Word.ws English Dictionary

fastpacking

fastpacking is the present participle and gerund of fastpack.

Noun

fastpacking (uncountable)

  1. Running while carrying a backpack.
    • Long popular in Europe, various forms of endurance sports are finding their niche on this side of the Atlantic as well. In addition to trail running, there is ultra running, wilderness running, mountain running and orienteering. Yet another offshoot gathering steam is fastpacking — running multiple...1993 June 18, Ad Crable, “Running wild”, in Lancaster New Era
    • The bad news: fastpacking. The good news: cougars view swiftly fleeing humans as food. But seriously, fastpacking is the backcountry equivalent of a 9-day, 18-nation tour of Europe.1997 February, Terry Morse, “Backtalk”, in Backpacker, volume 25, number 156, page 12
  2. Backpacking with the goal of maximising the distance covered each day.
    • The opposite of slackpacking is fastpacking, or powerhiking, which maximizes daily mileage by walking for long hours with only a few short stops.2011, Chris Townsend, The Backpacker's Handbook, 4th Edition, →ISBN, page 12

Meaning of fastpack

Verb

fastpack (third-person singular simple present fastpacks, present participle fastpacking, simple past and past participle fastpacked)

  1. To run while carrying a backpack on a multi-day trail.
    • In 1987, with fellow runner Will Uher, John fastpacked the 211-mile John Muir Trail in the Sierra Nevada in 8 1/2 days, carrying a 30-pound pack.2011, John Vonhof, Fixing Your Feet: Prevention and Treatments for Athletes, →ISBN, page 361
  2. To to backpacking with the goal of maximising the distance traveled every day.
    • It was slowing her down in adventure races, and it was complicating her plans to fastpack a bunch of trails in New Zealand.2004 May, Katy Schafer, “The Challenge”, in Backpacker, volume 32, number 156, page 87

Questions about fastpacking

What does fastpacking mean?
Fastpacking means running while carrying a backpack.
What is fastpacking the present participle and gerund of?
Fastpacking is the present participle and gerund of fastpack.
What part of speech is fastpacking?
Fastpacking is a noun.

Words near fastpacking in the dictionary

  1. fastpaced
  2. fastpack
  3. fastpacked
  4. fastpacker
  5. fastpackers
  6. fastpacking
  7. fastpacks
  8. fastpitch
  9. fasts
  10. fastuous
  11. fastuously

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: fastpacking (page history and authors); fastpack (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “fastpacking.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/fastpacking. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.