hangboarding - limiting issues

I just finished a hangboarding phase on a Rock Prodigy board and noticed a couple new things this time:

1) By session #5 I was adding 20 lbs and found that I had to let go not because I was pumped, but because my skin hurt too bad. Specifically this is with the deeper two finger pocket. I ended up dropping that hold from my routine for the rest of the workouts. Any tips to mitigate this besides chalk, which I used copiously?

2) On a related note, I've noticed that sometimes I have to let go because of my shoulders or arms failing before getting pumped. Wondering if that means I need to improve general pull-up strength. Has anyone run into this?

For the shoulders/elbows thing, yeah, you could improve those, but also be careful that you're not straining them.

For the skin pain issue, that was the case for me, too. I found that it was useful to move as quickly as possible to holds that only utilized my first pad, so that there was not as much of the "folding skin" pain at the joints. You might have to drop a bit of the weight you're adding, but you'll build similar strength.

Yeah, I do the two finger pockets with like 35 pounds taken off, but it's a lot more comfortable to do that on a one pad hold than to do more weight on a deeper hold. Take it easy with the shoulders, find a hanging position that works for you, my partner and I do very different shoulder positions while hanging. Also, consider playing with your board spacing to find a more natural shoulder position.

Hey Chris!
sort of had the same thing with 2FP happen to me as well, but on a V5.12 board. Do you have a smaller set of pockets you could move to with weight taken off?
I've personally drifted away from 2FP on hangboards because of this, presumably open hand and 3FP stuff should carry over well to 2FP, the Eva Lopez method always has 4 fingers on

Same here, moved to the smaller pocket with more weight off and the problem went away...

Same for shoulders, go to smaller holds with more weight off and your shoulders (and fingers) will thank you.

You know holds outside arent exactly friendly. Maybe dealing with a little pain the board is a good thing?

Whippin wrote: By session #5 I was adding 20 lbs and found that I had to let go not because I was pumped, but because my skin hurt too bad. Specifically this is with the deeper two finger pocket. I ended up dropping that hold from my routine for the rest of the workouts. Any tips to mitigate this besides chalk, which I used copiously?

There are various options, in approximate order of value (i.e. try #1 first, and move from there)

1. Sand a bit of texture off the hold. A few swipes with a medium-grain sandpaper is usually enough.

2. Condition your skin with antihydril (or iontophoresis), sanding, etc. This will also have significant carry-over benefit for real climbing.

3. Do a light “warm-up” hang right before your “money” hangs. I find this is especially helpful on the MR pocket, where skin pain is often an issue. My skin always kills on the first set, but after that it stops hurting on subsequent sets. So, I do an easy “Set 0” with reps at low weight to warm up my skin to the hold, or stun it into submission. Also helps to warm up the tendons for pockets before trying hard. Then I move into my normal sets 1 through 3. I only do this for the 2F pocket; it isn't needed for the edge/sloper/crimp grips.

4. Switch to a smaller (1-pad or less) pocket. Skin-wise, I generally find that holds in the 1/2 to 1 pad range provide the best comfort (least pain). Once you go larger (~1.5-2 pads), you can run into skin issues with skin rolling/folding around the joint and the edges of the middle callus. Smaller holds are painful too, as a mere matter of size.

5. Get a Beastmaker. Hanging on wood is more comfortable. Full stop. Especially so on the Beastmaker. Might be worth the $$$.

6. Tape. I can’t stand using it, and think that solutions 1-5 are better, but some like to tape when HBing. You may need to consider using taping pre-adhesive sticky spray, or superglue, for maximum effectiveness.

Whippin wrote: On a related note, I've noticed that sometimes I have to let go because of my shoulders or arms failing before getting pumped. Wondering if that means I need to improve general pull-up strength. Has anyone run into this?

Maybe. How many grips/sets/reps are you doing, and at how much weight? A full repeaters workout with 7 grips, 3 sets on each, and 7/6/5 reps per set can end up being a huge amount of work for your shoulders if you are hanging large-ish holds and adding 25 or more lbs on each. Hanging smaller holds with less added weight (or with weight subtracted) will lessen the total shoulder loads. Also realize that while each grip works different angles and positions for your fingers, you shoulders and arms hold each set in the same way, so you are really beating them up.

It may be worth considering switching to smaller holds (and thus lower weights), or to maybe drop some of the lower-value grips. One good solution is to switch to pinch-blocks (Steve Maisch style) for your pinches. Because you hang weights off of those, and lift them, this works your shoulders in a different way and reduces shoulder hanging fatigue.

It definitely sounds like it's time to downsize holds and reduce weight. I've been so focused on adding weight that I guess I missed the obvious. I'll give it a shot next hangboarding phase. I guess that means I'm progressing though which is cool.

Jon, yeah I can downsize from the 2-pad 2FP to the 1-pad. My thinking was to be conservative since I'm not too strong at pockets yet, but there's no reason I can't bump down in size and reduce weight appropriately.

Ryan that's a good point, though I think if the intensity of the workout is super hard you are already dealing with a good amount of mental anguish just to finish!

JCM those are good suggestions, I think #4 is easiest and most practical for me. The Beastmaker looks intriguing though.

Whippin wrote:My thinking was to be conservative since I'm not too strong at pockets yet, but there's no reason I can't bump down in size and reduce weight appropriately.

I'd say if you're adding 20 lbs to the MR grip then you're pretty strong at pockets. Certainly strong enough to switch to the 1-pad pocket if you start conservatively and remove plenty of weight until you're familiar with the new grip.

Also +1 to the comment about the spacing of the halves of the board. I use the Trango board at my gym and the spacing is not adjustable. I actually can't use certain holds (the pinches, the shallow ends of the VDERs) because they're too far apart and totally wreck my shoulders.