Hanging up my crampons?

[simonov]

I have not made a winter ascent of any mountain since I moved to Reno almost a decade ago. The snow conditions are very different from what I was used to in SoCal and I had some trouble adjusting.

We have a mountain nearby called Mt Rose which is very similar in size to Mt San Jacinto, and the route to the top is also similar to the San Jacinto climb from the tram station. I have topped Mt Rose many times in the summer.

This weekend I decided to finally tackle Mt Rose in the winter. I pulled out my crampons and fitted them to the boots I bought a couple years ago. I set out on the well-trod boot track before dawn and it didn’t take long for me to become completely frustrated and exhausted negotiating the boot track. It was of course hard and uneven where people had walked, but the moment you stepped off you sank up to your knees. A mile and a half into the five mile ascent I decided I wasn’t enjoying myself and sat down to take a breather before heading back.

I did enjoy that part, though. Unlike on, for example, the Baldy trail I could sit there for half an hour and not a single person came by. It was quiet, no wind, no highway sounds, the best aspect of being outside in the forest.

But I wondered whether this is it for me and winter mountaineering. I will be 64 years old this year and I think I am in pretty good shape. I commute to work by bicycle three miles each way almost every day, which isn’t a lot but it’s more cardio than most people my age get. But I was just so frustrated yesterday on the trail.

We are getting a couple of big storms in the next two weeks and after they blow through I think I will give myself one more try with Mt Rose in the winter. If I fail again I guess I’m hanging up my crampons for good.

BTW, this doesn’t mean I stay out of the mountains in winter. There are lots of great snow hikes around here, on boots, snowshoes or skis, and I try to get out as often as possible. But high winter mountaineering, like Baldy and Rainier and Whitney, might be in my past.

[Elwood]

Kudos for attempting this Winter ascent, and thanks for posting about it. I've got a few years on you. I hike a good 13 to 20 miles per week on two or three afternoons. I ascend a couple of thousand feet each of these days. I find an amazing amount of variability in my stamina, thus speed and frankly enjoyment of these hikes. My main point is that no single ( nor several ) bad day (s) should be taken as a sign of anything other than a bad day.

[David R]

I am a bit younger then you and I noticed over the last five years a significant slowing down of pace and thought it was age. It was age but it was also having extra weight on my frame . When I was younger I could power through with that extra weight not anymore. I lost all that weight got down to a similar weight to what I was in my 20s and I'm back to my old energy levels. Also you lose muscle as you get older, resistance training once you hit 50 is a must. I'm more muscular now then when I was younger. As you get older you can still do quite a bit but you have to adjust to the aging process.

[JeffH]

Sounds like that snow was better suited to snowshoes rather than crampons.
I'm also 64 and don't hike as fast as 10 years ago, glad to still be out doing it.

[Edward]

In addition to the age issue, with which I am very familiar, there are the snow conditions and equipment issues. To be fully prepared for snow, you often need to carry microspikes, crampons, trekking poles, ice axe, and snowshoes or skis. Microspikes for thin or intermittent snow, crampons for continuous steep firm snow, snowshoes or skies for deep soft snow, etc. You can encounter all of them on one trip. And you can still encounter conditions for which none of them fit well.

[GoalHiking]

I too am no spring chicken, and I didn't have a problem with things like Rim to River in a day, hiking from Wilson down to the Chantry Flats area and back up, etc. I did White Mountain (the CA 14er) around 20 years ago and I was completely wiped out afterwards: I crawled back into my tent at Grandview and slept for several hours. I don't think I could jog it now, but if I were acclimatized and the weather was OK I could probably do something afterwards if I wanted. The diff between then and now is I quit smoking (at Grandview, actually), I quit my subsequent nicotine gum addiction (~17 years!), and I started going to the gym. I don't know what I weighed then, but I think I was 215lbs after I drove across the USA in 2003 (which involved several hikes). Somewhere around 2015 I ballooned to ~286. Now, after CICO (but no drugs), I'm ~188. I just can't seem to shed the last few pounds but I'm focused more on fitness. Losing weight, resistance training, and getting off nicotine gives me a fair bit of energy.

What gets me is the tread. If I have to do a lot of step-ups that's more tiring than a smooth trail. Coming down things like that or slippery things is more challenging for me than I'd like. In your case if you're doing a lot of postholing that's obviously going to require much more effort than something you can glide over on snowshoes.