Essential Nutrients for Hill Walkers: Fuel Your Adventure with These Nutritious Snacks
Hill walking offers a wonderful way to connect with nature, challenge your body, and clear your mind. However, the physical demands of walking up and down steep terrain mean that optimal nutrition is essential to ensure you stay energised, strong, and focused. Whether you're setting off on a gentle stroll or tackling a more challenging route, here are the top nutrients you need to consider, along with some nutritious snack ideas to keep you fuelled on your adventure.
Carbohydrates: Your Primary Energy Source
Carbohydrates are the body’s preferred source of energy, especially for the prolonged physical activity involved in hill walking. When you’re trekking up a steep incline, your muscles rely heavily on glycogen, the stored form of carbohydrates, to keep you moving.
Snack Ideas
Oat-based energy bars: Rich in complex carbs, oats provide a steady release of energy.
Dried fruit mix: A blend of raisins, apricots, and apples offers quick energy with natural sugars.
Oat cakes with nut butter: The oats provide sustained energy, while the nut butter adds some healthy fats, protein and satisfying taste.
Protein: Supporting Muscle Repair and Recovery
Protein is essential for repairing and building muscle tissue, which is particularly important after a day of hill walking when your muscles need to recover. Including protein in your snacks helps to reduce muscle fatigue and aids recovery, so you’re ready for your next adventure.
Snack Ideas
Hard-boiled eggs: Portable and can be eaten cold - packed with high-quality protein.
Beef jerky: A convenient, savoury snack that provides a good dose of protein.
Greek yoghurt with nuts: This combination offers protein along with healthy fats, making it both nourishing and satisfying.
Healthy Fats: Sustained Energy and Satiety
While carbohydrates are crucial for immediate energy, healthy fats provide a slow-burning fuel that helps keep you going over the course of a long walk. They also help keep you feeling full, which is important for maintaining your energy levels.
Snack Ideas
Trail mix with nuts and seeds: Almonds, walnuts, and pumpkin seeds offer a mix of healthy fats and a bit of protein.
Dark chocolate with almonds: Dark chocolate contains healthy fats, and combined with almonds, it makes for a satisfying and energy-boosting treat.
Energy bites: you can buy these premade, but we think it’s more fun to make your own! We love this recipe for stuffed energy balls.
Weather Considerations: Choosing Snacks that Withstand the Elements
When planning your snacks for a hill walk, it's important to consider the weather conditions you'll be facing. In hot weather, chocolate-covered snacks or those with high fat content can melt, making them messy and difficult to eat. Instead, opt for dried fruit, nuts, or wholegrain crackers that can withstand the heat. On the other hand, in cold weather, some snacks can freeze solid, especially those with high water content like fresh fruit or energy gels, which can become hard to bite into. To avoid this, choose items that are less likely to freeze, such as nuts, jerky, or energy bars specifically designed for cold weather.
Hydration: Staying Hydrated for Peak Performance
Staying hydrated is crucial for maintaining energy levels and optimal performance during a hill walk. Dehydration can quickly drain your energy and impair your ability to keep going. While water is essential, especially during strenuous hikes where you lose fluids through sweat, you also need to replace electrolytes like sodium and potassium that are vital for muscle function and fluid balance.
Did you know: Taurine plays a crucial role in maintaining normal hydration and electrolyte balance in the body, interacting with sodium, potassium, and magnesium ions to regulate their levels and support various physiological functions - there’s 1000mg of Taurine in our Zest Active!
Zest Active: Key Nutrients to Optimise Your Performance
Zest Active provides a convenient and effective way to support your energy levels. Mixed with water, it not only hydrates but also delivers essential vitamins and minerals to help maintain your focus and stamina throughout your hike.
In Zest Active you’ll find B1 (thiamine), B2 (riboflavin), B3 (niacin), B5 (pantothenic acid), B6 (pyridoxine), B7 (biotin), B9 (folate), and B12 (cobalamin), which play a crucial role in energy metabolism helping to convert carbohydrates, fats, and proteins into energy, which is essential for sustaining physical performance.
The combination of ingredients including Beta Glucans, L-Lysine, L-Theanine, and Taurine, offers a range of benefits that support energy, the immune system, mental clarity and muscle function.
