Best books on performace to climb 5.12?

From what I can gather:

Training for Climbing
The Self Coached Climber
How to Climb 5.12
Performance Rock Climbing
New Alpinism

You don't need a book to climb 5.12

How to climb 5.12:
Climb a lot. At least 4x a week.
Climb with different groups
Climb with 5.12 climbers
Don't get fat

What you definitely need is a bunch of half snide comments from people who want you to know that climbing 5.12 is really really easy.

Josh Allred wrote: From what I can gather:

Training for Climbing
The Self Coached Climber
How to Climb 5.12
Performance Rock Climbing
New Alpinism

I would recommend Logical Progression by Steve Bechtel and Rock Climbers Training Manual by the Anderson Brothers over any of those.  I've owned the first 3 and New Alpinism.  New Alpinism is not at all specific to rock climbing, Steve House's site has a program for rock climbing that is essentially the Anderson Brother training plan.  Horst is reasonably good for getting up to 5.12, but I think that his plans might be more complicated than the average climber actually needs without any added benefit.  Self Coached climber is really good honestly but I find it a bit out dated.

Brother Numsie wrote: How to climb 5.12:
Climb a lot. At least 4x a week.

Crap.

Climb with different groups

Errr...

Climb with 5.12 climbers

Does myself count?  Oh, right...no.

Don't get fat

Fawk.  You forgot “don’t have kids.”

Brother Numsie wrote: How to climb 5.12:
Climb a lot. At least 4x a week.
Climb with different groups
Climb with 5.12 climbers
Don't get fat

I agree with all points but the last one. I would have agreed with you not too long ago, but I’ve seen plenty of bigger folk crushing 13s lately. That’s just an excuse. 

Just climbed my first 11d outside after 2 years of training, here are some points that may help you:

1) Climb 2x a week on rope. Bouldering 1x per week.
2) You need to try really hard on the attempts in 1). (Watch other good climbers how much effort they give when training...)
3) You need to find right balance between training and recovery, you won't progress if you are 100% over-trained, and not healing properly.
4) Learn about 3 energy systems, and realize you need to train them all.
5) Work on your diet, eat healthy, pay attention on what you eat and how you recover. Also make sure you eat right nutrients for tendons, joints & ligaments.
6) On off days work on antagonist exercises for shoulders and elbows/forearms.
7) Gently experiment with finger board training, also listen to this: https://www.trainingbeta.com/media/tyler-simple-fingers/

Josh Allred wrote: From what I can gather:

Training for Climbing
The Self Coached Climber
How to Climb 5.12
Performance Rock Climbing
New Alpinism

An honest question: why are you trying to gather this list? 

I can’t speak for New Alpinism, but all the other books on your list have a lot of good info, that would help 5.10 climber (assuming your ticks are accurate) improve to some extent. 

But:

1) There is such thing as choice paralysis. This is not a game quest where you need to “gather all resources” first. Do you have one of these books already? Then forget the rest. Start reading it right now.  And follow the program outlined in it for 6 months. 

2) “training” keeps trickling down into lower and lower grades, and it gets to be somewhat ridiculous. Some of these books are more focused on the types of training that is really yet not very beneficial to someone who is climbing 5.10. Windshield wipers, or hangboard protocols, or posterior chain exercises just aren’t going to do it.

3) for the combined price of all these books you can probably afford a private session with a climbing coach, and it will probably get you farther along, and faster, than the reading. 

4) physical skills aren’t gained by reading. They are gained by doing. 

PW Zenpw wrote: Just climbed my first 11d outside after 2 years of training, here are some points that may help you:

1) Climb 2x a week on rope. Bouldering 1x per week.
2) You need to try really hard on the attempts in 1). (Watch other good climbers how much effort they give when training...)
3) You need to find right balance between training and recovery, you won't progress if you are 100% over-trained, and not healing properly.
4) Learn about 3 energy systems, and realize you need to train them all.
5) Work on your diet, eat healthy, pay attention on what you eat and how you recover. Also make sure you eat right nutrients for tendons, joints & ligaments.
6) On off days work on antagonist exercises for shoulders and elbows/forearms.
7) Gently experiment with finger board training, also listen to this: https://www.trainingbeta.com/media/tyler-simple-fingers/

A refreshingly helpful reply.  I am in the 11a zone after 1 year of climbing (returning after a brief 22 year rest from the 90s).  I'm starting to feel a persistent pain in the back of my shoulder/deltoid.  I think I need to spend more time on antagonist training to support the big pulling muscles. I currently do 3 sets of 10 scapular pullups twice a week.  What antagonist exercises have been helpful for you?  

If you want books, maybe look for books that offer new mindsets rather than new exercises - lots of physical fitness plans can work as long as you stick to them. “9 out of 10 climbers make the same mistakes” was the most important book for me. I’ve heard good things about Rock Warrior’s Way but haven’t read it the whole way through. +1 for understanding the different energy systems.

