How Dave MacLeod went from 8b -9a in 18 months

TL;DR:
-hangboarding (max str)+ endurance circuits 6 days a week
-lives near rock and able to climb outdoors often

What do you guys think about this?  How applicable to the general population do you think this is?  Dave claims that most decently developed climbers who are well trained should be able to handle this because the actual amount of time spent at high intensity is relatively low (1-2 minutes, if you just count hang time), but most other training experts (Anderson Bros, Horst) recommend at least a day or two between HB sessions and no more than 2-3 sessions per week, even for advanced climbers. MacLeod tends to be pretty reflective and obviously his results speak for themselves, but how reproducible are they?

First, I wish I had as much muscle as he does going in to this.

Second, he should brush his teeth.

Third, I've easily over done it on hang board during covid.  2x a week was almost too much.  Even then, rest and recovery is pretty damn important for training...  

Fourth, I didnt watch the video.  Thanks for the TLDR.

I hangboarded only 3 days a week for like a month and a half and have been climbing harder than ever.

Princess Puppy Lovrwrote: I hangboarded only 3 days a week for like a month and a half and have been climbing harder than ever.

Did you do any other climbing besides hangboarding?

Huge Dave M fan but the one-armer that was in there indicates a certain baseline strength that most of us will never have.
https://youtu.be/gCIyoS10s3g?t=284
If you can do a one-arm pullup on a first pad edge, you're pretty damn strong

Ted Pinsonwrote:

Did you do any other climbing besides hangboarding?

I did not this was during my states stay at home order. I had been hangboarding once every other week before and was climbing better but I walked up all my projects quickly after the 45 days of hangboarding.

The whole point of the vid is the only reason that this worked for him is he had a huge base of climbing experience and had not really hang boarded before. His point is that this isn't reproducible for most people, and that you should go climbing more, as that's what most people lack. 

Peter Bealwrote: Huge Dave M fan but the one-armer that was in there indicates a certain baseline strength that most of us will never have.
https://youtu.be/gCIyoS10s3g?t=284
If you can do a one-arm pullup on a first pad edge, you're pretty damn strong

Yeah, I think Dave’s a bit too humble and doesn’t realize how strong he is compared to the general population, lol.  However, I’m wondering if this is applicable if done to scale which seems likely.

Trevor: that’s really interesting!  Nice unintentional controlled experiment.

drewpwrote: The whole point of the vid is the only reason that this worked for him is he had a huge base of climbing experience and had not really hang boarded before. His point is that this isn't reproducible for most people, and that you should go climbing more, as that's what most people lack. 

Actually I would say his point is that finger strength is the single limiting factor for most climbers, mainly because he said that.

Seems that people can only hear what they want to hear. Dave Macleod made it clear that he has seen climbers w/ stronger fingers and stagnant or declining movement techniques since the whole training craze and yet the OP concludes finger strength is the single limiting factor for most climbers (did he even say that explicitly in the video?) I recall him saying that it's a core ingredient of climbing performance (i.e. necessary but not sufficient), which I don't disagree.

His 6 days a week routine as described:
1. max hang (1-2 min of actual hang time)
2. 2 40-min bouldering circuit 6c to 7c-8a which may be in route grade (8a is pretty hard bouldering).
3. 1 hour run

I would agree that's actually not a lot of fingerboard volume (a lot less than RCTM on a weekly basis). But if you looked at his program as a whole, it takes ~4 hours each day (including all the warmup, prep) and a much larger climbing volume than most training programs (and what most people working stiff can muster), and that's just in his "fingerboard" phase.

In 2004, Dave Macleod was 26 and already redpointed 8b+/5.14a. In 2004, I was a couple years older and just started climbing. If I was already climbing like him and didn't have a job, I can see myself duplicating his training. Today? No freaking way.

Ted Pinsonwrote:

Yeah, I think Dave’s a bit too humble and doesn’t realize how strong he is compared to the general population, lol.  However, I’m wondering if this is applicable if done to scale which seems likely.

Trevor: that’s really interesting!  Nice unintentional controlled experiment.

Yeah, the one thing worth pointing out is that for the last four years I probably have gotten 250-350 pitches of onsighting a year so I have a large climbing base relative to a lot of people.

rebootwrote: Seems that people can only hear what they want to hear. Dave Macleod made it clear that he has seen climbers w/ stronger fingers and stagnant or declining movement techniques since the whole training craze and yet the OP concludes finger strength is the single limiting factor for most climbers (did he even say that explicitly in the video?) 

Most folks looking at this thread should really listen to the points at 7:20 and 8:20, with the advent of gyms and more folks in climbing having far less time on rock than plastic overly strong physically for the grade is really prevalent. The further you live from rock the harder it is to deal with, but if you really want to get better at moving over stone you need to prioritize time on rock over whatever fancy training routine you can come up with on plastic.

A tale of two climbers to exemplify this. Both started about the same time, climber A was mid 30s and climber B late 20s. In 2015/16, after climbing about two years, their levels were pretty similar, both could onsight around 10- trad and 10+ sport. Both had natural strength on slab and were pretty weak on steep terrain (both with shit upper body strength).

Late 2016 climber B started heavily using flex time at work to get out any day conditions remotely lined up and worked longer days when it rained, rope soloing if no partners lined up. On weekends in winter climber B would make a 5+ hour drive to smith regardless of how cold it was and climb whatever they could with no feeling in their fingers.
At this time climber A had settled into getting 2-4 pitches in on 1-2 weeknights all spring and summer projecting and a mix of easy mileage and projecting on the weekends. All winter basically spent in the gym because they were convinced that bouldering on plastic would get them stronger and be an effective use of time.

Those patterns generally remain up until now, although A has started doing more of their bouldering on granite in winter and B has adopted more strength work and low volume targeted gym work. Still B is consistently logging more mileage on stone when factoring in winter and has got on a wider variety of stone.

Climber A is working 12+ projects and sends 12- in a few goes. Climber B is working 13- projects and sends 12+ in a few goes.  
Same start, similar backgrounds, living in the same place with the same opportunities available. Very different builds, but honestly people really over emphasize "genetic potential" BS at intermediate grades. Also before someone feels attacked here, I'm climber A ;)

rebootwrote: Seems that people can only hear what they want to hear. Dave Macleod made it clear that he has seen climbers w/ stronger fingers and stagnant or declining movement techniques since the whole training craze and yet the OP concludes finger strength is the single limiting factor for most climbers (did he even say that explicitly in the video?) I recall him saying that it's a core ingredient of climbing performance (i.e. necessary but not sufficient), which I don't disagree.

I’ve actually concluded nothing (or else why start this thread?), but he absolutely attributes this as the single most important factor FOR HIM.  What I am wondering (not claiming either way) is how applicable this would be to the general population.

His 6 days a week routine as described:
1. max hang (1-2 min of actual hang time)
2. 2 40-min bouldering circuit 6c to 7c-8a which may be in route grade (8a is pretty hard bouldering).
3. 1 hour run

I would agree that's actually not a lot of fingerboard volume (a lot less than RCTM on a weekly basis). But if you looked at his program as a whole, it takes ~4 hours each day (including all the warmup, prep) and a much larger climbing volume than most training programs (and what most people working stiff can muster), and that's just in his "fingerboard" phase.

In 2004, Dave Macleod was 26 and already redpointed 8b+/5.14a. In 2004, I was a couple years older and just started climbing. If I was already climbing like him and didn't have a job, I can see myself duplicating his training. Today? No freaking way.

Yeah, it’s crazy that he fits in 6 days of hangboarding on top of regular climbing.