After returning from the Austria hiking trip, I commenced with another Hybrid Round. This one incorporated P90X, P90X2, P90X3, Insanity, and various Skogg Kettlebell routines. Because I was enjoying the benefit of all the kettlebell swinging, I extended this round to 224 days, with now two kettlebell sessions each week.
But, of course, the 224 day round wound up taking much longer to complete, due to vacations, colds and flu. Additionally, I no longer work out on Tennis days or when I have some other activity taking place which I can rationalize as fitness-related. This process makes sense for me to ensure I don’t over-stress my body and ensure sufficient recovery time. And aside from annoying colds and the flu, I haven’t had any injuries from working our or playing tennis for a good long while.
The only complaint with my Round 17 Hybrid is that I’ve lost come degree of cardio fitness. And those Insanity routines, I’ve decided, no longer suit my 56 year old self. It’s too stressful on the knees and wrists and the result is a less than optimal cardio workout. So, for my next Round, which I started today, I replaced all the Insanity routines with 45 minute – 1 hour stationary bike riding (or any cardio activity I choose). I also tweaked the schedule a bit to ensure I don’t have upper body workouts two days in a row.
This new Round is also 224 days long, so it’s hard to imagine where I’ll be and exactly when I’ll complete it. But I’ve proven sufficiently diligent and consistent in my efforts to know I’ll do it so long as I’m able.
In July 2017, I set out to Austria with friends to hike for four days along the Stubaier Höhenweg. In total, the Stubaier Höhenweg is serviced by eight huts, over a U-shaped traverse through beautiful alpine landscapes, over a course of 100 km (62 miles). Our tour afforded us the opportunity to visit four of these huts, overnighting in all four, traveling in a clockwise direction for 33.3 km (21 miles).
After the hut to hut hiking, we toured Austria and München for several days to visit various essential tourist destinations.
Stubaital, (the “Stubai Valley”) lies in the Federal State of Tirol, in western Austria, approximately 30 minutes south by car from Innsbruck.
The Stubai Alps form the border with Italy. On the southernmost portion of our trek, we were a snowball’s throw away from Südtirol.
The Trip
On June 29, 2017, we flew out of Atlanta direct to Munich, Germany. The next morning, we arrived and spent the day touring Munich via Segway and enjoying food and beer at both Augustiner am Platzl and the world famous Hofbrauhaus. We spent the night at the Platzl Hotel which has the benefit of being in the Altstadt Marienplatz of Munich.
The entire trip is documented in a video you can find at the bottom of this post. The video is 1 hour long, which admittedly makes it difficult to digest for the casual viewer. For convenience, each section header of this post takes you directly to the appropriate part of the video.
The Stubaier Höhenweg Tour
The Stubaier Höhenweg is a high alpine hut to hut hiking tour that, over the course of nine days and eight nights, traverses beautiful mountain landscapes in Austria. Its complete traverse is possible without crossing glaciers or difficult passes which makes the route ideal for mountain walkers, families and others with limited alpine experience. However that is not to say you will not encounter snow, steep ground or the odd scramble here and there. Each evening offers the comfort and refuge of overnighting in a hut, which means a warm bed, dinner, beer, schnaps, breakfast and good company. The benefit of these accommodations cannot be overstated as you awake each morning, revitalized and eager to pursue your itinerary.
Our tour afforded us the opportunity to visit four of these huts, overnighting in all four, traveling in a clockwise direction from Innsbrucker Hütte to Bremer Hütte to Nürnberger Hütte to Sulzenauhütte and back down to the valley. The tour is approximately 34 km (21 miles) long from the top of the Elfer lift to the ending point at the Sulzenauhütte bus stop back in the valley. We experienced cold, rainy/cloudy conditions at the beginning of our tour, offset by spectacular sunny weather and beautiful vistas accenting the final half of our hiking.
