overly optimistic?

[Julio]

Hey anybody or everybody,
I've been hiking for many years. I am 60 years old but very active. I work construction for a living as well as owning a restaurant. I work long and hard hours. I am one of those lucky people who has been blessed with a pretty strong body (for a pint sized 5'9"). I am planning a NOBO thru hike for march of 2015. Recently I have been doing day and section hikes with a full pack to get conditioned. I've been keeping track of my eating habits and mileage. It appears that I average close to 3 miles an hour when I hike. If I figure on 3 hours in the morning and 4 hours in the afternoon I estimate I can cover about 20 miles a day. Am I being to optimistic? I understand there will be zero days and unforeseen delays, but on an average day is 20 miles do-able? I want to average 120 miles a week. Not in a race, just planning.

[flemdawg1]

For the first week or two, slow down and limit yourself to 8-12. The GA mountains are probably a good deal tougher than what you're used to training on. Then gradually ramp up the miles.

[Data]

I'm 63 and last year (2013) hiked 1450 miles from GA to NY. I found the going very slow in GA & NC. My average speed was between 1.75 and 2 miles an hour. The ups & downs slowed me down quite a bit in the early part of my hike. Also, the NARO virus got me in Erwin, that made we feel weak for a week. (no pun intended.) Where I really lost time was family issues: a new grandchild, a 30 wedding anniversary and an engagement party. I think its easier for younger hikers to concentrate on hiking and nothing else. I am going to finish my hike from CT to Maine starting in May, hope to see you on the trail.

[apd07c]

20 mpd average is very do-able for some... and not for others. I think maintaining that average will be more about mental strength than physical strength. Only one way to find out...

[kayak karl]

For the first week or two, slow down and limit yourself to 8-12. The GA mountains are probably a good deal tougher than what you're used to training on. Then gradually ramp up the miles.

i agree with this, but most do what they want and end up hurt. oh, why the need to plan 20 per week ??

[steve0423]

In addition to the unforeseen, there will be times when terrain will make it impractical. But I think the big question is why? Do you have a time constraint? I saw a lot of folks in their 20s and in incredible shape get beat up physically and mentally by convincing themselves they had to walk big miles every day. My best advice would be to ease into it, listen closely to your body and only do what you’re comfortable with. What you’re talking is probably doable for you; just make sure you’re not taking from the experience by stressing about millage. I think it’s probably smart to go into it thinking this is the only opportunity you’ll ever have to do this and make the most of it. I caught up to a LOT of fast hikers in VT, NH, and ME who had decided to slow down and enjoy it more.
I’ve never once met a thru hiker who told me they wished they’d gone faster

[apd07c]

I’ve never once met a thru hiker who told me they wished they’d gone faster

I hear this quote a lot. It is those that don't finish because of weather that are the ones that wished they went faster.

[rafe]

Seasoned young thru-hikers do 20 mile days routinely once they've gotten a few hundred miles under their feet. Almost nobody actually maintains that as a long-term average, however.

Once you've found your stride, maintaining an average of 15 miles a day is certainly possible, as a fit senior, in the middle part of the trail, at least 'till you get to Glencliff. I'd suggest a lower goal once you're in the White Mountains. Partly because it's seriously tough terrain, because weather may work against you, and if it doesn't, you might just want to slow down and enjoy the scenery.

I did my last long AT section at age 55 and managed consistent 15 mile days (long term average.) I took no zeros, but took a short day (say, 8-10 miles) every four or five days. Three years later I still managed 15 miles/day from Monson to Abol. On the Long Trail these last two summers I've been averaging barely 1 MPH.

3 MPH is not realistic for most of the AT. Again, the young un's are much faster but my average is well under 2 MPH, once breaks are figured in. In decent weather and moderate trail I can usually crank out 18 miles over the course of a summer's day.

[colorado_rob]

Just as a data point, I'm nearly 58 and I averaged 18.5 MPD on the 1st 1000 miles of the AT last year (heading back this year to hopefully finish), not including zero days, but with including nero days (days less than, say, 7-8 trail miles, visiting a town, etc).

