

Suunto Blog

Suunto Summit 2017
Watch the video and experience the first ever Suunto Summit that was held in October, 2016.
We are thrilled to share the selections for the Suunto Summit 2017. After hosting an open, public application process, we received inspiring motivation letters and stories from all around the world.
Within our final group we have authors, awarding- winning photographers, influential bloggers; we have XTERRA world-champions, and winners of major ultra-trail races. Balancing these inspiring experiences and accomplishments was a challenge, but we are thrilled to have had so many inspiring applications that shared a synonymous passion for being a part of the Suunto community.
Stats:
6 female, 9 male
9 from Europe (2 France, 1 Spain, 1 Finland, 2 Sweden, 1 Norway, 1 Latvia, 1 UK, 1 Switzerland)
2 from USA, 1 from New Zealand, 1 China, 1 Malaysia.
Suunto Summit 2017 participants:
Arnau - Spain
Diane-Perle - Switzerland
Marta - Latvia
Marit - Norway
Mia - USA
Barbara - USA
Petra - New Zealand
Ramon - Malaysia
Sebastien - China
Pelle - Sweden
Jean-François - France
Tim - United Kingdom (UK)
Mathias - France
Sante - Finland
Oskar - Sweden
Congratulations to all selected, and a huge thank you to all who applied and shared their passion with us!
- Suunto Team

World Vertical Week 2017 Big Data: See who stands on the top!
The World Vertical Week is about collecting vertical meters for your country and your sport. All moves in all human-powered outdoor sports count. To keep the playing field level, we were only comparing averages. A cumulative number of ascent meters per country would not have made sense as the population and number of Suunto App users varies.
Skiers are still quite clearly the queens and kings of the hill with 849 meters of ascent in average. The mountaineers climbed on the second spot with 636 meters and the trail runners rounded out the top three with their 400 ascent meters.
Actually the order of the activities remained almost identical compared to 2016: the only difference was that mountain bikers passed the snowshoers in the listings.
Average ascents in various activities
Ski touring 849m
Mountaineering 636m
Trail running 400m
Mountain biking 362m
Snow shoeing 316m
Trekking 293m
Cycling 236m
Cross country skiing 222m
Running 104m
SKI TOURING IS NUMBER ONE – BUT WHO SKIS THE MOST?
Now that we know that ski touring is the sport with the biggest average ascents, it is time to dig deeper. The snowy winter in the Pyrenees has boosted the skiing spirits of the Spanish and they were the only athletes to cross the thousand vertical meter mark – in any country and any activity. Felicitaciones, españoles!
Top 10 countries in ski touring
Spain 1034m
Switzerland 938m
Slovakia 936m
Germany 927m
Andorra 916m
Italy 909m
USA 883m
Austria 877m
Poland 874m
France 858m
A SLIGHT SURPRISE IN MOUNTAINEERING
Mountaineering was second in the activity listings. But the leading nation within that activity was a slight surprise: United Kingdom surely has a long mountaineering tradition, but only a few – at least here in the Suunto office – would have bet their money for the island nation. The UK was not among the top mountaineering nations last year, but still they took the first place with 836 meters in 2017.
Top 10 countries in mountaineering
United Kingdom 836m
Italy 772m
Switzerland 749m
Germany 713m
Japan 685m
France 683m
Austria 655m
Taiwan 620m
USA 600m
South Korea 575m
ASIAN COUNTRIES DOMINATED TRAIL RUNNING
It was clear already last year that China, Hong Kong and Japan are strong in the trail running segment. This year they occupied the top three with excellent performances and clear margins.
Maybe having the Vertical Week in winter limits the possibilities for trail running in mountainous areas in Europe and North-America but still the Asian performance was impressive. Great climbing, China, Hong Kong and Japan!
Top 10 countries in trail running
China 887m
Hong Kong 808m
Japan 711m
Italy 572m
Portugal 540m
Spain 524m
United Kingdom 509m
Slovenia 469m
Greece 468m
Austria 437m
CLOSE MARGINS IN COUNTRY COMPARISONS
We also analysed the data for all human powered outdoor sports and compared the average ascents between countries. The margins were tight, but still there was one above the rest: The Austrians ascended on average more than any other nation, 320 meters per every workout tracked during the Vertical Week.