Our tour, and the full Stubaier Höhenweg
The Stubaier Höhenweg is challenging alpine hiking. The entire eight day tour covers 62 miles (100 km) and consists of ascents/descents totaling nearly 26,246 feet (8,000 m). Each day consists of 4 – 8 hours of hiking through various alpine environments including: high meadows, cliffs, boulder fields, snow, passes and summits. Where appropriate, ladders and cables are provided for safety. Because no glacier crossings are involved, crampons and ice axes are not needed for this tour. However, walking sticks are a must. For added piece of mind, you may opt to bring harnesses and via ferrata gear (Black Diamond Easy Rider, Petzl Aspir and gloves) for negotiating some of the cable sections. For this tour, we merely employed the gloves.
Stage 1. July 1, 2017: Neustift (via Elferbahn) ‐ Innsbrucker Hütte (3 hours, 45 minutes) Our first day began in Munich with a quick breakfast and the 2.5 hour drive to Neustift, Austria, the beginning point of our tour. (Don’t forget to stop and purchase a vignette sticker for your car to allow use of Austria’s autobahn.)
In Neustift, we contemplated the rain as we ate pizza and visited the tourist center to acquire maps and Wander Stempel cards to keep track of the huts we intended to visit. Afterwards, we drove around the corner to the Elferbahn, the cable car that would lift us effortlessly and facilitate an easy, 3 hour and 45 minute hike to our first hut: the Innsbrucker Hütte. Upon arriving at the hut, we checked in to our 4 person Zimmerlager, showered, enjoyed beer and a Jausenplatte and relaxed.
view from Elferlift down to Neustift
view down to Neustift from top of Elferlift
From the top of the Elferlift, we began our hike to Innsbrucker Hütte, first stopping along the way at Elferhütte.
views along the way up to Elferhütte
Elferhütte
After a brief stop at Elferhütte (to buy hat pins), we continued on along the Panoramaweg to Karalm.
along the Panoramaweg to Karalm
viewpoint en route to Karalm
Karalm
Still 2 hours to Innsbrucker Hütte
first snow and views down en route to Innsbrucker Hütte
Innsbrucker Hütte
My only beef about the Innsbrucker Hütte is the cost of showering there. If I remember correctly, it was something like €2 for one precious minute of hot water. You need to be an exceptionally good planner to rinse the suds off before the bracing cold water flows from the shower head! A minor quibble, really. The food, beer, schnaps and sleeping quarters were all very good.
Stage 2. July 2, 2017: Innsbrucker Hütte ‐ Bremer Hütte (7 hours, 20 minutes) We set off under cold, wet conditions of 2°c/36°f. The previous night had brought steady rain. And this long day offered up a mixture of rain, mist and clouds, obscuring much of the promised vistas heralded in the trip literature. Still, the cool temperatures were appreciated on the uphills. And the mist presented an otherworldly air and its own special drama to our play. Importantly, the weather presented us with no difficulties in the hiking itself, so we were able to proceed through our day as originally planned.
your humble scribbler, flanked by youth
Bobby and snowfield
into the clouds
misty silhouettes, ice & water
panorama
glimpses of splendor
wonderland
nearly there!
Bremer Hütte
Die Bremer Stadtmusikanten / Bremen Town Musicians
The Bremer Hütte is sponsored by the German city of Bremen. And the Brothers Grimm–of fairy-tale fame–wrote a famous tale of the Bremen Town Musicians, the protagonists pictured above. Just another example of the whimsical findings along the way when hut to hut hiking in Austria.
Bremer Hütte panorama
I thoroughly enjoyed this hut. Smaller, older and more charming than the other, bigger huts in our itinerary. The proprietors and staff were friendly, the food excellent the facilities clean and the room comfortable. My personal mission was to introduce my party to various and sundry forms of schnaps. This, I accomplished in spades. What can I say? I improve lives.
It’s 30 degrees f, and Jake is in a t-shirt. He’s so big, he creates his own micro-climate!
Truth in advertising? Claim: 3-4 hours to Nürnbergerhütte. Reality: More!
