Critique my plan, please + questions

I'd appreciate any input on my training plan from you MP training gurus. I'm basically your average punter, dabbling in 5.10 trad and 5.11 sport climbing. I've been climbing for 4 years but finger injuries have derailed me for the past 2 years and I've basically stagnated. The injuries are actually what inspired me to attempt a structured, progressive training plan even though I climb at a pretty low level. My last pulley strain was 6 months ago, I've edged past my old high-point and I'm feeling healthy. I just did a 6 week mini-cycle and am on a rest week (my first attempt at structured training).

Goals: I have several trad routes I'd like to redpoint in the 5.11 range, at the Gunks or the Dacks, and one 5.12-. I've TR'd the 12- clean from its mid-5.11 cheat start (bypassing the initial boulder problem crux). I also have a ton of 5.10's left to attempt onsight in the Gunks. There are a couple V5 boulder problems I'd like to send as well, but those are 2nd or 3rd priority.

Circumstances: I'm trying to peak for October. I have weddings to attend the last 2 weekends in September, so I'll take off about 1.5 weeks at that time. That gives me 9 weeks to train (I'm on a rest week now). I'm a weekend warrior and like to train in the gym early in the morning when it's empty (it gets crowded at night and structured training becomes impossible). I'm mostly bouldering due to time constraints, and the routes suck anyway (30 feet tall, and not well-set IMO).

Without further delay:

2 weeks Aerobic Conditioning/Base Building/Reconnaissance (Tuesday and Thursday)

- 2 sessions/week with 2x30 minute ARC sets each (autobelay). Pick 2 movement drills to work each session and rotate them. Increase intensity by feel over the 4 total sessions. Rest 10 minutes between sets
- Since it'll still be hot as hell and unpleasant to climb outside, throw in a short indoor bouldering session on Saturday or Sunday to maintain bouldering strength and do recon for the next phase.

4 weeks Bouldering/Strength (Tues/Thurs)

- 2 session/week. Start climbing outside again on weekends and refine all those other skills that go into being a good climber. If it's hot, HTFU/chase the shade and climb easy routes. As always, movement drills during warmup.
-1st session will be CIR bouldering - 8-10 problems, max of 3-4 quality tries each. 1 repeat allowed to dial in movements and it counts towards the total.
- 2nd session is a very abbreviated repeaters/rockprodigy style hangboard workout + some short-duration interval work. Hangboard work will be something like 3 holds x 2 sets each (basically an intro to hangboarding). Intervals will be a 3x2...trying to link 2 of the easier problems I've dialed in the CIR workout (that makes 12-18 moves, or 45 sec to 1 minute on the wall), 3 sets, full recovery between sets.
- Focus on edges, and make sure all the problems are strenuous. No "tricky" BS problems that aren't physically demanding i.e. stemming, steep slab and balance-y vert problems. 35/45 degree wall preferred.

3 weeks Anaerobic Conditioning (again, Tues/Thurs)
- 2 sessions/week. It'll be September, so definitely get out on the rock on weekends. Onsight as many 10's as possible. Start working on goal routes. Link pitches and do all-nuts ascents of 8's and 9's. Movement drills during warmup, outside and inside.
-1st Session is medium duration intervals, 4x4's building up to 5x5's.
-2nd Session is longer intervals. 6x6's building up to 8x10.
- Intervals should be done with timed rests; keep rest consistent throughout phase and substitute more difficult problems to progress. Again, focus on edges and strenuous problems on the 35/45 degree walls.

Is it OK to combine the hangboard and short-duration interval work in my bouldering/strength phase (weekly session #2)? I kept the volume low for this reason. I feel like anaerobic endurance is a weakness of mine, and the hard doubles are good preparation for 4x4's in the next phase. Should I split it into hangboarding in the morning and intervals at night? I live 3 blocks from the gym, so that's doable (+ single, no kids, reasonable hours at work).

I'm not planning to train power because campusing and threshold bouldering scare me...I fear injuring a finger again, or developing elbow tendonitis. I know this isn't ideal, but is it a real problem? I've heard campusing is nearly useless for my level. Opinions?

What kind of maintenance work do you guys do during your peak phase on weekdays when you can't get outside?

Would trying to lose 10 pounds be too much at once?

If you've read this far, thank you! I'll try to update the thread as the plan progresses.

Holy shit! I didn't even get thru the first paragraph. You need to not focus on the details so much, just get out and freaking climb. That's how your going to get better. I'm sure most would agree that climbing is 80% mental 20% physical. just get out more.

Charles Kinbote wrote:Opinions?

Everything looks good but skip the hang board and focus your efforts on bouldering. The hang board is too non-specific for someone at you level of experience. You will gain much more through the subtle movements learned during group bouldering sessions.

Charles Kinbote wrote:What kind of maintenance work do you guys do during your peak phase on weekdays when you can't get outside?

Boulder, route climb inside, anything fun to keep the motivation high. Nothing too taxing, like 4x4s.

Charles Kinbote wrote:Would trying to lose 10 pounds be too much at once?

Depends on if you have it to lose.

Ryan N wrote:I'm sure most would agree that climbing is 80% mental 20% physical.

No.