Top 10 countries overall
Austria 320m
Italy 298m
Switzerland 287m
Spain 261m
Slovenia 261m
Portugal 258m
Hong Kong 247m
France 240m
Norway 235m
Slovakia 218m
TOP COUNTRIES IN OTHER ACTIVITIES
And to give you even more to speculate here are the top countries in the other activities mentioned above.
Top 10 countries in mountain biking
Italy 515m
Slovenia 479m
Spain 471m
United Kingdom 465m
Austria 461m
Switzerland 443m
South Africa 416m
France 370m
Germany 367m
Poland 366m
Top 10 countries in snow shoeing
Italy 564m
Andorra 530m
Austria 510m
Germany 429m
France 424m
Switzerland 345m
USA 228m
Spain 213m
Canada 178m
Finland 163m
Top 10 countries in trekking
France 406m
Italy 397m
Austria 353m
Poland 322m
Spain 307m
USA 274m
Germany 271m
Norway 243m
United Kingdom 229m
China 141m
Top 10 countries in cycling
Spain 405m
Italy 403m
South Africa 393m
Colombia 392m
Portugal 355m
Cyprus 332m
Switzerland 328m
Czech Republic 308m
France 298m
Austria 294m
Top 10 countries in cross country skiing
Czech Republic 391m
France 312m
Poland 286m
Norway 270m
Sweden 266m
Italy 260m
Austria 252m
Canada 225m
USA 222m
Germany 221m
Top 10 countries in running
Portugal 157m
Hong Kong 151m
Slovenia 148m
Switzerland 136m
France 128m
Spain 127m
Norway 126m
New Zealand 124m
USA 117m
Czech Republic 115m
Main image © Patitucci Photo

Hollie, Sami and Christoph are the Vertical Week photo contest winners
World Vertical Week was held last week and the hundreds of pictures tagged with #verticalweek on Instagram give a great overall look into what people have been up to during the week. Three of the most inspirational photos were taken by Hollie Holden, Sami Renner and Christoph Oberschneider. Each one of the winners will receive a new Suunto Spartan Ultra to accompany them on their future adventures.
🌲// Legs/entire body felt like an 🐘 at this weeks @vanrunco trail ✈️ crew BUT I managed to hit my @suunto #VerticalWeek goal of 4000m (1k more than my 1st goal! 🙌) of climbing and we were blessed with a pretty layer of 'convenient snow', right @coralie2700 ? 😉🤣❄️
A post shared by Hollie Holden (@holholden) on Mar 5, 2017 at 12:59pm PST
“The Vertical Week was a great opportunity for me to start building my strength and climbing skills ahead of my upcoming training season for my 1st 50 mile Ultra Marathon - the Squamish 50 in August which is a tough, mountainous course with 11,000 feet (3350m) of climbing!
I set myself the goal of covering a similar amount of climbing during Vertical Week so I spent a lot of time on a local trail called the BCMC which starts at the base of Grouse Mountain climbing to the top. This trail has 850m of elevation gain in just 3km of climbing! I ended up doing this trail 4 times in the week (3 times within one 24hr period!) then finished off the week running trails with my local run crew, Vancouver Running Company Flight Crew, surpassing my 3k goal and hit 4000m for the week instead!
The weather in Vancouver has been unseasonably cold, with lots of snow & wet rain and I wouldn't have done anywhere near as much climbing last week if it wasn't for the awesome community of friends that I have here who are willing to come climb mountains in a snow storm with me!”
–Hollie Holden, BC, Canada
Cause she asked so friendly... 🐦 #lovemountains #skimo #verticalweek #collectingmoments #mountaineering #watzmann
A post shared by Sami (@samirenner) on Mar 5, 2017 at 10:10am PST
“The photo was taken on the last of three summits at the “Watzmann-überschreitung”, a famous summer tour in my hometown with over 24km and 2500m of climbing. The goal for me was to do this very technical tour with skis. As I reached the third summit, I shared my last Powerbar with a bird.