The photo above reveals a recurring theme for me in my Austria hiking exploits. As a general rule, the time estimates provided by the trail signage prove unobtainable for me. Even in my advanced dotage, I consider myself a reasonably fit and experienced hiker. But here, in the Alps, I am simply slower. I accomplished this “3-4 hour” hike in 4 hours, 40 minutes. The younger members of our crew, of course, exceeded my results.
Eden
Zollhütte am Simmingjöch (2,764m / 9,068 ft) A border hut for the border police.
snow crossing
Vater und Sohn
trail panorama, looking back
beautiful, hanging valley
cables provide appreciated assistance
a water crossing
a final climb
Nürnberger Hütte!
Nürnberger Hütte
The Nürnberger Hütte, too was a very enjoyable hut, cozy, with good food.
Stage 4. July 4, 2017: Nürnberger Hütte – Sulzenauhütte (4 hours, 25 minutes) We began our day, greeted by sunshine and and warm 11°c/52°f temperatures. This day would also take us up and over the Mairspitze, which at 2,781 m (9,124 ft) was our tour’s highest elevation, offering the most commanding views.
Nürnberger Hütte morning panorama
crew picture, departing Nürnberger Hütte
We ascended steep, alpine grassland, passing sheep and goats as we pursued the Mairspitze.
sheep
cable assist
Mairspitze: Jake & Bobby
Mairspitze: yours truly
Mairspitze: Jake & Gregg
Mairspitze views east
Mairspitze views west toward Sulzenauhütte
Mairspitze pass
descent to Sulzenauhütte
dramatic shot of easy turn
View of the Wilder Freiger over the Upper Grünausee
Grünausee panorama
Freigerbach crossing
Glacier polished rock and Freigerbach
Moraine panorama with Sulzenauhütte
hanging valley at Sulzenauhütte
Sulzenauhütte
Sulzenauferner
We arrived early at the Sulzenauhütte. It’s a busy hut during the day, full of day hikers, as it’s an easy, 2-2.5 hour hike up from the valley. The beautiful weather lent itself to enjoying the outdoor terrace well into the night.
After touring Werfen, we drove to München for a final day of sightseeing and shopping before returning home.
München. June 30 & July 7, 2017: München Altstadt Following are pictures from our first and our final day in München.
Hofbrauhaus
Augustiner Biergarten
Stubaier Höhenweg Resources:
Here is a map showing the location of the huts we visited on our trip. Maps: Alpenvereinskarte 31/1 and 31/2, available for purchase from the Austrian Alpine Club (UK). As an Alpenverein member, you get insurance and discounts at the huts. U.S. residents should join the UK section of the Austrian Alpenverein.
Huts: I booked all the huts in advance via email or online forms on the individual hut websites. Advance payment was not required.
Money: Just a note about money. In the remote villages and huts of Austria, cash is not only king, but is often the only form of payment accepted.
Weather: Late July through early September is the best opportunity for non-technical hiking in the Austrian Alps. Everything is weather dependent. Having a detailed itinerary affords you the opportunity to modify the plans based on weather conditions. We made changes to our original itinerary based on the weather. Beautiful, scenic hikes on warm, sunny days, can quickly turn into dangerous, life-threatening excursions in rain and snow. The Hohenwegs should only be attempted in ideal weather conditions.
If this post wasn’t long enough for you and you somehow feel cheated not having had the opportunity to see all the pictures to get the fullest sense of the fun we had, then I invite you to spend the next hour of your life watching this movie. I recommend full screen and High Definition.
Stubaier Höhenweg 2017: The Movie (1 hour, 1 minute):
Sometime during the course of this month, I technically completed this long hybrid round. Though, it was only yesterday that I actually “checked off” my final Tai Cheng Neural reboot in preparation for a singles tennis match. The 147 day hybrid as planned sounds long and in actuality it took more like around 200 days to complete with interruptions from vacations, tennis matches and the common cold.
