Suunto Blog

Can an e-Car support an epic ski adventure? 100%.

Can an e-Car support an epic ski adventure? 100%.

As a professional adventurer, I constantly search far and wide for new challenges and new spots to explore. My happiness, my inspiration… essentially everything that fulfills me comes from nature. But looking at how I access these adventures, it’s clear: I am killing the world as it stimulates me. Not only was I well beyond the sustainable level, there was more that the test could not calculate. The heli-guiding, the snowmobile I used for access – these were not added to the thousands of kilometers driven in my F-350, or the multiple intercontinental flights. The truth was obvious: I needed to change my ways. Immediately I decided to try something suggested by my brother Graham at his TED talk. I became a weekday vegetarian and got my family to join me. (It is amazing to think how much of an impact the global meat industry has!) A simple but very effective change. But for me, with my globe-trotting adventures, I really needed to look into my travel. So I quit heli-ski guiding, sold my giant diesel truck, let my snowmobile rust and looked at different ways to get to the trailhead. We are constantly reading about electric vehicles being the future – but I was skeptical. EVs have historically had a limited range ­– which makes them ideal commuter vehicles for urbanites – but useless for someone where I live. Revelstoke is a small mountain town, deep in the Canadian mountains, 250–400km from major cities. With cold winters and deep snow there are many very valid reasons to be scared of converting to electric. The sacrifices I needed to make seem daunting ­– but perhaps they are not as big as they seem. So we had to test it out. My friend Chris Rubens and I went on an electric adventure. Our goal: live our normal adventurous lifestyle while being more sustainable getting from spot to spot. Chris and Greg on their electric volcano adventure. I rented a Nissan Leaf from Ecomoto in Vancouver – a commuter vehicle with 100 miles of range. Far from ideal – but if we could drive down the West coast of the USA, climb and ski a bunch of volcanoes and make it back, we could prove to ourselves that electric access is the future. So first, we met up and climbed and skied Mt Baker, then began our true road trip down south. An app called “Plug and Share” would guide us to all the level 3 chargers, which take around 40 minutes to fully charge the car. This trip was admittedly ideal, since the I-5 corridor that goes south down to Washington, Oregon and into California is littered with these chargers. It’s not to say we didn’t face challenges. The trailhead for Mt Rainier is quite far inland and well away from any Level 3 chargers. But our app showed us a Level 2 charger that someone had set up at their house for their Tesla. We arrived at the park boundary and started charging at Phil’s personal plug. The percentage slowly moved upwards. We had to hastily leave with barely 70% as the park’s gates were closing. Committed, we drove upwards. As we climbed up to the trailhead our % dropped and dropped. 40%...35% and then finally at 31% we made it. We parked and decided to deal with it when we returned. Greg charging down a sun-baked volcano. A great couple of days had us on the 14,400-foot summit and then skiing down a heavily crevassed, but super awesome run. Arriving back at the car we wondered if our first mistake was going to haunt us. Luckily the Leaf has a ‘B” mode which allows the car to slow itself using the engine, putting electricity back into the motor. So as we drove down 5500 feet we brought our charge back up to 50%. A few hours at Phil’s charger and we were off. Yeehaw! Maybe this is going to work! Mt Hood was our next objective – and there were Level 3 chargers right up to the trailhead. A great summit and silly ski had us driving south. Eventually the ease of charging had us pushing the battery percentage as low as we could go, extending each drive till the % disappeared and the ‘KMs left’ blinked out. We realized there was always extra battery left, and we pushed it many times. Never fully running out of gas – or rather, juice. Charging, charging... to make it to yet another mountain. We made it as far south as Mt Shasta in California, where there were less Level 3 chargers and we ended up charging up at RV campgrounds – Level 2 chargers that would take 3-5 hours to fully charge. A couple oddball Canadians, camped amongst the behemoth RVs. While we drove back north, hitting Mt Adams on the way we pondered our experiment. We ended up traveling almost 5000km, climbed and skied six volcanoes, went rock-climbing five times, had amazing adventures and camped in great places. Essentially: our normal lives, with one major difference. We used one liter of gas during the whole trip: for our cookstove. Not being able to move quickly between objectives made us more relaxed. Forced stops every few hours had us re-thinking our Type A personalities. To me electric vehicles are the future, especially since climate change would affect our jobs so badly. My lesson has been learned. Since returning from this trip I have bought an electric Chevrolet Bolt and have fully jumped into the electric vehicle movement. I have dreams of summiting 100 mountains and creating minimal emissions while doing so. It’s a challenge I am calling ‘electric adventures.’ I am 14 summits in, and I have run to some, climbed up others, and skied off those volcanoes. It is a great start and it feels so amazing to be part of the solution to our climate crisis. I will never be perfect – but I can search out ways to be better. All images © Chris Rubens Watch "Electric Adventures with Greg Hill and Chris Rubens"now Press play and follow along on an Electric Adventure
SuuntoClimb,SuuntoSkiAugust 24 2017
Is the ultimate cross-training… breathing? Mike Maric teaches athletes to breath better

