1: And so go check that out. If this is something
Speaker 1: that you think you want to do, if you're like
Speaker 1: serious about building up that muscle memory with that weighted
Speaker 1: pack on, you've got a hunt planned for this year.
Speaker 1: It's not just necessarily meant to be a video where
Speaker 1: you just like sit there and watch it. I think
Speaker 1: it'd be strange a video to do that. But throw
Speaker 1: your pack on, get on a treadmill or a stair
Speaker 1: climber or something, and then hike to this with this, UM,
Speaker 1: I think it'll help like kind of build that idea
Speaker 1: and get you kind of going in the right direction.
Speaker 1: So I thought i'd do that. Let me know what
Speaker 1: you think about it. I'll keep doing more. But I
Speaker 1: didn't want to do a bunch of them and then
Speaker 1: people be like this doesn't work. I don't I don't
Speaker 1: get this whatever. So your feedback will be awesome on that.
Speaker 1: Feel free as always shoot me messages UM, either on
Speaker 1: social media. You could even just drop a comment on
Speaker 1: that video or whatever. If you like it. You've got
Speaker 1: hunting buddies or whatever, share it with them. Sure this
Speaker 1: podcast with him, because look, I mean, you're hunting group
Speaker 1: is as strong as your weakest hiker. And that's one
Speaker 1: thing that I've learned as a guy, is like, hey,
Speaker 1: I'm hiking to the guy behind me, um, but I'm
Speaker 1: constantly trying to push them, and I think that that's cool.
Speaker 1: Is like, you know, as hunting buddies, you're probably gonna
Speaker 1: be pushing each other. But if you're if you're going
Speaker 1: on an elk hunt with a couple of friends, family, whatever,
Speaker 1: you're hunting with your hunt with my dad a lot.
Speaker 1: My dad's actually in killer shape. This is stuff like
Speaker 1: he puts on a weighted pack and hikes every day.
Speaker 1: He does some serious elevation, like we're fortunate we live
Speaker 1: close to mountains. He does it every single day. And um,
Speaker 1: he's actually does it more than I do. There's day
Speaker 1: I miss days. I'm not gonna lie, but I think
Speaker 1: that this is like a good way to get started.
Speaker 1: I think this is if you were to ask me
Speaker 1: one thing where that would make you more successful, Honestly,
Speaker 1: this is it. Um, they're a lot of hunting skills
Speaker 1: and other things out there, but unless you're in some
Speaker 1: kind of shape, and it doesn't matter how old you are,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter where you're starting out, you can always
Speaker 1: be better. I'm not saying you need to be in
Speaker 1: the best, like better shape than be better shape than
Speaker 1: the next guy, whatever, but just the best for you.
Speaker 1: And I think this is a really good way to start,
Speaker 1: really good way to do it. And I think that
Speaker 1: if you get in the groove of this, if you
Speaker 1: start it, you're going to find a lot more success.
Speaker 1: So go check those out. Let me know what you
Speaker 1: guys think. I'd love to build more of these out
Speaker 1: for you. So um, this is where it's. This whole
Speaker 1: podcast thing is gonna get interactive. I want this to
Speaker 1: be about things that benefit you. Also, let me know
Speaker 1: what you think about it, and until next week, keep
Speaker 1: on rocking.