Health and Fitness

Research on our four-footed Friends:

Quality of life of obese dogs improves when they lose weight, University of Liverpool, Feb 20, 2012.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander... 

Of course I suggest that you and the pooch hit the trails, first to walk, jog, and train. Then hit the High Sierra, or the wilderness near you.

One of the blessings of the High Sierra is the lack of ticks. Ticks cannot handle the dessicated and cold conditions in the High Sierra. Yet ticks do make it into the High Sierra.

Every Spring the Deer return to the High Sierra, bringing a load of ticks up to die. After the ticks feed on the deer they drop off, or they are scraped off.

  I figure that explains the few (2) tick encounters I've had in the Sierra during my life. I figure that both tick encounters can be accounted for by deer transport.

The two following articles are important for backpackers who use anti-infalmmatories, and for drug users generally. 

The first article indicates a further danger from NSAIDs, that of cancer. I strongly suggest that use of NSAIDs be episodic, and their use restricted to limited periods of time.

I deal with drug use in my injury recovery chapters of the Physical Fitness section.

Over one-third of California teens not getting gym classes at school, Sac Bee, June 1, 2011.

Nor are the kids getting art, music, or any solid foundation in math, science, or English. It's like our schools have become little more than free daycare for cheap illegal labor.

This article points out that people with aching joints are not doing the best thing you can do with aching joints, which is to work them.

Instead, my fellow arthritis sufferers are decreasing activity and increasing couch time. That's the worse thing you can do, according to my experience.

Backpacking Fitness: Related Topics. Drugs, Diet, Braces and Such

 This is the comments and questions page for the related topics section of the Trail Guide's Backpacking Fitness Guide. Post your questions or comments through the comments link at the bottom of this page.

A backpacking fitness program involves knowing the proper drugs to deal with the range of pains backpacking can bring on. We will look at some of the basic drug choices we have for inflamtion.

Backpacking Fitness: Weight Lifting and Upper Body Strength

This is the comments and questions page for the Trail Guide's Fitness Section on Weight Lifting and Upper Body Strength. If you have questions or comments, post them through the comments link at the bottom of this page. 

I believe that having adequete upper body strength is vital for comfortably shouldering the weight of a backpack, especially if the pack is loaded for extensive distances over difficult terrain such as the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

Backpacking Fitness: Legs and Lungs.

This is the comments and questions page for the Legs and Lungs section of the Backpacking Fitness section of the Tahoe to Whitney Trail Guide. Post your questions or comments through the commnets link at the bottom of this page.

If you have information or experiences that exceed the scope of questions and comments, Register and post your own article in this Backpacking Fitness Forum about how you keep your legs and lungs together for High Sierra backpacking.

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Backpacker Injury Recovery

This page is set up for your comments and questions from the Trail Guide's physical fitness section about injury recovery and starting a fitness program.

Post comments through the link at the bottom of this page. If you are a registerd member, you can post your own Forum Topic in this the Mountain Conditioning Forum.

Stretching and Flexibility

Introduction: Welcome to the Backpacking Physical Fitness Forum 

Skills

I believe that the most average person, male or female, possesses inherent physical and perceptive capabilities that are nothing short of amazing.

The average person can run all day long, observe the most minute details of the terrain as they pass through, and monitor their status and alter their plans on the hoof in response to changing internal and environmental circumstances.