A few days earlier during the Vertical Week I was in Zermatt, reaching Breithorn’s (4164m) west and east summits on skis, and on two more skitours. All in all, my Vertical Week was about 7500m of elevation gain over 65km.”
–Sami Renner, Germany
Welcome back, #winter! Yesterday was a great #powderday in @visitgastein. Can't wait for more!
A post shared by Christoph Oberschneider (@coberschneider) on Mar 2, 2017 at 3:09am PST
“I work as a backcountry skiing photographer in Austria, so my goal each winter season is to capture the beauty of backcountry skiing & ski touring, to share my passion for the sport with as many people as possible and ultimately to get more people to enjoy life in the outdoors.
So far we have had a very dry winter here in the Alps, so getting good shots has not been an easy task. So when it finally started snowing 10 days ago, I headed out to Sportgastein (a freeride spot close to Salzburg) with two good friends. We found some beautiful lines in the backcountry with lift-supported ski touring and I managed to get some good shots. And that's how I also spent the rest of the Vertical Week, ski touring in the mountains around Salzburg and trying to capture the beauty of the winter landscape and some more skiing action before the snow starts melting again.”
–Christophe Oberschneider, Austria
Congratulations to our three winners and thank you very much everyone for sharing your Vertical Week moments!
Uphill talk with Emelie Forsberg
Emelie Forsberg is not originally from the mountains – she’s from the hills. She was born in a hilly area on the east coast of Sweden called Höga Kusten. “There are no mountains, but the terrain is really playful with 300-meter-high hills,” Emelie says. Still she has become one of the world’s top mountain runners and ski mountaineers. How to do that?
Do you actually need mountains to train for the climbs?
Actually, not at all! If you have an uphill that is just 100 or 200 meters high – or even only 30 meters high – that’s ok. You just need to do more repetitions. But if you like mountains, I think it is important to also go to the mountains to train in the long climbs.
Do you prefer more mellow or steep ascents?
I like them both, because they are so different. I am quite powerful so the steeper climbs normally are a little better for me. But I have improved on the less intense climbs, too.
When setting a skin track, do you head straight up or…?
I did go really steep in the beginning! I was strong but didn’t really have the proper technique then. But now I like to set the track in a more mellow, comfortable angle.
How do you pace yourself in the long uphills?
First of all, I listen to my body because I think it is interesting to learn about my body. In training I always have my heart rate and analyse the data afterwards. That also helps me to understand my performance.
But in some races, that are not so technical, I may have a more mathematical approach and use heart rate also while racing. I can just look at my heart rate I say: “No, this is not enough. I need to speed up!”
Is training for uphill running and skimo the same?
It’s more or less the same interval training that works for both. Maybe I train little shorter intervals in the winter. But all intervals are important for me; from one minute efforts, where I can really feel the lactic acid coming, to more manageable four minute efforts and up to ten minutes where it is like race pace. Interval training can be super fun.
When you feel that you are in a good running form does that mean you are fast on skis, too?
If I am in good shape for running, I think it is easier to transition to skiing. Going from skiing to running feels harder.
Tips for increasing uphill speed?
My tips are really basic, and more mental than physical: You need to like what you are doing and have continuation in what you are doing. Not to train super hard one week and then have three weeks without any training.
Even if you only have time to run for ten minutes one day, go for that! It’s going to make you want to go out the other day, too. And try to make training a pleasure.
For me interval training has really worked. It’s an easy way to improve because the sessions are manageable. The workout can be like one, one and a half hours, and you really feel like you have done something really good when you finish.
READ MORE
World Vertical Week 2017
7 tips to keep a balanced training load
How to run a sub-3h marathon

Going back for a beating: Gary Robbins on his second attempt at the world’s toughest footrace
There’s about 67,000 feet (over 20,000m) of ascent
Which you cover over the course of two and a half days– if you can keep going that long, of course. And for better or worse, the course isn’t an A-to-B – it’s a loop that you do 5 times. Thus, the ‘Barkley Marathons’.
Gary at the yellow gate that marks the start and the finish of the Barkley Marathons course.