Antioxidants: Combatting Oxidative Stress
Physical activity, especially in an outdoor environment, can increase your body’s production of free radicals, which are unstable molecules that can damage cells. Antioxidants help neutralise these free radicals, protecting your body from oxidative stress and inflammation.
Snack Ideas
Mixed berries: Blueberries, strawberries, and raspberries are rich in antioxidants and easy to pack.
Dark chocolate: Contains flavonoids, which are potent antioxidants.
Herbal tea: A warm thermos of green tea can provide antioxidants and help you stay hydrated.
Optimal nutrition is key to making the most of your hill walking adventures. By fuelling your body with good nutrients, you’ll not only enhance your performance but also enjoy your time in nature more fully. Remember to listen to your body, eat when you’re hungry, and stay hydrated throughout your walk. Whether it’s a day walk or a longer trek, packing a variety of nutrient-dense snacks will ensure you’re well-prepared for the journey ahead. Happy walking!
*The advice in this article is for information only and should not replace medical care. As with any nutritional supplement please consult your qualified healthcare professional before use, especially if pregnant, breastfeeding, if you have a known medical condition or are taking medication. Food supplements must not be used as a substitute for a varied and balanced diet and a healthy lifestyle.
Author: Revive Active www.reviveactive.com
Related Content
Mynediad Dysgwch
This unassuming, bright, green or red moss with lush, almost tentacle-like fronds is hiding five well-kept secrets.
Hill Walking Articles
For many hill walkers, the call of the wild is a lifelong passion. However, the demands placed on our bodies by these activities require thoughtful care, especially as we age.
Mend Our Mountains Articles
The BMC volunteers have been super busy this summer, with the latest Get Stuck In project seeing 12 of them create a 50m length of stepping stone path to make a more sustainable way through the bog below Tryfan, Eryri (Snowdonia), North Wales.
Cerdded Bryniau Newyddion
This August, 14 BMC volunteers spent two days on The Band in Langdale, Lake District, making repairs to a 100m stretch of footpath in the latest Get Stuck In event, funded by the Mend Our Mountains campaign from the BMC's Access & Conservation Trust.
Cerdded Bryniau Dysgwch Sgiliau
How to choose an ice axe for your next winter adventure
Hill Walking Articles
Each year there are reports of people who have been attacked, or even trampled to death, by cows whilst out walking or approaching crags. BMC member Simon Coldrick was badly injured after a cow attacked him as he led a fell race on the edge of Sheffield.
Mountaineering Destinations
If you’re looking for an unforgettable, high altitude trekking holiday this year we’ve got some great ideas for you here in Nepal, Bhutan, Pakistan and India from climbing mountaineering expedition operator Jagged Globe.
Article
In National Walking month this May we’ve teamed up with BMC Official Retail Partner Cotswold Outdoor to bring you all the info and advice you need to care for and repair your favourite pair of walking boots. Not only does this save you money, it also saves the environment - the less we consume and throw away, the better.
News
BMC member Madalin Cristea, known as Cris, from Romania, has become the first person to summit both Aconcagua and Kilimanjaro from sea level and back again. He is currently attempting to be the first person ever to climb up and down each of the world’s seven summits (the highest mountain on each continent) from sea level - climbing every metre of the mountains up and down.
News
BMC member Wayne Andrews from Bettws, South Wales has started a hill walking group for people who suffer with their mental health or an addiction, called Forever In The Hills.
News
This May is National Walking month, so to celebrate the power of a good old stomp around the UK’s countryside, nine of the BMC staff have shared their favourite hike. From fossil-hunting in the Peak District and airy Scottish scrambling to the Via Alpina in Switzerland, one of these is bound to tickle your fancy this spring or summer. Better still, with the BMC collaborations with Komoot and HotelPlanner, you can plan and navigate your route and find your accommodation for your trip for less!
We interview one of the most popular takeovers of the BMC's Instagram, Amira the Wanderlust.
Why do we need groups like Black Girls Hike? London regional leader of the group Oge Ejizu explains her love of the outdoors and why she joined. Article from Summit Magazine Autumn 2020.