Who here incorporates climbing strength in their routines?

[Aaron Wilson]

I started Foundation a few weeks ago, and have enjoyed the routine and progressions. I do a lot of climbing as my other physical activity, and I was wondering if anyone on the board had done any work to adapt a series of exercises for climbing-specific skills that aren't covered by other parts of Foundation. My own forward progress past 5.12a is mostly hampered by forearm (grip) and finger-tendon strength, and I'm not super-familiar with anything systematic for training that, or for what would count as good mobility exercises to train alongside them. Has anyone here developed a "series of PEs for grip strength", as it were?

[Mikkel Ravn]

Good question.

I boulder twice a week (no access to a high wall). I can onsight French 6b sport routes, but haven't tried to push the grade, as my main motivation is just to have fun on 5-6 grade trad routes and ice in the WI5-6 grade.

Between bouldering and the GB courses I really don't feel like adding more stuff in, but then again I'm 40 with too much to do and too little time. Getting better all the time in both climbing and GST so I don't see a huge need for specific grip training anyway.

However, it could be interesting to see such a protocol.

[Kai Ewert]

How long have you been climbing? That plays a big part in selecting a good approach forward. In your first few years of climbing, actual climbing will give you by far the best "bang for the buck" in terms of improvement for time invested.

 

Finger/grip strength will almost always be what feels is limiting you in climbing, even if that is not the "real" cause. I once forgot my shorts for a session at the bouldering gym, and was whining to everyone how weak I was feeling already on my warmups (that I was familiar with) that day. Then someone convinced me to get my shorts (5 min bike ride...) and once I changed into those from my jeans, I no longer felt weak... 

 

Two climbing-related ways of systematic progressions come to my mind:

1. route or bouldering "pyramids", where over time you aim to redpoint routes/boulders to fill a pyramid, e.g. if your onsight level is 5.11a, your pyramid to complete would be 8x5.11b, 4x5.11c, 2x5.11d, and 1x5.12a. By the time you complete this if not earlier, you will be ready to bump the whole scheme up a letter grade... 

2. progressive hangboard training. Check out Eva Lopez, whose approach I have tried and found very effective with a small investment in time. There is also the rock prodigy approach which I don't know much about and haven't tried. Many other "methods" and hangboards and training prescriptions for hangboards are out there but a lot of them are not great. 

 

Apart from looking up Eva Lopez online, I would recommend you check out 

Performance Rockclimbing by Goddart/Neumann and 

The Self-coached Climber by Hunter/Hague

These will have ideas for progressions that also include movement exercises.

[Aaron Wilson]

"How long" is a hard question. I started fifteen years ago, but had a big break in there. I've been doing about two and a half to four hours a week consistently for the last two and a half years (but not systematically, just however many routes me and the group I go with can shove into that time frame). I can consistently onsite 5.11's in the gym (100% for a-b, tapering off towards 11d, probably about 50/50 depending on how the route is structured). For bouldering grades, I'm consistently in the V3-5 range, again depending on the route. The evaluation that it's grip rather than balance comes from my perception that my best routes are all balancy and stemmy, and my worst ones all have mad crimps on overhangs, or not-so-bomber slopers with compromised balance, but I get that perception and reality aren't necessarily the same thing.

 

The pyramid scheme is a neat concept, but how long does it typically take to get 15 routes in? I feel like the only way that's getting completed inside of two hours is to have a buddy who's only belaying, and do the lower routes in 2x2s or 4x4s. Is that a normal expectation?

 

And when you mention "rock prodigy", do you mean this specifically: http://rockclimberstrainingmanual.com/, or something else?

[Aaron Wilson]

Oh, and thanks by the way, this is all a great start

[Kai Ewert]

Sounds like for you two main things you can do right now are make your climbing outings more systematic with respect to training and focus on your weaknesses since you already know what they are. 

 

That's it re rock prodigy, the book and physical setup are relatively new, the name rock prodigy is something he (they?) has used for much longer on e.g. rockclimbing.com

 

the route pyramids are not meant to be completed in a day. Yours would actually have 11d as the base level (50% chance of onsighting) and you would build/fill it in over weeks if not months. Not much onsighting, more redpoint efforts, but that will be required now to progress.

