My perspective and intention with regards to life outdoors is that comfort and performance should be a combination of well designed gear and human adaptation. That adaptation should be both physical and intentional. In modern society we are continually pushed towards technology that is designed to do all the work for a negligent user. I think this results in both mediocre performance and progressively incompetent humans. The best performance with most outdoor gear comes from intelligent design, put to use by an educated user with physical training.
There are differing views on what “comfort” should be. We humans are, to varying degrees, adapted to our indoor, conditioned spaces. Some view comfort as bringing every aspect of our pampered lives with us out onto the trail with us. Personally, I think many of those habits simply do not fit out on the trail. There are some, which are unrealistic for us to train out of, but many are so inefficient that it makes sense to just adapt, at least a little. A glaring and common example of this is sleep sprawling. Mammals sprawl when they are hot. They curl up in a ball when they are cold. To build a sleep system to accommodate a human that wants to sleep like a starfish in cold weather is the antithesis of UL. There are likely certain examples of this where it is the only option for the individual, but in most cases, it’s just a refusal to adapt towards a more efficient habit, which results in massively inefficient gear and massively inefficient use patterns. Not only would this sleep system be heavy and huge, but the user is exposing more surface area to heat loss inside it and then the system is also exposing more surface area for heat loss to the outside. On top of that, the large internal volume has a long lag time. It takes longer for a body to warm up the bigger space. It’s just all around, pretty dumb.
On the other end of the spectrum, there are the seasoned thru-hikers who’ve adopted the “go-without” approach, and been they’ve been out on the trail for long enough to see the physical adaptation of that input. The previously mentioned, hyper comfort individuals interpret this method as spartan suffering, but the reality is that these folks are often just as comfortable, if not more comfortable, because their bodies have adapted and the pampered folks are the ones who suffer under the weight of their inefficiency. Obviously there is some level of mild “suffering” to the process of adaptation, but a lot of this sort of just happens without the person knowing. I’m thinking of the thru-hikers who head out with some of those super basic quilts with low density and poor fill control. You’ll see some of these out there that just look flat, with huge gaps…..but often, the greasy thru-hiker is doing just fine with it, because they’ve been adapting to being slightly cold from the very start. They change their habits to get warm when needed and their bodies adapt to that input and just don’t need as much.
I think what I aim for is somewhere in between. I think we should assess our habits and think about what is realistic to bring on trail and what isn’t. Then we should take a look at those things that aren’t ideal and assess how realistic it would be to train ourselves out of them. Sprawling seems like an easy one. It’s a terrible habit and really shouldn’t take too much to adjust a little. I do build systems that accommodate the face down, one knee up, one leg out position, mostly because it’s easy to accommodate without compromising the system design. It’s also not too bad in terms of efficiency, given that one leg and two arms are sort of gathered together. However, the full stretched out, limb sprawl is just not realistic outside, unless it’s used to cool down when hot. Contrary, I don’t think we all should be carrying flat, crappy, basic quilts so that we adapt to discomfort either. I’d rather see folks with this mindset carrying a well built system, but maybe with an increased temp rating and some user maintenance. For instance, a much lighter, well designed 40f system would likely outperform many of these basic systems in a 20f rating after all the shifting, clumping, and draft issues. Adapting some habits toward using fetal position can also give the sleeper a huge boost in efficiency. I have trouble actually sleeping through the night like this, so I retain the ability to be in other positions, but when I do use it, I can easily take a system 10 – 15f lower than I can while lying out straight.
Finally, let’s touch on the topic of an educated user who is intentional with their gear. Gear simply works better when a smart user can provide some basic inputs, instead of the watered down, generic, gear that appeals to the lowest common denominator. A good example of this is fill distribution in down gear. Taking a moment to fluff and distribute your down fill when you pull it out of your bag is really just a basic task which should be done with all down gear. I think there are some people out there who feel like they should never have to do this and that it is s sign of inadequate design. This couldn’t be further from the truth. Down is highly compressible and it will be able to shift in any chamber when that gear is compressed. The person who takes that moment to care for their gear will be warmer than the ignorant one. You could design a garment to have really tight control to limit the user inputs, but you pay the price for this. The warmth to weight performance goes out the window, but if you have a smart user who takes the time to care for their gear, the performance potential becomes much greater. Like most things, there is a sweet spot, that depends on the use case. I’d choose tighter spacing and more control for a garment that was to be used in active / semi-active use cases where moisture and other compromising conditions might be present. For static use, I would aim to have more efficiency and user input to get that really high level of performance.