When to stop working out before a hunt?

[EJDXT21]

Just curious if there is a guideline of when to stop working out before a hunt. Maybe not stop altogether, but stop the intense work. I want to make sure I'm fully recovered and not sore going into a hunt.
Do most of ya'll stop heavy workouts, but continue to do some type of walking of rucking up to the day before you leave or do you continue normal workouts up until you leave? Thanks.

 

[Dunndm]

Just curious if there is a guideline of when to stop working out before a hunt. Maybe not stop altogether, but stop the intense work. I want to make sure I'm fully recovered and not sore going into a hunt.
Do most of ya'll stop heavy workouts, but continue to do some type of walking of rucking up to the day before you leave or do you continue normal workouts up until you leave? Thanks.

I usually go even harder for a week prior to the week I leave. Meaning I’m sore as s**t the week before, then the week of I taper down workouts until the day before I leave I’ll get a nice sweat then stretch for a good while.


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[EJDXT21]

I usually go even harder for a week prior to the week I leave. Meaning I’m sore as s**t the week before, then the week of I taper down workouts until the day before I leave I’ll get a nice sweat then stretch for a good while.


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Thanks. Do you find that with this process, when you get to your unit you are not sore and feel recovered and ready to go? I was thinking of doing something similar. I could crank it up next week, then the following week ruck, up until the day before I leave.

 

[MallardSX2]

On the flip side, after getting sick for the last 2-3 weeks, I'm hitting it SUPER hard for the next 1.5 weeks and hopefully I have conditioned my feet, legs, lungs and rule out the chance of a heart attack before I leave for my hunt.

I will likely go into the hunt being a bit sore actually. I will recover on the 25 hour drive. Hopefully

This is the most unprepared I have ever been going into a hunt. I'll die trying. As usual. lol

 

[jzeblaz]

Taper week is my favorite part! I usually just focus on stretching and walking around the week before. I'm mainly concerned with an injury and going into the hunt sore. Enjoy the fruits of your workouts and take it easy.

 

[dreamingWest]

I had a bonus week this year. I was actually going to start a thread on everyone's favorite taper/bonus week workouts. My last full block ended last Friday. So I had 5 days before I flew out and about a week before I'm actually hunting.

I limited everything down to minimum dose and cut back anything heavy to help mitigate risk of injury. But I continued to "grease the grooves". So for any LSS running or riding I kept it around 30 minutes. I didn't sprint. I didn't lift heavy. I did some 15-30 minute yoga. I worked in some of the Knees over Toes Zero exercises, and I did what I called a mini-murph. Unweighted, and instead of all the reps I did small burnouts or until I hit 1/3. I enjoyed this past week. It was low stress and I feel great as I head to the Yukon.

 

[Steelhead]

Same as others, I typically throw the kettle bell around, burpees and running through the year and then go easy, stretches, walks the week before opener. This year is going to suck big time because I literally just got over having Covid and 2 weeks of down time, lungs are weak and frequent energy dips...and with 6 days until packing into spike camp I'm very intimidated and a bit nervous.
I'm also 53 years old so maintaining fitness just gets to be more and more work LOL!

 

[EdP]

It really matters what your travel time is. For me, with a 3 day drive to Wy, I work out at max intensity right up to the day before I leave. If I was only a day of travel away I would taper off my last two workouts, the last being the day before travel.

 

[Poser]

I live at elevation and just continue my normal training week, sometimes even lifting in the morning and heading out that afternoon. That being said, if you’re facing a major elevation change, going into that trip depleted and/or in a state of recovery will negatively impact your acclimation process. If it’s a big trip, you want to of course avoid getting injured just before the trip and if you hunting trip is the “big event” you train for all year then you should taper similar to an athlete leading into a big game, playoff week or race.

Also, if you are actually training, and not just exercising, you shouldn’t be particularly sore, especially that close to peaking. Soreness simply means that you are doing something (movement, activity, volume or intensity) that you are not adapted to. A training program should taper your progression in a way that you don’t experience major soreness because it is too costly when it comes to your recovery and adaption time. If you are getting “sore as shit”, you might rethink what you are doing, either the program or the random way in which you are exercising that is causing excessive soreness as it doesn’t translate into any type of meaningful training unless you are capitalizing on stress, recovery, adaptation cycle. If you are in fact capitalizing on the SRA cycle, then you should not be experiencing that degree of soreness because of the adaption. Sore just means sore, if doesn’t mean “better.” If you are getting that type of soreness in a setting where you are training for the primary purpose of athletic performance (as opposed to aesthetics where soreness may be more common), then you are likely stunting your progress.

