Portage Training: Strength, Endurance, Skills, and Preparation

How do you train for a portage?

Training for a portage involves a comprehensive approach targeting muscular strength, endurance, cardiovascular fitness, core stability, and specific skill development to efficiently and safely carry a watercraft and gear over varied terrain.

What is a Portage?

A portage is the act of carrying a watercraft, such as a canoe or kayak, and associated gear over land between two bodies of water or around an unnavigable section of a river. This practice is integral to wilderness travel, particularly in canoeing and kayaking expeditions. Portages can range from short, well-maintained paths to long, rugged, and challenging trails involving significant elevation changes, obstacles, and uneven terrain. The physical demands are substantial, requiring a unique blend of strength, endurance, balance, and mental fortitude.

Understanding the Demands of Portage

Successfully navigating a portage requires a multi-faceted physical capacity. From an exercise science perspective, the primary demands include:

• Muscular Strength: The ability to lift and stabilize a heavy, awkward load (the canoe, often 50-90+ lbs) onto your shoulders, as well as lifting and carrying packs. This requires significant upper body strength (shoulders, arms, back) and leg strength (quads, hamstrings, glutes) for propulsion and stability.
• Muscular Endurance: The capacity of muscles to sustain repeated contractions over an extended period. Portages can last minutes to hours, requiring your muscles to maintain effort under load.
• Cardiovascular Endurance: The ability of your heart and lungs to supply oxygen to working muscles during prolonged physical activity. Carrying heavy loads over challenging terrain elevates heart rate and breathing, demanding a robust aerobic system.
• Core Stability: The strength and coordination of the muscles around your trunk (abdominals, obliques, lower back) are critical for maintaining balance, transferring force from your lower to upper body, and protecting your spine from injury, especially when carrying an unwieldy load.
• Balance and Proprioception: The ability to maintain equilibrium and sense your body's position in space while navigating uneven ground, roots, rocks, and slippery surfaces, all while under load.
• Grip Strength: Essential for securely holding onto the canoe, paddles, and packs.

Key Physical Attributes for Portage Training

Based on the demands, a well-rounded portage training program should prioritize:

• Relative Strength: The ability to move your body and external loads efficiently.
• Anaerobic Threshold: To manage periods of higher intensity during uphill climbs or challenging sections.
• Aerobic Capacity: For sustained effort over longer portages.
• Rotational and Anti-Rotational Core Strength: To stabilize the trunk against the shifting weight of the canoe.
• Scapular Stability: To protect the shoulders and efficiently transfer force.
• Lower Body Power and Endurance: For steep ascents and descents.

Foundational Strength Training for Portage

Your strength training should focus on compound movements that mimic the lifting, carrying, and balancing actions of a portage. Aim for 2-3 full-body strength sessions per week.

• Compound Lifts:
  • Squats: Goblet squats, front squats, and overhead squats (for advanced individuals, focusing on shoulder mobility and core stability) build leg and core strength.
  • Deadlifts: Conventional deadlifts or Romanian deadlifts (RDLs) strengthen the posterior chain (glutes, hamstrings, lower back), crucial for lifting and carrying.
  • Rows: Bent-over rows, single-arm dumbbell rows, or inverted rows develop back strength, essential for stabilizing the canoe.
  • Overhead Press: Dumbbell or barbell overhead presses build shoulder and upper back strength for lifting and supporting the canoe.
  • Lunges: Walking lunges, reverse lunges, or Bulgarian split squats improve unilateral leg strength, balance, and stability on uneven terrain.
• Functional Strength and Carries:
  • Farmer's Walks: Carrying heavy dumbbells or kettlebells in each hand improves grip strength, core stability, and full-body endurance. Progress to unilateral carries (suitcase carry) to challenge core anti-lateral flexion.
  • Overhead Carries: Carrying a weight overhead (dumbbell, kettlebell) improves shoulder stability and core strength.
  • Sandbag Training: Sandbags offer an unstable, awkward load that closely mimics the challenge of carrying a canoe or large pack. Incorporate sandbag squats, carries, and cleans.
• Core-Specific Exercises:
  • Planks and Side Planks: Develop isometric core strength.
  • Bird-Dog: Improves core stability and coordination.
  • Pallof Press: Strengthens anti-rotational core muscles.
  • Loaded Carries (as above): Excellent for dynamic core stability.
• Grip Strength:
  • Dead Hangs: Hanging from a pull-up bar for time.
  • Plate Pinches: Pinching two weight plates together and holding for time.
  • Thick Bar Training: Using fat gripz or a thicker bar for lifts.

Cardiovascular Endurance: The Engine for Portage

Developing a strong aerobic base is paramount. Aim for 3-5 cardiovascular sessions per week, varying intensity and duration.

