Injures from postholing…

One more than one occasion postholing has tweaked my lower back, which has a history of being touchy. In areas of talus postholing can definitely lead to pulling or straining an ankle, knee or hip if you land wrong on a rock underneath. You can largely avoid the worst postholing by carefully staying on the firm area of the trail, testing and probing your footing in suspect areas, and being extra careful at the margins of snow and talus, where melt out can thin the snow around the rocks.

I have always worried about tweaking a knee postholing, especially when going downhill.  My injuries have been limited to cuts and scrapes on my calves and shins as I hike in shorts and the typical spring/summer corn snow and debris I the snow takes its toll.  After a while I am leaving a little red/pink tint to the leading edge of each hole.  I worry more about frozen sun cups.

When we went to Thielsen earlier this year, there was over 5′ of snow. Tree tips sticking out of the snow – that kind of thing. Should have called it off immediately, but we had driven a ways to get there, so we pushed ourselves to cover ground. I must have pulled or torn a groin muscle or tendon or something. I was in quite a bit of pain. It still bugs me…doesn’t really hurt, but it still doesn’t feel quite right.

Anyway, wasn’t sure if that was a common injury or not but yeah…fun.

I also fell up to my armpits in a spruce trap (or whatever you want to call it). Lots of lessons learned the hard way that day.

Thanks for the responses.

Postholing is arm-wrestling Satan for the mountaintop, especially with a 21 day winter pack full of food and trying to gain 3,000 feet of elevation in 2+ feet of snow.  Give yourself 3 hours to go one mile and you’ll be alright.  But Warning—DO NOT WEAR SHORTS with bare legs.  Snow/ice abrasion will eat the flesh off like a bicycle road rash—My leg below after doing so—

Postholing is always risky, simply because you have no way of knowing much of the time what lies beneath the surface of the snow.  If you are going to hike in terrain that will require it, prepare yourself by rigorous physical training, particularly the core and legs.  On downhill sections, it is a lot safer to flex your legs and sit back, a little like skiing powder, to let the quads act as shock absorbers and also allow you to sit down instead of pitching forward in the event you break through into rocks or other submerged objects. Pitching forward can easily cause your leg to hyper extend, resulting in a severe knee injury or fracture of the tibia.  In that same vein, when descending, go slowly, under control, to minimize the force exerted on your legs should you break through the snow.

Good info, thanks guys. @tipiwalter, that looks painful!

Lesson learned for sure on that trip…