I think 3 miles per hour is unrealistic, even 2.5 is a push, at least for me. I averaged right at 2.3 miles per hour including short breaks now and then, but I hiked 8-10 hours per day, sometimes a bit more (I had a few 24-25 mile days). I found slower hiking for more hours both more enjoyable and overall easier and more efficient energy-wise. Basically if there's decent weather and daylight, I hike. I don't like sitting around camp or shelters much.

Again, just another data point for us 55+ year olds.

[Malto]

You are suffering from spreadsheet hiking. "Alls you gotta do" is hike three miles an hour for seven hours and poof the spreadsheet says you have 21 miles. Reality is far more difficult than hiking via spreadsheet. But having said that, hiking 20 miles per day for an in-shape, fairly lightweight, motivated hikers is fairly straight-forward. You will do much longer days than you are expecting. I doubt seriously if you will average more than 2.5 mph. Doesn't means your goal is impossible, far from it. You will hike longer hours to achieve the pace. On a thru hike you can choose to get up earlier, hike later, take shorter and fewer breaks. This is the way to get 20mpd, not by worrying about mph.

[Kerosene]

Given a reasonable level of fitness for a 60-year old, I don't doubt that you can average 3 mph for a day hike with a backpack. You may very well be able to do it for multiple days in a row. The risk you run if you start out that fast is that your connective tissue and joints will likely not be up to that level of stress for many days in a row. As flemdawg1 suggests in Post #2, start out much, much slower to give your body time to adjust, recognizing that you may very well want to go faster and think you can, but you also don't want to get pushed off the trail after a week with shin splints, Achilles tendonitis, a sprained knee or ankle, tight IT bands, etc. As I've aged I have slowed from the 3 mph pace I sustained as a 20-something and my knees have slowed me further. Start out a bit slower (2.0-2.5 mph), maybe pump it up to 3.0+ mph for an hour mid-day as your "cardio workout", and limit your daily mileage for the first 2-3 weeks to 10-15 miles. After a month your body should be able to slowly increase mileage into the 15-22 mpd range if you're as fit and strong as you say, and you might even try the 4-state challenge as you approach WV!

Everyone's body is different, but we're all aging and few of us backpack enough to stay in thru-hiker shape all the time. As a section hiker and long-time soccer player, I was able to put in big mile days much faster than most, but even then I've slowed down (and become much more tentative when rock-hopping downhill!).

As Malto suggests, put away the spreadsheet and concentrate on planning your first week at a moderate pace. A thru-hike becomes a series of smaller section hikes after a while, and your plans will naturally adjust as you move up the trail. Best of luck!

[FarmerChef]

I'll just chime in to agree with Kerosene and Flemdawg. Start out slow and build up. 20 is completely doable but as one who has done this for several days in a row, it takes it's toll when your legs are new to the rigors of the trail. After a few weeks, all your stabilizing muscles are up to snuff and you can increase your MPD safely if that's what you want to do. The last thing you want to do is start out too fast and have to come off trail due to an injury that takes the joy out of hiking.

[Slo-go'en]

You have been hiking in NJ (from recent posts) and that is about as easy as it gets and not a good judge of the kind of milage you can do in the much more difficult sections. In NH and Maine, 1 mph is a good, fast pace and a 10 mile day is a hard day. North Carolina with it's seemingly endless all day up hill climbs wears at you.

Yes, there are large sections where you can bang out 20 mile days easy enough, (northen VA/PA/NJ/NY/CT) but even in those sections it will not be consistant. Usually because in the mid altantic states it's insanely hot and humid and that slows you down too.

[bigcranky]

When I did my section hike in central Virginia this past summer, the guys who were cranking out 20-25 miles per day were the old guys. I mean 60s and 70s. They got up before dawn, hit the trail, and just walked all day - no distractions.

Not sure you can expect to maintain a 3mph pace on the trail, especially from day 1, but you can expect that walking all day will get you where you want to be.