Is the ultimate cross-training… breathing? Mike Maric teaches athletes to breath better

Tell us a bit about your dive history. I was a free diver and still am a free diver. I was lucky enough to meet the legendary Umberto Pelizzari, and not long after joined his entourage for trainings, travels and world records. I began to free dive professionally myself in the early 2000s, and my career took me to underwater all over the world. But in 2005 tragedy struck when my best friend died during a dive. What happened next? After that, I stepped back from competitive diving and began to work more as a trainer and safety diver. I continued my studies in the medical field, and then eventually I began to put my medical competence to use as a free diver. Tell us more. I work very specifically with breathing and breathing technique, with the goals of improving performance and reducing recovery times. Essentially, we’re helping athletes increase their oxygen supply, and teaching their muscles to work better without oxygen. We work specifically with the diaphragm to have more oxygen. Then next is to be master of your breath. To be more conscious about have more air. Mike Maric working with Trek Segafredo pro cycling team (©Trek-Segafredo) To be more conscious? That sounds like a mind game… Absolutely. Science shows us it’s not physical, but mental – apnea technique is really important, but we also know mental is really important! My students really learn how to improve the mental conditions and discover new limits inside of themselves! And now your work includes lots of people who don’t dive and don’t intend to. Everyone in the world can benefit from better breathing techniques! Over the last few years I’ve been working with many athletes from different disciplines – beginning with triathletes, but now including martial arts masters, fencers, and more. I’ve even helped an oncologist who uses the techniques with his cancer patients. How do you help a world champion in fencing? The first goal in fencing or karate is to relax before the performance – reduce the stress and lower the heartbeat. The second is to reduce the recovery time. In fencing, for instance, world Paolo Pizzo is going full-speed for 30 seconds, then rest. During that rest time he moves his shoulders, breathes in a specific way, and recovers very quickly. The first time he did that, a lot of people wondered what he was doing – but it works. How do you use your Suunto? The Spartan is an extremely important tool for me – I use it to see breath frequency and heart rate. Medically educated forensic scientist Mike Maric has taken what he’s learned from free diving and applied it to a multitude of other sports. How can you help amateur athletes? There are for sure some simple exercises to be conscious about your breathing. When I ask people ‘how do you breath?’ they don’t know! They know about shoes and running, they know about eating, they know about supplements! But they don’t know how they breath! We need to breath not with the chest, but with the diaphragm! But you need to practice continuously – the basics, about eight minutes each day. That’s enough time to improve over six weeks – although it’s different for each athlete. No yoga. Ha! I don’t do yoga. I back up medically sound advice with scientific evidence. Better breathing can improve your mental condition, increase performance, and decrease stress. That’s science! For more info on Mike Maric's work visit mikemaric.com
SuuntoDive,SuuntoRide,SuuntoRunAugust 24 2017
Finding remote

Finding remote

What exactly is it? Well that’s really up to you. For our friends, Kona Gravity team rider Graham Agassiz and Kona Canada’s Matt Stevens, that thing is fly fishing. So, they made a plan, packed up their bikes, and converged in Lytton, British Columbia to head to their own secret stash. Prepped with fishing and camping gear, Suunto Traverse Alpha, Matt’s fishing kayak, and Aggy’s dog Autumn, they headed straight for the goods.   Escape for a moment and watch the video    Learn more about Suunto Traverse Alpha, the GPS/Glonass watch with versatile outdoor functions for fishing and hunting     All images ©Kona Bikes
SuuntoRideAugust 15 2017
What’s tougher: running the Barkley Marathons… or training for it?

What’s tougher: running the Barkley Marathons… or training for it?