Yet it’s not really that “long” per se. Over the course of the round it cycles up and down in difficulty each week, punctuated with recovery weeks, scheduled (and unscheduled) recovery times. The nice thing about where I am at this point is that when I modify a few days–or stop altogether–I know I will resume. I trust myself to do that. Consequently, I’m uninjured. No overuse injuries from working out or injuries from tennis play. This is the “sweet spot” and the entire point of exercising to begin with.
The only nit with this workout regimen is that my cardio endurance is somewhat less than say two years ago. I recognize that at 54 years old I’m also two years older and that is certainly a factor. I have learned that for me, at my age, it’s vital to incorporate adequate recovery time, especially when I’m playing singles tennis. For the past two singles tennis seasons, I’ve moved up a level and my results (score-wise. win-wise) have suffered. Yet, I’m stronger and moving well. I’m trying to learn how to play a more forward, aggressive style and stop punishing myself with endless running down of every ball, just because I can. I may win the point, game, set or match that way, but it’s also a recipe for injury. And injury is to be avoided. It puts me in a bad mindset because, injured, I can’t play and it’s difficult to exercise as I would like.
When I began this round in August 2016, I was dealing with a tweaked, weakened right shoulder. But I continued to do the kettlebell routines with my lowest 8 kg bell. I stayed at that weight for about 5 weeks with my weekly kettlebell day. The shoulder improved and (along with everything else) got stronger. By the end of this round I was swinging the 20 kg bell for most of my routines.
Back in August, I started this round weighing in at 160 pounds. Now, I’m still 160. I continue to believe I should be at 155, maybe even 150. Yet I give myself some latitude because 1) I’m still doing around 100 cumulative pull ups on certain pull up days and 2) my legs, back, chest and shoulders are bigger and stronger.
So, in all, this “Mother of all Hybrids” combo of P90X, X2, X3, Insanity and Skogg Kettlebell has been good for me. I expect to focus a bit more on the kettlebells, complemented with yoga, in the near term before re-starting this hybrid again.
Once again, it’s time to commemorate the year’s top 10 posts for this blog. The Top 10 represent the posts which have the most visits during the course of the calendar year. Given this, recent posts are at a disadvantage because they haven’t has as much time to accumulate hits. Again this year, the tennis elbow saga dominated the hit list. So much so, that I should probably petition to get a commission of Thera-band revenues.
But it wasn’t all about recovery. P90X/Insanity related posts remain popular as well as my rants about getting a scholarship in the State of Georgia.
This year, my posts about several of my hiking exploits came to the fore. I’m glad to see that as these reflect the fruits of my labor, as it were. I haven’t been very good at blogging this year, mostly because it’s not so interesting to me to keep reporting on the same exercise routines I’ve been doing for up to six years now. But, rest assured, I’m still at it. And I continue to enjoy and get much utility out of the kettlebell (item 8 below).
Now, one day after the massacre at Berlin’s Christkindlmarkt, don’t expect me to express my solidarity with the people of Germany by sharing any vapid, meaningless, hashtags or profile picture changes exclaiming “ich bin ein Berliner,” or “Pray for Germany.”
Even if these had any value, how could one reasonably keep up with the demands of expressing constant compassion for: Paris, Belgium, Nice, Cologne, London, Paris, Paris, Grafing, Malmo, und so weiter?
And how much compassion can one reasonably muster up when the victims are perhaps the greatest deniers of the very reality mowing them down? Western civilization in Europe, apparently, isn’t dying off fast enough vis-à-vis the population’s collective decision to not reproduce. No, this bizarre, macabre dance with death must go full-on jitterbug by importing and paying the tormentors to express their grievances at our Christmas markets, soccer matches, dance clubs and topless beaches.
It’s a mental disorder of the highest degree, this insane compulsion of so many in society to deny reality. I subscribe to various German news publications so my Facebook feed is full of the news stories of the day reported through German eyes. As Mark Steyn observes, there were, indeed, the obligatory headlines describing the event as a “truck crash.” But, the German comments, by Germans, peppered below these news pieces escalate the denial by describing the “event” variously as: “Goddamned 2016,” “humanity,” and “religion.” Along with the obligatory: “you cannot judge,” and “terrorism speaks for no religion.”
