Hi and welcome to my blog!
This is my first post, so go easy on me. I’m a fan of the outdoors based in England and next summer (June 2012) I shall attempt to ascent Mount McKinley (aka Denali) in Alaska via the West Buttress. I realised the sheer logistics are huge, so as I learn I shall keep you posted about my kit, fitness, specific training and overall physical and psychological preparedness for the expedition. Apart from that I will be generally blogging about any other escapades that I get up to.
I went into the Helly Hansen store today and was served by the ever-helpful Richard and an assistant Ben, who turned out to be a bit of a mountaineer and 2nd year university student in his spare time. I trust those guys to help kit me out with decent baselayers for Denali. Inge Solheim (http://www.hellyhansen.com/campaigns/ingesolheim/) has over ten years guiding people on expeditions to the North Pole and I have been assured he is the man to talk to about cold weather. Handy, since Helly Hansen are hosting an evening with him in Manchester at the start of Manchester.
I’m currently in training for the Original Mountain Marathon (http://theomm.com) and have spent a few months preparing. I am only planning on getting round in a fair level of comfort, not on getting a podium position. With less than two weeks to go I find myself still in need of some basics like lightweight cookware and a meal plan, but I have spent a lot of time researching sports nutrition and have had some real helpful advice from Joe Swingler (http://www.bespokenutrition.net). Tent-wise for the OMM I have invested in a 2 man Nerra Nova Laser Photon 2- it’s a serious bit of lightweight kit and I am looking forward to putting it to the test. Once the OMM is out of the way I shall start to think about the training for Denali. I’ll hopefully get some training plans up on this blog soon 🙂
Happy adventures!
-GeekintheHills
Geek in the Hills 