The idea behind my recent climbing trips has been to just keep myself in shape. Now, with just over a month to go before I leave for Mexico and the highest mountains in my climbing carreer, I have started stepping up the workout. I'm climbing with more weight in my backpack than I require and trying to push myself for faster ascent rates. I'm going to post my training progress here. Hopefully, by the time December 27 rolls around, I'll be able to maintain a 500m/hr ascent rate with a 20kg or so pack.

The only problem is that I'll be in Vienna December 12-22, and Vienna isn't very far away from sea level. So in the last five days before Mexico, I'm going to have to jump-start my altitude acclimation process, presumably by spending every night at the summit of Pajarito Mountain (3,182m / 10,441'). Pajarito Ski Area only takes about 10 minutes to get to from my house, and offers the quickest route to reasonably high altitude in my area.

Anyway, training climb #1: Little Mother ski route (follows the Mother lift), 1km hike w/ 400m (~1,300') of gain, 51 minutes to the summit carrying a 7.1kg pack (including water).

So carrying 7.1kg at a steep (38° average) incline between 2,770m and 3,182m, I can push an average ascent rate of about 470.6 m/hr. I want to push that to 500m/hr, then start adding weight. I might take today off because of Thanksgiving and the fact that I have a cold, but we'll see.