• Long, Slow Distance (LSD):
  • Hiking: The most specific form of cardio. Start with flat trails, gradually increase duration, elevation, and backpack weight.
  • Running/Jogging: Builds aerobic capacity. Focus on trail running if possible to adapt to uneven surfaces.
  • Cycling/Swimming: Excellent non-impact options for building aerobic fitness.
• Interval Training:
  • Incorporate high-intensity interval training (HIIT) or tempo runs to improve your anaerobic threshold and ability to recover quickly from bursts of effort (e.g., uphill climbs).
• Loaded Hiking/Rucking:
  • Progressively add weight to a backpack (starting with 10-20% of body weight) and hike varied terrain. This simulates the physiological demands of carrying gear during a portage.

Specific Portage Skill Development

Beyond general fitness, practicing the specific movements of portaging is crucial for efficiency and injury prevention.

• Lifting and Mounting the Canoe:
  • Practice the "clean and press" motion: Squat down, grab the canoe's thwart, lift it to your thighs, then in one fluid motion, flip it onto your shoulders. Focus on using your legs and core, not just your back.
  • Start with a lighter object (e.g., a long piece of lumber, a PVC pipe) and gradually move to an actual canoe.
  • Practice lifting from both sides to develop balanced strength.
• Carrying Technique:
  • Once the canoe is on your shoulders, find the balance point. Your head should typically be through the yoke.
  • Maintain an upright posture with a slight forward lean. Avoid hunching.
  • Keep your gaze forward, not down at your feet, to maintain balance and anticipate obstacles.
  • Use your arms for stabilization, not to bear the full weight.
  • Practice footwork: Learn to step over logs, navigate rocks, and find stable footing without looking down.
• Practice Portages:
  • If possible, find a local area to practice short portages with your actual canoe and gear. Start with short, flat distances and gradually increase length, elevation, and terrain difficulty.
  • Simulate real-world conditions: wear your hiking boots, carry your packed backpack, and potentially a PFD.

Pre-Habilitation and Injury Prevention

Proactive measures can significantly reduce the risk of injury, especially to the shoulders, back, and knees.

• Mobility Work:
  • Thoracic Spine Mobility: Cat-cow, thread the needle, foam rolling.
  • Hip Mobility: Hip flexor stretches, 90/90 stretches.
  • Ankle Mobility: Ankle circles, calf stretches.
• Stability Exercises:
  • Rotator Cuff Strengthening: Internal and external rotations with resistance bands, face pulls.
  • Scapular Stability: YTWLs, prone cobra.
• Flexibility: Regular stretching, especially for hamstrings, hip flexors, and chest.
• Warm-up and Cool-down: Always perform a dynamic warm-up before training and a static cool-down afterward.
• Listen to Your Body: Avoid pushing through sharp pain. Rest and recovery are as important as training.

Sample Training Principles and Progression

• Start Early: Begin your training at least 2-3 months before your trip, ideally longer.
• Progressive Overload: Gradually increase the weight, repetitions, sets, duration, or difficulty of your exercises and cardio sessions.
• Specificity: As your trip approaches, make your training more specific to the demands of portaging (e.g., more loaded hiking, practice portages).
• Periodization: Divide your training into phases (e.g., general conditioning, specific preparation, taper) to optimize performance and prevent overtraining.
• Consistency: Regular, consistent training is more effective than sporadic, intense bursts.

Integration and Periodization

A typical training cycle for a portage trip might look like this:

• General Preparation (3-4 months out): Focus on building a strong foundation of overall strength, muscular endurance, and aerobic capacity. This is where most of your compound lifts and LSD cardio will occur.
• Specific Preparation (1-2 months out): Increase the specificity of your training. Incorporate more loaded carries, longer and more challenging hikes (especially with elevation), and start practicing actual portage techniques with your canoe and gear. Reduce heavy strength training volume slightly to prioritize recovery for specific work.
• Taper (1-2 weeks out): Gradually reduce the volume and intensity of your training to allow your body to fully recover and supercompensate, ensuring you are fresh and strong for your trip. Maintain light activity and mobility work.

Nutrition and Recovery Considerations

• Balanced Diet: Fuel your training with a diet rich in complex carbohydrates for energy, lean protein for muscle repair and growth, and healthy fats for overall health.
• Hydration: Stay well-hydrated throughout your training and especially during your trip.
• Sleep: Aim for 7-9 hours of quality sleep per night to facilitate muscle repair, hormonal balance, and cognitive function.
• Active Recovery: Light walks, stretching, or foam rolling on rest days can aid recovery.

Conclusion

Training for a portage is a holistic endeavor that goes beyond simply "getting strong." It requires a strategic, progressive, and multi-faceted approach to develop the necessary strength, endurance, stability, and specific skills. By adhering to evidence-based training principles and listening to your body, you can transform from a novice to a confident and efficient portager, ready to embrace the challenges and rewards of wilderness travel.