i'm not fat, but i gained 40lbs over the last two years and now none of my midlayers fit anymore because i bought them all in size small. feelsbad man.
>>2405308yeah they're very useful especially if you're a bigger guy. even if you don't like hiking with trekking poles its worth the weight at least on dayhikes. why? they stop your knees from getting destroyed on descents because you can basically use them as brakes. hiking is really bad for your joints long term regardless of weight & the heavier you are the worse it is. poles do a lot to negate that if used properly.
for backpacking the weight's well worth it as long as you plan around it. trekking pole tent and tarp/tarp tent setups can use the poles, so you can subtract the weight of otherwise necessary tentpoles from what they cost to bring. also they kick ass in tarp setups because you can use their adjust-ability to knock rain off your tarp or tighten it when it sags etc. if the soil's decent i'll use my aluminum ones as a poop trowel and leave that at home. wouldn't do that with carbon ones though.
the only downside to them is that the telescoping kind can make it hard to set certain backpacks down without hanging or taking them out and setting them down first. especially smaller packs and daypacks. there's also 'tent pole' folding style ones which lose the adjustability but pack down small. those ones are great for climbing and dayhiking.
