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Climbing during Rock Prodigy strength phase

Original Post
Tim Westover · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Jul 2015 · Points: 0

Hoping to get a recommendation on how to incorporate climbing into the strength training hangboard phase of the rock prodigy training program given my situation.

Currently, I work right next to my rock climbing gym and I can go there pretty much any day I want for multiple hours. Before starting the rock prodigy training method I was climbing 3-4 days a week usually one day on one day off. Climbing V5-V6 mostly bouldering.

My question is, given my hangboard setup being at home (about an hour from the gym) how can I incorporate climbing into the strength phase of the program? I see that it recommends some light arc'ing before hangboarding to warm up however I'm not sure if it would benefit me to stop by my gym, do a quick 30-40 minutes of light climbing, then hop on the train home and do my hangboard session when I get there an hour later.

I'm having trouble doing just hangboarding as I have so much free time to climb so hoping to see if anyone has any recommendations on some climbing I could incorporate into the strength phase without hindering the results. Right now, my schedule is...

Monday - Hangboard

Tuesday - Yoga then Core Exercises (TRX, hanging leg raises, planks)

Wednesday - Antagonist muscle workout

Thursday - Hangboard

Friday - Core Exercises

Saturday - Gym climbing (not sure if I should be climbing hard at this phase)

Sunday - If I climbed saturday then usually more of an antagonist muscle workout, if not Hangboard

Is there any way I could incorporate more climbing or maybe adjust my schedule to work more effectively. If not I can continue as is, I just have a lot of time to dedicate and have trouble staying away from climbing.

Thanks in advance!

Will S · · Joshua Tree · Joined Nov 2006 · Points: 1,061

I'd put the HB sessions in the morning before work, then climb on the same day in the evening. Cut down the volume of sets a bit on the HB workout, and stop the climbing session before you are trashed. Keep the effort level on the HB at 8/10, don't push weight or reps to failure. Pick one day of the weekend for climbing, preferably Sat, and use the other for relaxing and chores and such.

Don't expect either your gym or real climbing sessions to reflect your top performance level. If you need a little bit extra to send a project or something, run a short taper for a week or two, get fully recovered.

Micah Klesick · · Charlotte, NC · Joined Aug 2013 · Points: 3,971

I personally wouldn't recommend any real climbing during the strength phase. If you really want to follow the program, and get the most out of HB training, you will want to really take those two rest days between sets. Doing a good warmup at the gym would help, and then hour rest would be fine. I typically did a bouldering warm up ladder to my flash level, do a couple problems at that level, and then take a half hour rest before starting my HB session.

TheBirdman Friedman · · Eldorado Springs, Colorado · Joined Jan 2010 · Points: 65
Micah Klesick wrote:I personally wouldn't recommend any real climbing during the strength phase. If you really want to follow the program, and get the most out of HB training, you will want to really take those two rest days between sets. Doing a good warmup at the gym would help, and then hour rest would be fine. I typically did a bouldering warm up ladder to my flash level, do a couple problems at that level, and then take a half hour rest before starting my HB session.
I agree. I find if I'm doing my HB training right, climbing is a waste of time anyways since my forearms are destroyed. I typically HB every 3rd day, (Monday, Thursday, Sunday). The day after my HB workout I do an hour long core circuit and an hour long "strength circuit". My strength circuit is a mix of one-arm pull-up training, lock-offs, flys, muscle ups, typewriters, etc. I try to use this to strengthen my shoulder power and overall stability. (Tuesday, Friday, Monday). I try to do yoga and antagonistic work on the third day and maybe some light cardio.

As I said, hang boarding is hard because you really do have to stop climbing for 4-6 weeks to get the most out of it. Whenever I try to incorporate climbing, I either injure myself or I am disappointed because my performance is garbage. If you're hang boarding correctly, your forearms should be too wasted for climbing anyways.
Andrew Southworth · · MN · Joined Apr 2014 · Points: 289

I think the above recommendations are really good. I agree that if your gonna HB 3 times a week that is enough. When I work strength I was doing the 2 days HB and 1 gym day. at the gym I would:

Warm up
2 sets of:
Pinch only route until failure
Sloper only route until failure
Crimp only route until failure
Cool down