Short Fall Sean wrote: What you definitely need is a bunch of half snide comments from people who want you to know that climbing 5.12 is really really easy.

This is actually more true than one would think. In bike racing I knew a guy who, after performing at a mediocre level for years, made almost an overnight leap to just killing everyone. When I asked him how he improved so quickly after such a long time, his response was: “I just decided that I wouldn’t suck anymore.”  Same goes for climbing. 

How to climb 5.12:
Pick a 5.12 you like and keep trying it until you send it.
Now you are a satisfied 5.12 climber.

Chris Jones wrote:

A refreshingly helpful reply.  I am in the 11a zone after 1 year of climbing (returning after a brief 22 year rest from the 90s).  I'm starting to feel a persistent pain in the back of my shoulder/deltoid.  I think I need to spend more time on antagonist training to support the big pulling muscles. I currently do 3 sets of 10 scapular pullups twice a week.  What antagonist exercises have been helpful for you?  

https://www.summitmedicalgroup.com/media/db/relayhealth-images/xrotcuf2_3.jpg

The easiest way to become a 5.12 climber is to find a gym with really soft grading. No book required.

"9 Out of 10 Climbers Make the Same Mistakes" by Dave McLeod is probably the best one to improve your climbing at any grade.

Chris Jones wrote:

A refreshingly helpful reply.  I am in the 11a zone after 1 year of climbing (returning after a brief 22 year rest from the 90s).  I'm starting to feel a persistent pain in the back of my shoulder/deltoid.  I think I need to spend more time on antagonist training to support the big pulling muscles. I currently do 3 sets of 10 scapular pullups twice a week.  What antagonist exercises have been helpful for you?  

Heyo, so I'm 18 months into a real similar progression.  I just lead my first 11b/c sport climb two weeks ago, I've been more interested in trad and have led 5.9+ in gear (I'm planning to try a .10 in Indian Creek sometime within the next two weeks).

Climbed in the 90s. I'm actually a lot better now because I am way more disciplined.  Raised kids, took 20 years off, no kids, no wife, so I climb.  I'm 41.

FWIW, I don't care about pushing grades, I just want to climb in more places and a lot of the climbing where I am is 11s and 12s.

I've taken the advice that people climbing sub-5.12 should probably not do climbing specific training to heart.

I really liked Eric Horst's book "Training for climbing"... I've spent the last couple of months just doing the stabilizer and antagonist sets and trying to increase the volume of climbing that I am doing outside (and bouldering a lot inside).  

What I am finding is that there is a limit to how much I can do before I either start to have days where I'm not feeling like I should train or I have obvious injuries that need specific attention.  Listening to that impulse to lay off of training for a day or two is a practice that all the books I've read emphasize.

My intuition is that I should just keep pushing on that limit as much as I can, and seriously listen when I hit a limit.  Right now I hit that limit just climbing 3 days a week and working out (incliuding indoor bouldering) 2 times/week.   And by "working out", I just mean 2 45min indoor bouldering sessions and then either an a/b set that is half the stabilizer/antagoinist and core from Horst's book.  I'm not doing any hangboarding or even any climbing specific exercises.  I'm not doing any specific periodization.

I'm just trying to strengthen the stuff that doesn't get worked when I'm climbing so I don't hurt myself, and then cancelling workouts when I don't feel 90%.

And that is all I can manage right now, so I dunno what else I would be doing... I'm pretty sure if I do more I will definitely injure myself.

But

18 months is not a long time.  I have been progressing week over week at increasing my overall volume, and I've been regularly been feeling better and better about being in control while climbing (as opposed to being full-on redlined trying to haul my ass up the wall).

It's possible that I could make more gains faster.  If I was 20 and willing to give up as much of my life as I have been, then I am sure I'd progress faster.  But I'm 41 so I will settle for not injuring myself and climbing as much as my body will allow.

Pick one book and follow its plan for multiple cycles.  Averaging the advice across multiple books is probably sub-optimal.   Most people fail by not executing on the training properly (not by picking the wrong plan).

I don't climb 5.12, but pretty solid 5.11 anytime, anywhere and I literally only boulder during the week

Go outside and familiarize with 5.12 moves. Go to gym, grab small holds, do hard similar moves, fall, talk with friends at the gym and rest, repeat.

Josh Allred wrote: From what I can gather:

Training for Climbing
The Self Coached Climber
How to Climb 5.12
Performance Rock Climbing
New Alpinism

9 out of 10 climbers make the same mistakes by Dave MacLeod.  He gives a realistic view on how to improve (hint: he doesn't recommend the endless hangboard/campusing/workout routines that these other books will slow you down with.)