I like playing with numbers and over the past couple of days I've compiled some statistics.
I was out for 72 days. During those 72 days there were 19 zero days or days when I didn't hike at all. Most of those zeros occurred when I was recovering from the back injury, which by the way is still nagging at me. There were 53 days that I actually hiked.
The average miles per day were 6.95 when all 72 days are used. The average increases to 9.45 when only hiking days are considered.
I find a more useful statistic, as far as indicating an improvement in conditioning is concerned, to be a comparison of the first 10 days out and the last 10 days out. During days 1 through 10, I averaged 6.8 miles per day and had 1 zero day during the period. During days 63 through 72 I averaged 9.09 miles per day. This period reflected a 33% improvement even though it included 2 zero days and one extremely short (1.5 mile) day to the trailhead where I was picked up.
Posted by at June 25, 2005 11:31 AM