Anyone do supplementary exercises for hiking

[trekker76]

Obviously hiking is the best fitness for hiking but wondering if anyone does extra training in their life either directly or coincidentally beneficial for hiking? Age related or otherwise? I lift weights as another hobby and which isn't overly relevant however part of that is exercises to maintain stability and shock absorbing muscle in a bad ex-army knee. Apart from that I skip/jump rope a lot which I 'think' helps with ankle/foot strength and stability on uneven surfaces and rock hopping. I'm in mid 40's though so a lot of this may sound like hocus pocus to guys under 35

[Moondog55]

I try [ sometimes] but mainly doing the down the stairs slowly using heel first technique and trying to always do a double step when going up. Mid you this is on top of my rehab exercises for the hip surgery I should do a lot more I know, even walking to do the shopping rather than driving would help a lot

[Ant71]

It is not directly for bushwalking but I am sure it has cardio benefits for bushwalking. I cycle mainly MTB but road as well, surf, swim, and run I also do yoga I thinks that helps with flexibility balance and core strength

[Mark F]

My take is that why train when I could be actually enjoying a walk. While there are flow on benefits from one activity to others I don't do things like go to a gym or run around the block twenty times. A bit of urban cycling, the physical activity from my bushcare volunteering and regular walks manage to keep me at a point where I can tackle most harder walks (just more slowly).

[wildwanderer]

I found squats really helped to build leg muscle endurance and overall stability.

My leg muscles used to fail during a big climb (700m+) not any more.

[Birdman]

Before I start with a multimonth hike with a heavy backpack, about a month before I start I usually do a bit of hiking in the local city park (10-15km 2-3 times per week) followed by climbing stairs (30-60 floors up and down) with the heaviest pack I'm going to have on the multimonth hike. This is to prevent a "shock" to my body when the real hike starts.

The other thing I do is eat more in order to put on some extra weight before the hike starts because I always lose lots of weight. On my last hike I lost 10kg despite of eating an average of 7000 kcal per day on the trail.

[trekker76]

As with some of the above a big interest in stair walks and squats . I found it kept legs going longer on uphills, especially if you weigh a lot.

[RowanSmith]

If you want to get technical then weights are incredibly relevant to hiking fitness.

As well as being the very best thing you can do for injury prevention and joint stability (as you rightly said!) weights can lead to two extra great benefits - increased movement economy (i.e. every step takes less energy) and improved strength (making stairs and uphills significantly easier).

Beyond that (particularly if you have a dodgy knee) any type of lower impact, long duration exercise (things like swimming or cycling) can have a good cross over into hiking fitness as well.

And then of course there are always things like loaded hill intervals when you want to get really serious