But as we approach the Barkley’s off-season, let’s take a look not at the race – but the training. Soon Robbins will release a short film detailing his Barkley experience – in anticipation, he’s shared a short piece focused on an incredibly difficult full overnight session where the goal was to reach 20,000ft (6,100m) of climbing in around 11 hours. See how his session unfolds – then keep reading for some more insight into his ‘off-season’. Watch this advanced preview of Where Dreams Go To Die documentary now. If this video doesn’t make your legs hurt, then this will: Robbins just finished the Nolan’s Fourteeners, fourteen 14,000 peaks in 100 miles, with a 60-hour cut-off time. Less than 20 people have ever completed the route. A post shared by Gary Robbins (@garyrobbins) on Jul 31, 2017 at 10:24am PDT "Adventures were had, and we got it done. Nolan's 14 finishers in 56h39m, with the best adventure partner imaginable." –@garyrobbins We’ve collected some of Gary's thoughts and feelings on the recent adventures, what’s upcoming, and what’s not just worth the time (hint: hypoxic training). Read on. You didn’t have the easiest time on Nolan’s! After trudging through fourteen plus hours of fog, wind and rain we found ourselves hypothermic and in a bad state. We actually had some snow flurries on Oxford (8th peak going south to north) and we realized we couldn't safely continue. We made the hard call to drop off the mountain and to call it a day. We skipped Belford (maybe one mile away) because of the state we were in. We dropped about five miles down to a trailhead and had our families and crew meet us there. After warming up and being reminded by my lovely wife that we still had 31 hours left to get this done we made the call to get back in the game. We turned around and headed all the way back up to the saddle we'd dropped off maybe five hours earlier. Nolan’s Fourteeners are like a Barkley, with less vertical but way more altitude… Exactly. It’s only been done a handful of times. I’ll be coming straight from sea level into that! But we had access to our support crew – we can check in six or seven times over the course of the traverse. The altitude is the biggest issue. Yeah – I live at the coast. But my partner in the coaching business studies this stuff – he says I have to spend 12 hours a day in a hypoxic chamber if I want any benefit from it. No time for that! You have a few events of your own you’re organizing. I run a race series back home and I’ve got events before and after the Nolan’s attempt. The biggest is the Squamish 50 – it’s the biggest ultra in Canada, with 1200 participants from 20 countries. Do you compete in them yourself? I just don’t have the time. I want to make sure it’s a great event for everyone who comes. I don’t run in the events because I need to run the event – I congratulate every finisher who comes across the line. During the Squamish 50 I’ll get about 8 hours of sleep over three days. You’re an organizer with some epic terrain close by. Any chance we’ll see a race like the Barkley, in your backyard? You know, we have the terrain for it – it could rival the Barkley on paper. But it’s damn near impossible to get the permits, and I don’t feel the need to replicate something so unique that Laz has created. Take us back to your recent adventure on Nolan’s – how did you finish? It rained for another 10+ hours up high but eventually the weather broke, before it broke us, and we were rewarded with a clear night on our third to last peak (La Plata) and a beautiful sunrise while ascending our second to last peak, the highest point in Colorado, Mt. Elbert at 14,433. I shed a tear on our final peak, Mt. Massive because I really couldn't believe what we'd just accomplished. It wasn't what we'd set out to do time wise, and I'm pretty sure we just completed the least scenic version of Nolan's ever, but the sense of accomplishment that overwhelms me today is the absolute definition of euphoria. So there’s no question you’re doing Barkley again. I’m 100% returning for a third attempt in 2018. Main image and video by The Ginger Runner
SuuntoRunAugust 14 2017
How to import training data from other sports services into Suunto Movescount.

How to import training data from other sports services into Suunto Movescount.

Do you want to import training data stored within other sports services into Suunto Movescount? You can import training data using these three third-party services. FitnessSyncer.FitnessSyncer allows you to synchronise your healthcare and fitness data with over 40 different devices and apps. Healthcare and fitness data from other apps, trackers and devices can be seamlessly moved to Suunto Movescount. To sync using FitnessSyncer, first create an account on fitnessyncer.com, add a data source on your account page and add Suunto Movescount as a sync destination in your account settings. More information about FitnessSyncer. RunGap.RunGap is a workout data management tool for iOS that imports your complete workout history from other services available on your iPhone or iPad, including Suunto Movescount, Garmin Connect, Endomondo, RunKeeper, Strava, Runtastic, Polar, Adidas and other services such as Magellan, Nike+, etc., and imports your complete training history. The beauty of RunGap is that it also has the ability to bulk sync all your training data with Suunto Movescount - instructions on how to use Suunto Movescount with RunGap can be found here. More information about RunGap MX Activity MoverMX Activity Mover allows you to transfer training logs from Garmin Connect or Polar Personaltrainer directly to Suunto Movescount. Data can be transferred directly per user identity (Garmin and Polar) or as a single activity via file upload (Garmin). The full version of MX Activity Mover can be purchased to upload multiple activities at once. You can select a time range of activities to transfer (send/receive). An additional feature of MX Activity Mover allows you to include a link to the original Garmin Connect or Polar Personaltrainer activity in the description field of the transferred Move.  More information about MX Activity Mover
August 02 2017
Three ways to navigate with a Suunto Spartan GPS watch

Three ways to navigate with a Suunto Spartan GPS watch

Jeff Pelletier, a trail runner and filmmaker from Vancouver, BC, Canada put together this great video with some tips for navigating with the Suunto Spartan. He showcases how you can navigate in new surroundings or challenging terrain using these three different features of the Spartan. 1. Routes 2. Compass 3. Breadcrumb   Watch the video now!   You are not limited to these three ways to navigate. You can also use POI navigation (read how this is done here). In addition, as of the Spartan update in June (1.9.36) you can now also use find back navigation which plots your quickest route back to your starting point utilizing the compass to guide you.   Main image by @jpelletier   Learn more about Suunto Spartan GPS watches
SuuntoClimb,SuuntoRunJuly 27 2017