When you first get on the trail, you may feel like power walking. Not a good idea at all. Anyone who wants to truly enjoy their hiking experience needs to learn how to pace themselves. Without this ability, hiking is not just exhausting and unpleasant, but potentially dangerous. Remember, it doesn’t matter how far you go for a hike, you need to get yourself back to where you’re started. If you burn yourself out on the outward journey, you might have difficulty getting back to base, definitely something you don’t want to do.
Below tips will help you pace yourself on your next hiking, camping, or backpacking.
Start Early as Possible: A much better, safer, more effective approach is to get underway early in the morning, find an agreeable pace and let your body warm up naturally.
Wear Quality Hiking Shoes: Wear the right shoes, painful feets can ruin your hike. No matter how strong you are or how much you train if you are not wearing comfortable hiking boots or shoe you’ll never get into a proper rhythm. Your hiking shoes are the medium that transfers your physical effort into motion. If they are not up to the task you’re in for a very unpleasant experience. Invest in a quality shoes, your footwear should provide support, protection from rocks and roots, and traction on wet and dry surfaces.
Match Your Breath to Your Stride: The best way to find your stride on the trail is to match your breathing with the rhythm of your steps.
Keep a Steady Continuous Pace: Keeping a consistent pace even when you come to harder uphill landscape is very important, try not to slow your pace too much from walking on easier flatter trail. The goal should be to keep your pace as steady as you can.
Take Regular Breaks: it’s necessary to break from time to time to drink some water and make any necessary adjustments to your pack or shoes. 3 to 5 minute break every 1 or 2 hours is recommended. Even if you feel very warm from exertion, you will cool down very quickly when you stop for a break on the trail in cold weather and you’re usually exposed to higher winds in the mountains.
Use Trekking Poles: Trekking poles help absorb downward forces and distribute them to your arms and shoulders.
Listen to Your Body: Dehydration is the biggest threat to your well-being while hiking. Even in the winter, you need to drink enough amounts of water. The warning signs of dehydration include headaches, confusion, cramps, disorientation and small amounts of bright yellow pee. On hot sunny days, you need to be wary of heat stroke as well. The warning signs include a lack of sweating, muscle weakness, dizziness, dry bright red skin, shallow breathing, and a rapid heartbeat. Whether you’re in rhythm or not if you experience any of the above symptoms you need to stop and get a handle on the situation.
Content source:10 Tips For Pacing Yourself On The Trail: https://montemlife.com/
