From the bottom of Bald Mountain in Park City, Utah the climb up to the summit looks relatively tame, but it’s anything but, just ask Daniel Pratt.

"You get half way up and get through the snow. It starts off as slush and turns to ice and then it turns into about three-foot deep slow. It's hard to explain how difficult it is, but you get half way up and think 'why am I still walking up this mountain?'”

The simple reason, as Pratt and the rest of the team are fully aware, is the benefits of altitude training.

Located in the pristine Deer Valley, Bald Mountain has an elevation of 9,400 feet (2,865m) and has already provided the players from the North Melbourne Football Club much pain and despair and it is only week two of their high-performance camp.

"It's a good mental experience for the boys. You don't really get to do these things back in Australia because you just don't have the opportunities, but the club's done a great job to get us over here and the boys are really enjoying it so far,” Pratt told kangaroos.com.au shortly after conquering the mountain.

But today’s one hour hike was an easy one compared to past days. The players have completed two other painstaking climbs of around eight hours each. There has also been a few uphill running sessions and plenty of cross training.

For Pratt, his training output has been severely limited due to the fact that he is still recovering from post-season surgery.

"It's been frustrating because they've been going for six or eight hours on the hike and you hear all the banter they come back with. It's always disappointing to miss out on this sort of stuff.”

So Thursday’s climb was more of a power session for Pratt and the aim was the scale the mountain as quickly as possible.

"I got out to a good early lead but blew up on the last bit, but managed to make it up safely and beat the other boys up which was good. However I haven't been doing all the work the rest of them have.

"I'm progressing really well, along with Robbie Tarrant. We had the same hip surgery done on the same day. I'm probably a week behind due to the severity, but it's going really well and I'm getting some really good power back in my legs and I've been able to drop a few kilos. The altitude helps with the weight loss as well.