I got this idea from performance rock climbing and I think it worked well for me. The author states that if you climb a route with mixed grips you never really max out a single one to exhaustion. (I'm not a weight training expert so I'd be interested to hear others views on this.) The downfall is it can be really hard to find routes where you can pinch/crimp/use slopers to exhaustion. You have to mixs routes and get creative with holds sometimes. I'll say I think it helped my pinch grip the most since my HB doesn't have that.

evan h · · Longmont, CO · Joined Oct 2012 · Points: 360

Yes, forget about climbing well if you're really looking to maximize strength gains. As others have suggested, you'll be trashed the next day if you're really going 100% on the hangboard workouts. You'll only get frustrated if you try and do anything remotely hard. Alternatively, the day after the first few workouts, I do find that some very light climbing, on the order 5.8 or so, helps to get the blood flowing and promotes recovery. This is recommended in the book. After about 6-7 workouts though, I need every hour of rest I can get, so I taper most climbing off. It's hard after 3-4 weeks, but when you start putting down big objectives later in the season, your discipline pays off!

reboot · · . · Joined Jul 2006 · Points: 125
Will S wrote:I'd put the HB sessions in the morning before work, then climb on the same day in the evening.
This. If you have the time & luxury of easy access to a full service climbing gym, there really isn't a compelling reason to strictly following the rock prodigy program. You get 8-10 hours to recover from the morning strength/power workout & can still get in a quality climbing session in the evening. Just make sure your total effort for the day remains comparable to a single longer session.
slim · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Dec 2004 · Points: 1,103

i think i would warm up at the gym after work for about an hour. bouldering, 5 each from V-easy to V flash or so. focus on trying to climb well. try to get home fairly quick, and then do the HB workout. maybe do a quick re-warm up set before the actual workout

i experimented for a while with the 2 workouts in a day and i could never get it to work well. usually, the evening session would pretty much just consist of clawing up junk mileage routes. it is really hard not to over-do the morning workout.

also, it takes a lot more time, it isn't really just the two halves equaling a whole. you lose a lot of prep and post time.

Will S · · Joshua Tree · Joined Nov 2006 · Points: 1,061

Slim, were you doing a repeaters HB at 6+ sets when you did 2 sessions/day? IIRC, the higher level RCTM protocols are something like 18 sets (3 rounds of a set on each of 6 holds?).

I think you could make it work if you looked at a much lower volume of sets and/or used a lower rep scheme (singles to triples), and didn't go to failure on any of them. You're right in that you're still going to spent a lot more time than it appears due to warm up, prep, etc. Even what I consider a very low volume max singles type workout takes me over 30min. And the idea of lifting anything heavy first thing in morning just doesn't work for me. But some people are psyched in a.m., wish I was one of them.

reboot · · . · Joined Jul 2006 · Points: 125
slim wrote:it is really hard not to over-do the morning workout.
Yes, that can often be a problem in the beginning; I think giving yourself a hard time constraint in the morning can be very helpful. I did this 2 summers ago while living in silicon valley. Because it gets hot during the day, I was forced to campus early in the morning. But of course, it's hard to find partners to climb that early, so I'd go back to the gym in the evening to rope climb. I wasn't overly concerned w/ performing in the evening & consequently it didn't feel like much time was wasted re-warming up (I did have to shower twice a day). In that summer, I was able to perform reasonably well on the long valley routes while coming back way better at campusing.

To me, it feels like an advantage of these types of approach is I never feel like anything is "unlearned". There is very little ramp up to max strength/power even if I haven't specifically trained HB/campus for a while. Sure, the gain doesn't seem to come quickly, but neither do they come quickly over the entire round of linear periodization cycles.

I hate to bring up Adam Ondra b/c he's a mutant, but he essentially structures short workouts 3 times a day. Of course, he can also handle training 6 days a week...
slim · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Dec 2004 · Points: 1,103

good points - i think i was doing a 15 set workout in the morning (although only 5 sets approximately to failure). this was probably too much. the hard time constraint is a great idea (i actually do this during my bouldering warmup as it is easy to get fixated on a problem and thrash yourself).

i think this split workout could be really good for stamina style climbing (ie all day / long routes). i will be interested to see how WillS' experiment turns out, so keep us posted.

Guideline #1: Don't be a jerk.

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