Building Endurance Through Peakbagging, the OGUL List and the Mountaineer's Bucket List

Before a person can become a mountaineer, one has to start from the bottom. Building one's endurance does not come easy. There's just no short-cut to the TOP!

I started building my cardio enhancement through walking 6 miles in 1:40 hrs. I set my mind that I have to finish that workout 2x during the week and walking more miles during the weekend. For few weeks I repeated such exercise without the help of any supplements. Its the way you get your body getting used to the mild torture.

Once my cardio level improved, the hill hiking was the next. That's when I started joining hiking clubs. But because I wanted more challenge, I joined more advanced level hikers. These are the kind of people who would give up their whole weekend just to see "The Great Outdoors".

However, I heard of the group who does nothing but just go up to the top of a mountain, not just to enjoy its sceneries, but to stop to eat lunch. Its crazy as it sound but its what the group does. The idea was sold and I just can't wait to eat lunch to the top.

I pre-qualified to join the Dave Wilmott's group  http://www.meetup.com/norcalpeakhikers/. He organizes and leads peakbagging for NorCal Peak Hikers Meetup. There is simply no shortcut to the top. Many runners and cyclist could not survive if one is not an advance level hiker. Its not because runners and cyclist do not have endurance but it has something to do with the mind. Not only the endurance requirement, but one has to be self-sufficient, knows the backcountry navigation and oriented with weather forecast. To sum up, before someone becomes a peakagger or mountaineer - one has to go through years of training and experience.

There is no other person who can do that I know in Northern California but Dave Wilmott. Younger generation like me calls him "Papa Dave". Dave brings with him over 30 years of backcountry peakbagging and skiing experience. I am one of the lucky person who often join the trip that I've received "free" lessons.

By joining NorCal Peak Hikers group, we typically crossed out the peaks we've made it to the peak. The list is quite long. There are 63 named peaks in the OGUL list. Every end of season we celebrate who completed the list. So far, there is only one person, a female who completed the list in 18 months. That's quite a feat for a full time worker. Myself has done about 38 peaks and I have 25 more to go. Most of these peaks are only accessible during summer.

The Peakbagging and OGUL List Adventure photo collection can be seen here:
https://picasaweb.google.com/112364082721983243207/OGULAdventure#