The race is one hundred and thirty something miles
No one knows for sure – the route evolves every year at the whim of the race organizer. If there are no finishers the course stays the same, if there is a finisher the course is made more difficult by adding another checkpoint that involves an additional climb and descent. Most think the loop, done 5 times, is a bit longer than an actual marathon , and there’s no question the terrain is absolutely brutal. Only 14 people have finished the race in nearly thirty years And what’s worse – every time there’s a finisher, they make the course harder but not necessarily and longer.
Oh, there’s no trail markers
A huge part of the challenge is to navigate the race course. To prove you’ve completed the whole course, you tear a page out of books you find hidden at various points along the race route. After every lap, the organizer will count your pages.
You have no idea when the race will start
Anytime between midnight Friday and noon on Saturday! So it’s tough to plan your rest before the race.
The race takes two and a half days.
How do you train? You go up
I live in Vancouver, BC, and we’ve got three peaks right in town, each of them claiming about 3,000 feet of prominence. I do a couple laps at a time for 20k vert training session about once every seven days – that takes about twelve hours. The other days of the week I go out for a few thousand a day. In the final three weeks of training I'll likely do a 15,000ft workout, and maybe 2x 20,000ft. The 20k workout can take up to 12hrs. Other than that I do at least one near daily lap and attempt to get my overall weekly vertical up to at least 30k ft.
What’s in the pack for a 20k climb?
The way the race is set up, racers can return to a campground (where their cars are parked) at the start line at the finish of every loop. So that’s how I do my training – I can access my vehicle twice during a long training session a day. I’ll bring a water for three hours, food for 12 hours, and gear like a waterproof breathable kit, shirt, gloves, micro spikes for snow.
I need 250 calories an hour
Running is a calorie deficient sport and you can only digest so many calories while moving. 250 per hour is the formula for success. With that, you should be able to move forward, so that’s what I’ll do during the race. After each lap (about 8 - 10 hours, I’ll quickly down about 500 calories go for a full meal, then reset, then get going again. Liquid intake is totally dependent on weather – if it’s hot, more water. Cold, less.
You need two pairs of shoes
I do most hundred-milers in one pair of shoes, but the brush and briars on the Barkley is so brutal that it just can tear shoes apart.
Navigation skills are crucial to success in The Barkley.
And you absolutely need a compass
Having a map, compass, and the skills to use them is an absolute necessity. It also helps if you have a course veteran to glean knowledge from. Getting lost can mean the difference between finishing and not finishing. You have 60 hours, and clock doesn’t stop if you get lost.
I love the weekly vertical totals on my Suunto
My goal is to get as much vertical as possible. It’s the only way to prepare for this event. The watch shows you your daily and weekly vertical totals. My workout ENDS when I get as much vertical as I need – so my watch makes it easy. The weekly graph that is a great reference point I can’t get away from. It’s a daily reminder that if I don’t get out of my door, I’m not getting my vertical in, and I’m not training hard enough!
Stay tuned during Suunto Vertical Week 2017, as Gary plans to put up over 60k vertical in just a two week stretch – and make sure to check out the Barkley Marathons documentary, now showing on Netflix.
All images: © Matt Trappe / Trappephoto.com
The annual World Vertical Week 2017 is coming!
World Vertical Week will be held globally on February 27 – March 5. You can climb where ever and choose whichever human powered sport you want.
Last year the biggest average ascents per Move were climbed in Switzerland, Austria and France. Ski touring and mountaineering led the highest average ascents for individual sports. Which countries and sports will lead the way this year?
The only thing you need to do to participate is to make sure your country information in your Suunto App settings is correct. After that your ascent will automatically be calculated in your home country’s total figure.
By the end of the week we’ll find out where in the world the real climbers live. Have fun!
#VERTICALWEEK PHOTO CONTEST
Share your Vertical Week experiences on Instagram or Facebook with #VerticalWeek for a chance to win a Suunto Spartan Ultra GPS watch. (Terms and conditions apply. Read them here.)
Read more
How to enjoy the outdoors with your partner: a chat with Emelie Forsberg and Kilian Jornet
Greg Hill's mountain rules
7 tips to accelerating your uphill speed