 

[D S 319]

I just listen to my body. Most likely you aren’t over training anyways. It takes a lot for that, our bodies are tough! Always implement stretching though that seems to help with a lot of my aches and pains.

 

[ETX-(Ty)]

This thread rocks, I like the taper week idea. we always try to peak for opening day but with travel, road food, less sleep its easy to show up to the trail head already compromised. I got altitude sickness really bad on my first diy (I live/train at sea level) hunt so planning at least one good sleep at altitude before getting to work allows the training to actually count for me.

 

[Sccritterkiller]

I stay on the same w/o schedule until the day before I leave...2 days driving is plenty of rest.

 

[rclouse79]

I was shooting our 3D course with a 50 lb bag of concrete in my pack. I remember feeling a strange sensation when crouching down to pull an arrow. Then when I went scouting a couple weeks before the season I would get a strange shooting pain in my right quad when bending my knee too much going downhill. I pretty much stopped all leg lifting after that hoping it would heal. I could still feel it slightly opening day, but I seemed to hike out whatever it was. When not dealing with any injuries I usually do one last light workout a few days before the season.

 

[EJDXT21]

Thanks everyone. I am likely not training as hard as I should be. I do get a little sore when I add some additional weight or in the case of riding a stationary bike, add more resistance and cadence. But I’m not getting super sore. I just want to make sure my body recovers before I get there so Its not trying to recover while hiking around which would be incredibly hard.
I think we likely have about a 2 day drive and I will be going from basically a couple of feet to 10,000 feet of elevation so definitely factoring that in.
It sounds like maybe stepping it up a notch with the workouts the week before then tapering off the week of, while continuing some moderate rucking/low intensity workouts and or stretching regimens may be the ticket for me. Probably won’t do anything but stretch and rest the day before we take off.
I guess I’ll see what that does and figure out if I need to make any adjustments for next year.

 

[EJDXT21]

Same as others, I typically throw the kettle bell around, burpees and running through the year and then go easy, stretches, walks the week before opener. This year is going to suck big time because I literally just got over having Covid and 2 weeks of down time, lungs are weak and frequent energy dips...and with 6 days until packing into spike camp I'm very intimidated and a bit nervous.
I'm also 53 years old so maintaining fitness just gets to be more and more work LOL!

Steelhead, I feel ya. Last year I got Covid in July, our hunt was the last part of October. I was useless for about 2 weeks and it took another week before I could start training again. Lost some muscle mass too from being down and up there, putting in any kind of effor was really taking it out of me. Not sure if it was due to the Covid or elevation or both. We’ll see how different if any I feel this year. Been healthy so far. Good luck to you and try to enjoy it, even if you have to scale it back a bit.

 

[PredatorSlayer]

For me it is usually 10-11 months before the hunt In all seriousness I start to tone my workouts down about 2 weeks prior. I like to lift heavy weights and for the most part have avoided injuries, but two weeks prior to the hunt I roll with sets of 10-12 with lighter weight instead of sets of 5-7 with heavier. I also stretch more.

 

[V2Pnutrition]

@EJDXT21

Great topic!

There’s a difference between a genuine deload in training volume and just backing off your workouts.

If you’ve been training in a very planned way with progressive overload over several weeks, a reduction in volume (choose your variable) can help a ton. Generally speaking, a reduction of 30-50% is what’s suggested.


We just did a podcast on the topic you might enjoy.

Check it out here if you’d like.

 

[dphifer]

I was just considering how to taper down the week I travel. In all my genius, I scheduled to do a Spartan race on the Sunday before I leave. So I plan on just taking that easy and having fun with it and then just light cardio for the week before leaving Thursday.

 

[Q child]

I recommend you quit exercising altogether.

 

[Newtosavage]

I would start to scale back the bleachers and weighted pack hikes about 2 weeks out and by the last week it was pretty moderate. Reason being, I didn't want an injury to ruin my hunt. I figured if I got injured 2+ weeks out, I might be able to recover enough to still hunt.