Tahoe-Ogul Peaks List

Rank	Peak	Elev-Ft	Range (Level 5)	Prom-Ft
1.	Mount Patterson	11,673	Pine Nut-Sweetwater Ranges	4153
2.	Wheeler Peak	11,663	Pine Nut-Sweetwater Ranges	343
3.	South Sister	11,360	Pine Nut-Sweetwater Ranges	760
4.	Highland Peak	10,936	Carson-Iceberg Area	2456
5.	Freel Peak	10,881	Carson Range	3146
6.	Middle Sister	10,854	Pine Nut-Sweetwater Ranges	854
7.	Jobs Sister	10,823	Carson Range	343
8.	Silver Peak	10,800	Carson-Iceberg Area	760
9.	Mount Rose	10,776	Carson Range	3630
10.	Jobs Peak	10,633	Carson Range	793
11.	East Sister	10,404	Pine Nut-Sweetwater Ranges	724
12.	Round Top	10,381	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	2541
13.	Red Lake Peak	10,063	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	1463
14.	Stevens Peak	10,059	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	499
15.	Hawkins Peak	10,024	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	2144
16.	Raymond Peak	10,014	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	1282
17.	Pyramid Peak	9983	Desolation-Crystal Range	2583
18.	Mount Price	9975	Desolation-Crystal Range	535
19.	Dicks Peak	9974	Desolation-Crystal Range	1534
20.	Jacks Peak	9856	Desolation-Crystal Range	376
21.	Mount Tallac	9735	Desolation-Crystal Range	695
22.	Reynolds Peak	9680	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	760
23.	Lookout Peak	9584	Carson-Iceberg Area	544
24.	Waterhouse Peak	9497	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	1417
25.	Mount Siegel	9451	Pine Nut-Sweetwater Ranges	3477
26.	Markleeville Peak	9415	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	1135
27.	Wade Benchmark	9367	Carson Range	287
28.	The Nipple	9342	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	702
29.	Mokelumne Peak	9334	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	1494
30.	Red Peak	9307	Desolation-Crystal Range	107
31.	Ralston Peak	9235	Desolation-Crystal Range	1075
32.	Phipps Peak	9234	Desolation-Crystal Range	434
33.	Snow Valley Peak	9214	Carson Range	1254
34.	Rubicon Peak	9183	Desolation-Crystal Range	263
35.	Genoa Peak	9150	Carson Range	1830
36.	Mount Lola	9148	North Donner Pass Area	2068
37.	Castle Peak	9103	North Donner Pass Area	1343
38.	McConnell Peak	9099	Desolation-Crystal Range
39.	Jeff Davis Peak	9065	Mokelumne Wilderness Area	585
40.	Basin Peak	9017	North Donner Pass Area	337
41.	Granite Chief	9006	Granite Chief-Northwest Tahoe Area	1846
42.	Needle Peak	8971	Granite Chief-Northwest Tahoe Area	331
43.	Desert Creek Peak	8958	Pine Nut-Sweetwater Ranges	1660
44.	Tinker Knob	8949	Granite Chief-Northwest Tahoe Area	1029
45.	Silver Peak	8930	Desolation-Crystal Range	250
46.	Lyon Peak	8891	Granite Chief-Northwest Tahoe Area	251
47.	Twin Peaks	8878	Granite Chief-Northwest Tahoe Area	1318
48.	Tells Peak	8872	Desolation-Crystal Range	272
49.	Ellis Peak	8740	Granite Chief-Northwest Tahoe Area	1060
50.	Anderson Peak	8683	Granite Chief-Northwest Tahoe Area	163
51.	Duane Bliss Peak	8658	Carson Range	698
52.	Sierra Buttes Lookout	8590	Central North Sierra	1870
53.	Mount Mildred	8398	Granite Chief-Northwest Tahoe Area	318
54.	English Mountain	8373	North Donner Pass Area	1253
55.	Adams Peak	8197	Diamond Mountains	2197
56.	Haskell Peak	8107	Central North Sierra	1427
57.	Black Buttes	8028	North Donner Pass Area	708
58.	Snow Mountain	8014	Granite Chief-Northwest Tahoe Area	1334
59.	Signal Peak	7841	North Donner Pass Area	641
60.	Mount Elwell	7818	Central North Sierra	806
61.	Old Man Mountain	7789	North Donner Pass Area	789
62.	Mount Fillmore	7715	Central North Sierra	1675
63.	Devils Peak	7704	Granite Chief-Northwest Tahoe Area	504

Aside from the OGULs collection, a peakbagger also dream of making it to the 13er and 14er. Its a technical term which simply means mountains above 13000ft and 14000ft.

Typical 13er/14er weekend https://picasaweb.google.com/112364082721983243207/Agassiz13er#

Posers at the top :

A very advance peakbagger does not mean he/she is an advance mountaineer. Every mountain has its own terrain features and routes to the top. Some peaks are just a walk-up and runnable like White Mountain and Mt. Whitney but some peaks need technical expertise to get to the top such as the Palisades big 5.

The cirque’s crest lies in Kings Canyon National Park and is crowned by five 14ers (Mt. Sill, North Palisade, Polemonium, Thunderbolt and Starlight), comprising a third of all the 14ers in the state of California. None of the 14ers in the cirque are easy to climb either, requiring at a minimum class 4 rock climbing moves over vast exposure.

the Palisade glacial cirque- Mt. Sill (14,159 ft.) at left, North Palisade (14,242 ft.) right of center, and Thunderbolt (14,003 ft.) at far right

Sill is the easiest of these at class 4, with the remaining four summits- Polemonium, North Palisade, Starlight and Thunderbolt peaks requiring class 5 technical moves. Thunderbolt is the northern-most 14er in this great spectrum of wonderment, as well as being the northern-most 14er in the Sierra. It also contains the hardest standard moves of any California 14er, a few 5.9 mantel moves to attain its uppermost summit block. It is by no means the hardest 14er to climb in terms of physical effort- I would put that distinction on Mt. Williamson, but the pure technicality of Thunderbolt’s sheer granite summit makes this peak one of my favorite 14ers.

 For the really hard core mountaineers, one has to go far as the Pacific North America just to their training, in Mt. Rainier, to make to the base of Denali (Mt. McKinley), North America Hemisphere's highest peak.

Im not quite there yet, in fact, I have to hone my technical and navigation skills. As I've stated in the beginning of this blog, with mountaineering, there is just NO short-cut to the top.

These are my 100 mountains in California bucket list  http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6263728399460216321#editor/target=post;postID=5379173511557500480