Preparing to climb Denali and big mountains
Are you thinking about climbing Denali and not sure if you are ready? Don’t be intimidated, it’s a big arctic mountain, but with the right preparation it’s an attainable goal!
We realize it can be difficult to determine if you are ready to climb Denali, so we’ll try to give you some solid benchmarks and ideas of what you can do to be successful on a big climb. We are always happy to talk to you individually to help you develop a program and a plan to be ready. If you are willing to put in the work to prepare well, you will have a much more enjoyable experience when you do find yourself carrying a big backpack at high altitude, and you’ll have a much better chance of reaching the summit. One of the most rewarding aspects of guiding is working with climbers to develop long term goals and a plan to achieve them. Please don’t hesitate to contact us and let’s make a plan to achieve your goals! There are no shortcuts, but the journey is incredibly enjoyable and rewarding and you might learn something about yourself along the way.
When we are talking to prospective climbers, we try to break the skill sets needed down into three categories and assess an individual climbers readiness in each of these different categories.
1) Mountaineering Skills
2) Expedition Climbing and Winter Camping Experience
3) Strength/Fitness.
1) Mountaineering Skills
The West Buttress route on Denali is NOT considered a technical climbing route, but it is a mountaineering route where you need to have what we consider basic climbing/mountaineering skills. These can be learned on just about any introduction to mountaineering course, which we offer through Mountain Trip in Alaska or Colorado, or you could take in many other places. Just because it is not a “technical” climb, don’t underestimate the challenge of the West Buttress and other mountaineering routes, you will be on steep terrain where your skills with crampons, and ice axe self arrest, etc. are important for the safety of you and your team.
The basic skills include:
Ice Axe technique (self-belay, self-arrest) Know how to use your ice axe in self arrest and self belay grip.
Crampon skills (French technique, front pointing, descending) You should practice putting your crampons on your boots that you’ll use on Denali including with your overboots if you will be using them. Be familiar with basic crampon technique French technique; Flat Foot (pied à plat), Duck Foot (pied en canard), Hybrid Technique (pied troisième).
Crevasse rescue techniques We don’t expect climbers joining a guided team to be experts a performing crevasse rescues, as this is a pretty advanced skill. You should however be familiar with the techniques so you can help in case of a crevasse fall.
Self-Rescue You should be understand how to ascend a rope using an ascender and a foot prusik.
Team-Rescue You should be familiar with the concepts of team rescue including anchor building and hauling systems.
Fixed Lines. You should be familiar with using an ascender on a fixed line, using a “cows tail” backup, and using an “arm wrap” as a self belay to descend a fixed line.
Running Belays. We will often use a “running belay” where a rope team clips into intermediate anchors while traveling in exposed terrain. Understand how to pass an anchor as the middle person of a rope team.
Rappelling. Although we don’t expect to need to rappel on the West Buttress route, this is a fundamental skill that you should be familiar with.
Basic Climbing Knots/Hitches. There are just a few knots/hitches that you should be familiar with.
Figure 8, Prusik Hitch, Double Fishermans, Clove Hitch
All of these skills are taught in almost any 5-7 day introduction to mountaineering course, and will take you a long way in the mountains. You will need to put these skills to use, practice them, and have experience using them. We will review skills as necessary on a Denali expedition, your guides are also instructors and we plan to review skills along the way, but a Denali expedition isn’t the place to be learning these things for the first time!
Guides Tip: Get your harness and climbing gear out and practice in the living room, or set up a rope at the local playground to practice ascending a rope! Even professional guides refresh their skills before a trip.
Get these skills down, and they can take you a long way in the mountains! We will also be posting video’s and articles to discuss many of these topics.
Expedition Climbing and Winter Camping Experience
A huge part of the Denali expedition is the winter camping element, and the extended nature of this expedition. We schedule our West Buttress expeditions to include up to 22 days on the glacier, although most trips get back long before that, it is a long time to spend camping in the snow. We do some things to help make it comfortable and enjoyable, but much of the experience is the camp time. You should be ready to be camping in the snow or on a glacier, and have some experience doing it. We’ll help you with techniques to keep your boots dry (if not warm) and how and when to clear snow off of your tent when it’s piling up in a storm. At the same time, we understand that a Denali expedition is, for most people, going to be the longest expedition they’ve done, and will be a different environment than they’ve experienced in the past. That is all part of the unique and exciting elements of a Denali expedition that make it so special!
Again, there are many places to get this experience, and it is generally a part of most introduction to mountaineering type courses. Mountain Trip offers these courses both in Alaska and in Colorado. Other places where climbers generally gain this type of winter camping and mountaineering experience including; Mount Rainer, Mount Baker, Mount Shasta, Colorado 14’ers, White Mountains (NH), Himalayan climbs, Alps climbs. There are many ways to gain the expedition type of experience necessary to succeed in the Alaska Range, but Denali should not be your first multi-day winter climbing experience.
One expedition that you may want to consider before attempting a Denali climb is Aconcagua in the Argentine Andes and the highest peak in S. America. The route that we climb on Aconcagua is non-technical, and you get the opportunity to go to an expedition to just under 7000 meters. This is a great opportunity to get expedition experience and high altitude experience in a much friendlier environment than the Alaska Range. It’s also just a great trip, and really fun experience. http://mountaintrip.com/international/aconcagua
Climbers who have completed a good introduction to mountaineering course and then climbed Aconcagua are generally very well prepared to join a Denali team.
Fitness/Strength
You need to be in very good physical condition to climb Denali. Summit day shouldn’t be maxing out your strength and endurance, it should be well within your comfort zone. This is one thing that is within your control and can effect the success and safety of you and your fellow climbers. So many variables are out of our control (weather, etc.) that we really need to be sure we manage the ones that we can. Climbing big mountains is primarily an endurance event, but you do need strength as well.
Experience on a couple of other mountains prior to going to Denali will also help you gauge where you are physically. Start now! Don’t expect to be able to train for just a few months and be ready to climb Denali unless you start at a pretty high level of fitness.
Training for mountaineering and climbing is complicated and many of you have questions about how to best proceed. Or perhaps you don’t have the time to plan your training and would like to follow a plan designed by experts. Mountain Trip has partnered with Uphill Athlete (by Steve House and Scott Johnston) to create scientifically sound training plans designed by two professional coaches and leading mountaineers. Even fit and experienced climbers will benefit from a good training program. Check out their program at Training Peaks
Denali is one of the few expeditions that we offer where we can’t really provide “porter” support to lighten the loads. We often leave base camp with 50+ pound (22+ kilogram) packs, and drag almost as much in a sled behind us. You really need to be training with a pack this big as a part of your training regime so that your body can adapt to it, otherwise it can be crushing. Again, check out the training plans on Training Peaks to get a specific plan, but most importantly make a plan and stick to it as much as you can!
We’ll be posting several informational videos in the coming months, so look for links on the Climb Denali page.
Finally, don’t forget that a good attitude and teamwork go a long way to having an experience that is enjoyable as well as successful!
We love working with climbers and aspiring climbers to come up with a plan to reach their goals and maybe go further than they even dreamed possible. If you’d like to climb big mountains or come up with a dream please contact us!