When it is forbidden and racist to use your mind to know and to judge (which is to think and be fully human), then events like yesterdays are mystical, unknowable things, where the cause can be attributed to “the year,” “all of mankind,” or “all religions.”
The multi-cultural ethos relieves the adherent from the obligation to know–to know anything at all about the culture, religion or tribe they are celebrating. And in that vacuum of complete ignorance, without standards, without value, everything is indeed the same.
Nature, unfortunately, abhors a vacuum. And so it fills rather quickly.
Our culture is expressed each day in the work that we do, the hand we extend, the garden we tend, the wealth we create and the love we share. The yawp of life and liberty. That is the bounty of America.
Let’s together animate the better angels of our nature in tender pursuit of happiness.
Now 36 days into this hybrid, I have to say I’m feeling satisfied with my progress. My shoulder is slowly improving. I’ve been able to play tennis again. I even signed up and played my first match of the singles tennis fall season.
I attribute my progress to date to several factors:
This hybrid round ramps up in difficulty over three weeks, then includes a recovery week, then ramps up again in the same cycle. This prevents me from over-taxing myself.
I continue to swing the kettlebell light. The first 4 weeks, I kept it at 8 kg. Now, I’m using the 12 kg and dropping to the 8er for high pulls and snatches. This keeps my shoulder happy.
I do Tai Cheng Neural Reboot or X3 Yoga prior to tennis play. I refrain from other workouts when playing tennis. This obviously extends the duration of this hybrid. But it also prevents me from overdoing it.
Thus, I am in pursuit of a long, ego-less round. I want to work the cardio, endurance and to a lesser degree, strength. I played a two set singles tennis match yesterday in 95 degree heat. I basically won by having more endurance than my opponent (7-6, 6-2). So, even though I’m not 100%, it was a good feeling to be able to push through that heat to a win. The legs felt very good. I give the kettlebell work a lot of credit for overall strengthening of my legs.
Also, it’s been three years since I’ve done the original 60 minute long P90X workouts. I can state unequivocally now that they are more difficult than X2 or X3. Just sayin’.
One week into this round, I can confidently report that taking two months off of any resistance exercise results in material gains in weakness.
Some of this weakness is out of respect for my still compromised right shoulder. In each routine, I reduced weight amounts from prior levels. But even still, at the close of week 1, I am sore as can be.
Even with The Challenge, at only 5 pull ups and 15 push ups per set, I was humbled with total body soreness for two days after.
And with today’s kettlebell routine (after a rest day), at Level 4 with an 8 kg bell, I was like the tin man when I started. The good news is that after the first round, blood flow lubricated my muscles making the subsequent rounds very productive. It remains a good decision to stay low with that 8 kg bell. With it, I’m doing more, good form reps and good, very deep squats.
My hope is that by not “pushing it” I’m getting a decent workout, good cardio and rehabbing my shoulder. So far, I’m satisfied that I’m accomplishing this.
It’s with some trepidation that I am re-entering the blogosphere and dipping my toes into a new and extended workout round.
Why? Well since completing my last round, now over two months ago, I’ve been in general “recovery mode” playing some mixed doubles tennis, doing yoga and listening to Mozart operas. It’s also been something of an extended recovery period because at some point I did something to the back of my right shoulder that was causing discomfort and weakness. Range of motion wasn’t really compromised, though. So while this annoyance was happening, I stopped tennis play and just did yoga (and opera).
After a month and a half of no tennis, I played a recreational mixed doubles match only to find that the shoulder felt better the next day. And that better feeling continued to the next day, and the day after that. OK, that was weird. I still feel some minor irritation, but nothing like prior to playing that match. Could it be that swinging my arm released some kind of impingement? Well I guess we’re about to find out.