[Spirit Walker]

Some of the older hikers I met easily outpaced the younger hikers, not because they necessarily hiked faster, but because they were more willing to hike sunrise to sunset. If you get caught up in the shelters, people end up stopping at 2 or 3 in the afternoon. If you hike until 5 or 6 every day, without staying at shelters, you can hike an additional 6 - 8 miles a day. The older hikers also tended to spend less time in town, which eats up time. Not always though. As I've gotten older, I've actually ended up spending more time in town, because one day of running errands uses up more energy than a day of hiking, so I need an additional day to actually get some rest.

[Dogwood]

Julio, I commend you for your preparation, but since you have never done a 2200 mile hike hiking in a week after week after week month after month after month fashion I would still caution, as others have, to work your way into your thru-hike. Plenty of AT NOBO thru-hikers, and sections hikers, get knocked off the trail because of injury, often over use injuries, sometimes ending their entire hikes, because they started their hikes with a rigid mentality of going out too fast, furious, and far in the beginning than they were ready for. Don't be a shotgun hiker - fast out of the gate but with little stamina/endurance. A thru-hike is largely an endurance event not a beat the clock event for the vast number of thru-hikers no matter what faster hikers would like others to assume. I would advise, don't get caught up in the all the speed hiking mania or MPD obsessions at this point in your hiking. There's a very good amount of flexibility and adaptability I notice in the hiking styles of those that complete their first long distance hikes. I notice it often even in those that regularly happily complete long distance hikes or whatever duration hikes they complete. Don't be so rigid in your pre AT thru-hike planning that you ignore your ability to also be flexible.

"You are suffering from spreadsheet hiking." LOL.

[RockDoc]

Your math is not realistic.
The speed depends on slope. You might top out at 3 mph on a nice gradual downhill, but the uphill will reduce your speed to 2 mph (1 mph if you take breaks). Overall, most real-world older hikers average 1 to 2 mph. You can do 20 mile days if you are willing to hike 10 hrs plus/day. My wife and I are marathon runners, but we averaged only 1 mph all the way through the Maine AT, for example.

But really, we would rather hear you talk about something other than mileage. There is so much else that is more interesting. It's usually the young hikers that get fixated by the shallow goal of making big miles.

[peakbagger]

The zero days will get you if you don't watch out. Its easy to plan skipping zeros but the for many the attraction is too much. Over the years of sectioning I met many unconventional thru hikers over 60 and many tended to do slower speeds but longer hours per day. Definitely the hare and tortoise approach. One individual in his late sixties got up before sunrise and was walking out of the site as soon as he didn't need a headlamp. He typically hiked to about an hour before dark. Some other thru hikers along this section commented that they would always pass him in the morning as he was slow but inevitably he would pass by them when they had quit for the day.

As an example of what town days do, I and a friend did 5 weeks of sectioning, we had two cars and would spot a car, drive south and hike back to the first car. We set it up so that we got up early on the last day and hiked for 4 to 6 hours and ended at the car around noon. We then resupplied, got a motel or hostel room, did some wash and sometimes respotted a car. The next morning we would then drive to the trail and do it again. We were only doing 16 to 18 mile days but our average was great as we never took a day off for 5 weeks. Obviously two cars isn't an option for thruhikers but turning a zero into a half day in town is going to cut you expenses and increase your average.

[rafe]

If you're not a purist, one of the ways to improve your overall rate is to slackpack. You can walk (and climb) much faster without a pack on your back. Warren Doyle's numerous AT expeditions were in effect 100% slackpacking.

Aside from that I'd just echo what everyone else is saying; cut down on the zero days and use as much of the day as you can for walking. I typically walk from 8 AM to 6 or 7 PM, but that includes a couple hours down time. Say, forty minutes for lunch, and a fifteen minute break every two or three hours.

[fiddlehead]

I'll throw my 2 cents in here:

IMO it takes about 1,000 miles to truly get your body in condition for thru-hiking.
If it's your first hike, I'd figure you can do 20's AFTER that first thousand.

If it's your second, it will only take a week or two. (your muscles remember)

Lots of good advice above but, I think you can do what you want to do by taking it easy early, let those muscles and feet build up where they don't hurt anymore and plan on busting out 20's around Shenendoah National Park.

Sure you can do them earlier, but you might pull a muscle or overtretch a tendon and postpone the rest of your hike for an unnecessary problem.
Good luck and have fun.