Don’t Wait for the Pain During the Hike. Assess Early, Adjust Early.

You start the hike feeling great, your legs are fresh, the pace feels easy, and you push a little harder than planned.

A few hours later, everything changes. Your pace drops, the climbs feel harder, and your movement becomes less controlled. Suddenly your knees start hurting on the descent.

What happened?

The answer may be in the balance between the demand of the hike and your capacity.

The demand of a hike comes from distance, elevation, terrain, duration, pace, backpack weight and environmental conditions.

Your capacity is what your body can handle at that moment, and it isn’t constant. As the hours pass, fatigue accumulates, heat may increase and your muscles become tired. So a pace that felt easy at 8:00 AM might feel completely different at 1:00 PM, that’s why you shouldn’t wait until you’re exhausted or in pain before assessing how you’re doing.

Pay Attention to the Early Signs

Every now and then, check yourself. Is your breathing becoming much heavier for the same pace? Are your legs becoming unusually heavy? Are you stumbling more? Has your technique changed? Have you eaten enough? Are you drinking appropriately? Is a small discomfort gradually increasing?

These changes don’t necessarily mean something is wrong, but they may be telling you that the demand of the hike is getting closer to, or exceeding your current capacity.

Change the Demand

You can’t suddenly become fitter halfway through a hike, but you can change the demand. Slow down, take a short break, eat, drink, reduce some load if possible and adjust your plan. Then see how your body responds. This is much better than ignoring the early signs until you reach the point where you can barely continue. Pain and injuries are complex, and not every problem on the trail can be prevented, but sometimes pain is simply the point when we finally start paying attention to a situation that has been changing for the last hour.

Don’t wait for the crash.

Observe → Adjust → Reassess

Because on the mountain, you can’t immediately increase your capacity, but you can often modify the demand.

Assess early. Adjust early. Don’t wait for the pain.

Mario Fares
Strength & Endurance Coach | Physical Educator