We asked our trekking company for guidance on training for Kokoda, which they supplied in the form of a pdf file. The reputable firms will have a training regime or general guidance which they will send to you when you pay your deposit. There is surprisingly little Kokoda training advice available free of charge on the internet. It is primarily left up to you to organise your own training, although some companies will organise training courses for large groups, or organise a personal trainer for you if you require it. Of course these things come at additional cost.
There are several things you need to consider when training for Kokoda:
- Your aerobic fitness (you’ll be trekking between 6-10 hours per day, with breaks in between. Some days you might do even more).
- Strength in your legs (you’ll need to be able to take big steps up and down; You’ll walk uphill or downhill for hours)
- Your core strength (in slippery conditions it can be very difficult to keep your balance, even more so if you carry your own backpack!)
- Upper body strength + core strength if you carry your own backpack
Adam has put together a bit of a summary of our training and some thoughts on how you could prepare.
Aerobic Training
Living in Australia means that we have limited access to tropical mountainous conditions (Mt Bellamy in the Owen Stanley Ranges is 2250 metres). You can supplement with your own local conditions and hills. When training for Kokoda, we felt it was important to condition our bodies to work under stress for several hours without break. Walking Kokoda is like climbing up and down a flight of stairs steadily for several hours with short intervals (flat areas) in between. We wanted to condition our breathing (very important) and heart rates (for oxygen flow to muscles) to stabilise in a certain band (say 100-150 bpm). This was imperative in order to allow us to develop a rhythm on the track. Once you find your rhythm walking becomes much easier.
Prolonged aerobic training induces the following:
• Expanded heart chamber size – increasing the heart’s volume per pump;
• Increased lung capacity (great for those wanting to quit smoking);
• Increased blood volume and haemoglobin (the cells that carry oxygen in the blood);
• Increased tolerance of lactic acid (which builds up after prolonged exercise);
• Increased no. of capillaries in the muscles; and
• Increased ability to burn fat stores (which we all want!)
Cycling, Running, Walking
For me (Adam), the best type of aerobic training was cycling. I’m not fond of running and have never been able to run for prolonged period. This may suit some people, however cycling is a low impact activity, and you can cycle for hours without injuring yourself. It is also a great way to meet people. You could join a cycling group in your area – they are everywhere.
Joining a club will also allow you to benchmark your fitness against others, and really encourages you to push harder and further. Competition prepares you psychologically, giving you the ‘killer instinct’ that you need to overcome the tough challenges that invariably present themselves whilst in PNG. It’s this incremental improvement that will mean success or failure at Kokoda.
Training for Kokoda - you better be prepared for these hills
We also did an enormous amount of walking together when training for Kokoda, doing bushwalks on the weekend, and trying to ditch the car wherever possible e.g. if you live relatively close to work, you may decide to walk/jog home from work (although this alone would not be enough to prepare you adequately!).
Strength Training
I also joined the local gym and did some work with a personal trainer. This was mainly strength training with weights. I found that this was an excellent way to push the body to its limits and make the muscles really burn. You don’t necessarily need a personal trainer when training for Kokoda, but weight training helps by giving the body different exercises than just cycling alone. Both cycling and hiking will strengthen your leg muscles, but don’t forget about your upper body, especially if you’re going to carry your own backpack. Also, weight training will give your legs additional strength, whereas cycling or running will help you to build endurance. I trained at the gym 3 times a week for several months (the cycling was additional).
It is said that using walking poles will take up to 20% of the strain away from your legs, however poles can be difficult along the track, as you often need a hand to hold on to a tree or a root, to avoid slipping.
Janna did the occasional weight session at the gym and a couple of pump classes but no regular weight training for Kokoda. She really felt this along the way, and often had to rely on a trekking pole to get up or down big steps. She says now that if she’d do the track again she would do more weight training and more intense aerobic training (with less walking).
Hiking
We were a pretty lazy with our hiking. We didn’t do any overnight bushwalks in any national parks like a lot of our fellow trekkers did. This would have been a really good preparation, not just to break in the gear, but also to get used to sleeping in tents after walking the whole day, not having toilets/showers around, etc. We live in Sydney, with the Blue Mountains in the west and the Royal National Park in the south. In hindsight, we should have done at least some overnight tracks, to test our equipment and ‘break in’ clothing, so we would not recommend that others follow our example. We found that we were fit enough for the conditions, but we weren’t used to things like wet and sweaty clothing in the morning, getting wet in the rain, river crossings (feet wet), smelling terrible and dealing with blood-sucking insects. Once there, these were not major concerns, but it would have been more fortifying to have experienced these things before Kokoda.
Monitoring our fitness progress
We did not do this either. In hindsight, especially if you find it challenging to motivate yourself, record keeping would be of real assistance. Note down what you did, how many kilometres, what you weighed before you decided to commit to training for Kokoda, etc (a personal trainer will normally do this with you). Then improve on this every week. Reputable companies will ask that those over 40 years present a doctor’s certificate confirming their fitness levels. A good diary of your fitness regime would certainly help to convince your local GP that you are serious about undertaking the Kokoda track.
How Did We Do?
So, how did our training for Kokoda fare, when we were actually on the track?
Training for Kokoda: Mount up
Janna certainly felt the challenge of the Track (especially in the hot and humid conditions!), despite training for Kokoda. She carried only her day pack (2-3kgs + water weight) and drank a massive 7 litres of water on the first day! She used 1 Trekking pole instead of 2, to help with the big climbs, but still have one hand free to hold on to trees and roots where needed. She was often helped by her porter (Solomon) who kept her from slipping on the downhill climbs more than once! Once in her rhythm, with appropriate breaks, and a good dose of mental strength and determination, she mastered all the difficult hills. In hindsight she says, she would do more weight training and more intense aerobic training (with less walking), combined with a couple of overnight hikes to get used to the feel of overnighting while hiking.
Committing to training for Kokoda and your fitness
Most importantly, we made a commitment to ourselves to just start. We cemented our commitment by paying our deposit to do the track in early July. This ‘all in’ approach was a big motivator, not necessarily because of the cost but because we knew with each passing day the trek was getting closer – our ‘D-Day’ would soon be upon us! And then we made a commitment to improve, each day a little at a time. Sure, we also had work commitments, family, friends, etc that wanted to impede our training – we just made a pact to deal with these events as they arose. It’s important to remember that anyone can walk the Kokoda track with the correct preparation and the right commitment for training for Kokoda.