I won't comment on the training plan, but I too suffered many finger injuries as I attempted to progress too quickly. The key to rectifying it was not slowing down the training, but instead antagonistic exercises. Bucket of sand/rice and a few sets of push-ups changed my life not only in terms of injury prevention, but injury recovery. I haven't found anything better for a finger injury than my bucket of sand to get the blood flowing to such a low-flow area like fingers. I was aware of it for years, it cost about 4 dollars, and I neglected it until one day I gave it a shot and haven't looked back since. Literally, after every climbing session, whether it's training, recreational, whatever, I spend 15 minutes getting a "reverse pump" which is what I call the feeling from the bucket of sand. It's a pump on the opposite side of your forearms. It's also good for recovery because it flushes lactic acid. Also, pushups keep your chest in balance with your back, which gets heavily worked from climbing whereas your chest does not. Cleared up the laxity in my shoulders from dislocations and I think (speculating on this one) helped tighten up my rotator cuff and alleviate some mild tendonitis I would get.

Birdman,

Not familiar with the bucket-o-sand. Please explain! Just tweeked a finger and looking for some good exercises.

Thanks!

Very, very complicated process.

1) Buy bucket
2) Buy/find sand
3) Fill bucket with sand
4) Push hands into sand in a fist and open fist pushing the sand in an outward (extension) direction.
5) Increase speed and frequency until you the outside of your forearms are burning much like how the inside of your forearms burn when you are pumped.

Just a little humor, but seriously do that and try to focus on using your fingers to move the sand, not your wrists or arms. It usually takes about 3 minutes for the "reverse pump" to be felt. I usually throw on a TV episode and try to do it as much as I can for the duration of the show (roughly 25 minutes). Let me know if you need more of an explanation. Hope this helps.

Metolious makes an exercise ball that has individual rubber bands that come out of the center of the ball to work extensor muscles.

Get out there and climb OWs....... Great exersice and finger injuries are very rare!!!!

TheBirdman wrote:Very, very complicated process. 1) Buy bucket 2) Buy/find sand 3) Fill bucket with sand 4) Push hands into sand in a fist and open fist pushing the sand in an outward (extension) direction. 5) Increase speed and frequency until you the outside of your forearms are burning much like how the inside of your forearms burn when you are pumped. Just a little humor, but seriously do that and try to focus on using your fingers to move the sand, not your wrists or arms. It usually takes about 3 minutes for the "reverse pump" to be felt. I usually throw on a TV episode and try to do it as much as I can for the duration of the show (roughly 25 minutes). Let me know if you need more of an explanation. Hope this helps.

This can also be accomplished by holding out ur arms horizontally and flicking your fingers forcefully outwards. Do this as fast and as hard as you can and you'll be amazed how pumped you get in a minute or two. Learned this from a guy in W.mass back when i used to have tons of finger problems - it worked wonders and you can do it anywhere, driving, walking, hiking, at work, etc. bucket def could be better on the resistance while ur at home.

David Sahalie wrote:If your fingers are getting injured on 5.11 you are trying too hard without warming up your fingers. Just climb more until you are doing 12s, then think about a strict training schedule. you need to simply do more mileage on terrain you can do.

Almost all the finger injuries happened bouldering, on moves that were much harder than 5.11. I'm pretty confident in my ability to make quick redpoints of 5.11 sport routes (2-3 tries); I've done it at a handful of areas. Close but no cigar on the few onsights I've attempted at the grade.

The plan shouldn't interfere with my ability to get mileage on the weekends. It's 2 days/week.

I am open to the argument that this is all too much. I'm open to stripping down and simplifying the plan. I figured I'd get some of those replies. But is "just climbing" at the gym really more productive?

My opinion is that at your level (and most non-elite levels), you should be focusing on getting better at climbing instead of getting physically stronger. I was climbing at about your goal level 2 years ago, and training a lot. My shoulder got messed up and I had to have my bicep reattached last summer.

Coming back from surgery, my initial thought was that I needed to get strong again, but the fact that I have to take a lot of rest days kept me from doing that. I started climbing with some people who are much better than me, and I realized that my technique could still use a lot of improvement. Now, it's been a year since I had surgery, I'm physically a lot weaker, and climbing harder than I was before I got hurt.

Since you have injury issues, I would not climb more than 3.5 days a week. The only thing that keeps my shoulder going is resting a day for every day that I climb (if I climb Sat/Sun, I take Mon/Tues off). When I was first coming back from injury, I rested 2 days for every climbing day.

As for training, I'd suggest bouldering, which will help you get stronger and improve your technique. If you're around better climbers, you can watch what they do. I also think that not just thinking about where you put your feet and hands, but exactly where you need to put your weight, helps a lot. I'm sure that doing tons and tons of campus sessions, etc. will eventually make you better at climbing, but actually climbing is way more fun and will also make you physically stronger in the process. Good luck!

Are you always crimping? I was amazed at what 8 sessions of hangboarding did for my open hand strength. I don't crimp everything now and it's great, plus my crimp is stronger too.

I started hangboarding when redpointing at the mid-12 level though until recently I didn't sport climb much outside of the gym.

Also 2x30 min ARC sessions could be a bit light if you're only doing it twice a week. I could do 3x30 or 2x45 if only ARCing 2x per week. 90 minutes of ARC on plastic does make my skin realllllly sore but I saw big gains in my # of circuits completed (up to 900 moves in 30 minutes).

Just climb more, inside for endurance, outside for technique. You're talking about doing a bunch of 5.8-9 trad when your goal is to do hard .11s? That makes no sense, especially if you already climb .10 trad.

Sounds like you need to work on your endurance, your technique, as well as your strength if you're looking to bump up to V5 and harder. Boulder outside more, but use an open hand grip like some have said. Do as many .10 and .11 trad routes as you can get on.

If you have injuries and you're planning on training as much as you intend, you're either going to get injured or bored and quit before you reach your goal or get on real rock.