(For bouldering, you can do pyramids like that in a single session (or keep the intensity/grade constant). That's a great workout which I've used a lot to great effect, and something that can be done in 2 hours. The Self-coached climber calls them VIR and CIR (variable intensity repeats and constant intensity repeats))

[Aaron Wilson]

Ah, gotcha, I get now that the focus is on redpoint, not on just doing that in a routine. That makes a lot more sense, I can work with that for sure. Have you worked at all with the reading recommendations you gave, or is that recommendation through reputation?

[Kai Ewert]

I have read or rather studied both those books and worked a lot especially with stuff from the self-coached climber (there's some overlap too). I have seen great results for stamina (# of good attempts you can do per day) and to some extent level of difficulty from CIR and VIR bouldering and for endurance from ARCing. But my real limiter is finger power I believe and while I have seen some good progress with Eva Lopez style max strength training, I did not do that for as long or as dedicated. 

Just FYI, I have onsighted up to 5.12a and V4. If you are onsighting (real) V5, you have more than enough finger strength to onsight 12a or harder and climb 12d or 13a. In the Self-Coached Climber, they suggest that you should be able to climb 5.13a with V5 being your bouldering limit which I would agree with at least for most 13as. Which means a lot of people nowadays have a huge gap between what they "should" be able to climb on ropes based on their maximum strength (for which bouldering redpoint level is a pretty good indicator) and what they actually can climb, especially outside...

[Andrew Long]

how much do you outdoor climb?

 

climbing out doors is usually considerably different and often harder. I have found it to be a better way to improve overall grip and finger strength.

 

is it finger strength weakness or finger strength endurance weakness?  

 

for a while I thought I needed to do harder and harder problems to improve my grip strength but it turned out that what I needed most was to work on routes i could get in only a few attempts and do lots of them static and controlled with very little rest and continue to do so until it became easy (kind of like ssc)  then I would go for some max strength bouldering climbs ( stuff i could conceive of but would take a while to achieve specifically on my weaknesses) for a few weeks before repeating another ssc.

 

do you do any fingerboard stuff?
careful with this stuff it is easy to over do it and injure yourself.  especially on those crimps.
I havent done an fingerboard stuff for a while but I found sloper holds or slanted edges advanced me the most along side open hand crimps.

i just built up sets of 60second holds on the tips of all my fingers for sets then as the intensity increased i reduced the amount of volume.  so by the time i hit the 2 finger hangs i only had to build up to 10-15seconds for sets(i incorporated ssc style training to achieve this) I also used something like a deload period for fingerboards.  for example i'd do finger board work 1-2 times a week for a month or so then id take time off (sometimes up to 2 months depending on how hard i climbed and how often and how my hands felt)

these might not be the best ways to do it but i saw lots of progress especially with the fingerboard stuff.  i was stuck at around 5.12c  and the fingerboard work got me to doing my first and only 5.13b lol stopped climbing shortly after that for quite a while due to travel and moving.

pick a goal (eg. 2 finger pull up)   and then think about progressions working backwards from that (eg. 2 finger L-pull up with feet supported..... 4 finger pull up...... 4 finger lock offs..... 4 dead hang.....6 finger pull up  etc...)
pick something you can measure progress against.  maybe even have a few projects outdoors that are just above your grade and use them as tests to see if you are getting stronger.   also maybe look at how your technique holds up when you are on something tough.  often peoples technique will fall apart because they get tired and pumped and then lose focus and try to rush it. being precise and controlled with a climb can be the difference between someone who is strong falling where someone weaker sent the climb.  this used to hold true for me quite a bit when i was climbing early on.  friend of mine nowhere near as strong but he was very precise with his movements and had slightly more endurance..... unless it was some pure power bouldering he always climbed better than me.


sorry about the long post.  hope some of my rambling helps.

[Aaron Wilson]

Not much outdoors, it's a lot of driving and setup and I keep pretty busy on weekends. That's how I started, so I miss it, but the gym scratches the itch for now until my situation changes.

 

The V3-V5 range should be interpreted like my 11-12 range, not that I'm onsighting all V5s--I am about 100% on V3 and 511a-b, 50% on V4 and 511d, 25% on V5 and 5.12a (or lower, it's just something higher than zero). Sounds like my performance about matches the numeric expectations you mention, though, so it's good to know my experience isn't weird or rare. Thanks again for all the info.