After about five days of my shoulder feeling better, and bored as hell with yoga, I decided to try starting up my self-designed, 20 week P90X/X2/X3/Insanity/Skogg Kettlebell regimen. I started today with the kettlebell via the Skogg Roots workout. I opted to go full Level 4, but with my lightest 8 kg bell. Doing Level 4 gave me a decent cardio workout. And keeping it light with the 8 kg kettlebell allowed me to focus on form, do really good, deep squats, and test out that shoulder.
The shoulder felt ok throughout the routine. I’ll have a better sense of everything tomorrow morning, but so far I’m doing fine. It felt good to be back at it.
What about the opera? Well, kudos to Mozart for keeping me sane while in low activity mode. Perhaps I’ll write about that at some point. For now, let me just say that opera on blu-ray can be very enriching. Uncompressed sound, high definition picture and English subtitles combine to create a captivating experience.
This post is a little late in coming, but just to tie this round up with a bow: I completed this hybrid on May 29, 2016.
In all, it took me 118 days to complete this 111 day Hybrid, begun on February 1.
I started this round at 160 lbs and finished this round at 165 lbs.
That’s tough to type. Back in the day, a few years ago, I was a steady 150 lbs. I’ve been gradually creeping up since. I’m willing to concede that some of this may actually be blamed on muscle gain. Since I started with the kettle bell, my thighs have gotten bigger. And there ain’t no fat in my legs. Neither in my shoulders and arms. But there’s no way I’ve gained 15 lbs of muscle mass. No, the fat resides as a sort of “modesty shield” covering my awesome abs. It’s there to make me more approachable and less intimidating to others.
This is all so much whining though, as I’m feeling in pretty decent shape.
Summer mixed doubles tennis starts this weekend and I’m looking forward to it. That knee/hamstring issue that began last June (!) is now almost fully resolved. Since completing this round, I’ve been doing Tai Chi and the Tai Cheng Neural Reboot each day. Just doing that has improved my range of motion to now be essentially the same on both legs. Still, I opted out of summer singles play. I plan to start that up in the Fall.
I must say I really enjoyed this hybrid. The variety. The mixing in routines of varying duration. I placed the recovery periods at good points where they turned out to be needed. Overall strength improved well. Pull ups improved throughout as well (even with the added weight gain).
So, this may me the new normal for me: extended regimens that incorporate a variety of workouts from multiple sources. I’m planning to take some time off, just focusing on walking, tennis, yoga and Tai Chi before starting up again. I drafted up another hybrid that incorporates P90X and Insanity along with P90X2, X3 and the kettlebell. The Mother of All Hybrids is what I’m calling it. Because of all the routines, it will extend to about 150 days. I plan to start up with that at some point this summer.
After returning from the Austria hiking trip, I commenced with another Hybrid Round. This one incorporated P90X, P90X2, P90X3, Insanity, and various Skogg Kettlebell routines. Because I was enjoying the benefit of all the kettlebell swinging, I extended this round to 224 days, with now two kettlebell sessions each week.
Sometime during the course of this month, I technically completed this long hybrid round. Though, it was only yesterday that I actually “checked off” my final Tai Cheng Neural reboot in preparation for a singles tennis match. The 147 day hybrid as planned sounds long and in actuality it took more like around 200 days to complete with interruptions from vacations, tennis matches and the common cold.
Once again, it’s time to commemorate the year’s top 10 posts for this blog. The Top 10 represent the posts which have the most visits during the course of the calendar year. Given this, recent posts are at a disadvantage because they haven’t has as much time to accumulate hits. Again this year, the tennis elbow saga dominated the hit list. So much so, that I should probably petition to get a commission of Thera-band revenues.
Now 36 days into this hybrid, I have to say I’m feeling satisfied with my progress. My shoulder is slowly improving. I’ve been able to play tennis again. I even signed up and played my first match of the singles tennis fall season.
One week into this round, I can confidently report that taking two months off of any resistance exercise results in material gains in weakness.
It’s with some trepidation that I am re-entering the blogosphere and dipping my toes into a new and extended workout round.
This post is a little late in coming, but just to tie this round up with a bow: I completed this hybrid on May 29, 2016.
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