Fingerboard or Kilter/Touchstone/Tension/Moon boards to build strength to get to V9?

Sam Dwrote:

Advice for that compressiony V6:  Next time try climbing a bit more quickly and deliberately.  Pausing and readjusting on holds longer than needed is a massive energy sap.  

Will try that. Thanks!

Li Huwrote:

There’s only 1 Kilter board at my Gym and it’s much farther away than I’d like to go for an afternoon climbing session.

So, I’m using Touchstone, Tension and have access to a Moon board. It’s difficult to get V0 on -35, -45 and -40 degrees, so, guessing they’re V4 minimum to V?

Currently flashing V4, at most gyms, but unable to pull V0 on these boards as of yet. It’s strengthening my fingers though.

Let’s see how I progress?

"Getting to V-something" is a mindset many of us have had at one point and I think it's not a good approach. Climbing a random boulder graded V-whatever means very little, if you are going to get shut down by the classic test pieces of that grade. Not to mention commercial gym grades which means absolutely nothing. Climbing is a complex sport. The goal is to climb better. Always focus on the weaknesses and not what you feel most comfortable doing. Keep working on that anti-style moonboard benchmark.

Xi Yinwrote:

"Getting to V-something" is a mindset many of us have had at one point and I think it's not a good approach. Climbing a random boulder graded V-whatever means very little, if you are going to get shut down by the classic test pieces of that grade. Not to mention commercial gym grades which means absolutely nothing. Climbing is a complex sport. The goal is to climb better. Always focus on the weaknesses and not what you feel most comfortable doing. Keep working on that anti-style moonboard benchmark.

Thanks for your input.

Pretty embarrassing that after 2-3 weeks on the fingerboards, I’m only just comfortable climbing V lowest on the Tension board. I can’t even start the Moonboard climbs yet.  

But, I think I can get something on it eventually. The fingerboard work is increasing my strength. Just have to keep at it.

Current progress: added 45 pounds for 7 seconds 20mm, 15mm  4 seconds. May be able to add more weight? But was told to keep 45 pounds but for 7 seconds and working my way down to 8mm edges over time of course.

On an 8mm edge with no added weight, I have the tendency to rock back and forth then fall off.

Li Huwrote:

Thanks for your input.

Pretty embarrassing that after 2-3 weeks on the fingerboards, I’m only just comfortable climbing V lowest on the Tension board. I can’t even start the Moonboard climbs yet.  

But, I think I can get something on it eventually. The fingerboard work is increasing my strength. Just have to keep at it.

Your rapid initial gain on the fingerboard is mostly due to neurological adaptation and not true strength improvement. If you can easily build up finger strength over a few weeks we would all be Daniel Woods by now.

Form on the hangboard is essential. Focus on actively squeezing and closing your hand, do not allow your hand to open up into a chiesel or dragging position.

That being said, if you cannot do the easiest moonboard benchmarks, you likely have serious deficiencies in your technique, including footwork, hip position, body tension, and so forth. At this stage your focus on finger strength might actually be holding you back as it allows you to muscle your way through low grade climbs with poor technique. My recommendation would be to film your attempts on boulders and focus on the movements.

Xi Yinwrote:

Form on the hangboard is essential. Focus on actively squeezing and closing your hand, do not allow your hand to open up into a chiesel or dragging position.

Do you recommend open hand grip then?

This would put the very tips of my fingers on the board, is that correct?

That being said, if you cannot do the easiest moonboard benchmarks, you likely have serious deficiencies in your technique, including footwork, hip position, body tension, and so forth. At this stage your focus on finger strength might actually be holding you back as it allows you to muscle your way through low grade climbs with poor technique. My recommendation would be to film your attempts on boulders and focus on the movements.

Yes, agree. I’m still trying that on Kilter and Tension boards.

Li Huwrote:

Do you recommend open hand grip then?

This would put the very tips of my fingers on the board, is that correct?

Yes, agree. I’m still trying that on Kilter and Tension boards.

He's (correctly) arguing the opposite — actively curl your fingertips into the board and DO NOT let them hang open. The point is to target your muscles and active tension, not simply the extension capacity of your soft tissue. An easy way to isolate that is to keep your feet on the ground and actively squeeze your fingers into the edge without letting yourself hang; i.e. try to pull your body up just with your fingers. A more advanced method would be to use something like the Tindeq and an unlevel edge and perform reps of squeezing, but it really is not necessary, especially if you're just getting started.

Like this?

No.  

Xi Yin is assuming you are using a half crimp for hang boarding. You can look up a picture of this on the internet - the index, middle, and ring finger are straight at the first knuckle, bent at 90° at the second, and the straight again at the third. The pinky bends however it fits best - for most people, their pinky is short enough that it stays straight at the first two joints and bends at the third. Xi is saying that when you pull onto the hangboard in a half crimp, your fingers should stay in the half crimp position throughout the rep. If your muscles become fatigued, then your fingers will open up, and you will no longer be using a half crimp position, which is what you are trying to train.

This is important for a few reasons. 

First, because different muscles control the articulation of different finger joints. If your fingers open up partway through the rep, you are no longer training the target muscles, and you are failing at the intention of the exercise.

Second, because you want to ingrain the pattern of holding on strongly to holds into your brain, rather than the pattern of gradually weakening. You want to train your mind to not give up when holding the half crimp on the hangboard, so it will perform similarly on the climbing wall.

Finally, it has been proposed that moving loaded finger flexor tendons is a mechanism for finger injuries, and so should be avoided. Or at least gradually worked up to if you had some reason to train heavy finger curls, but you probably don't have any reason to do that since it wouldn't be very climbing specific.

Li Huwrote:

Like this?

What you have here is a chiesel grip. Chiesel is perfectly okay when you are climbing normally, but on the finger board you should use the half crimp. Once your hand drops to the chiesel position as shown in your photo, the hang should be considered as having failed.

For comparison, in this photo Shawn Raboutou has his right hand in half crimp, and left hand in 3-finger drag position: reddit.com/media?url=https%…

Thanks Brice and Xi Yin!

Appreciate the help!

Brice Cwrote:

Second, because you want to ingrain the pattern of holding on strongly to holds into your brain, rather than the pattern of gradually weakening. You want to train your mind to not give up when holding the half crimp on the hangboard, so it will perform similarly on the climbing wall.

Slightly off-topic but something I've learned from switching to overcoming isometrics over the past 1-2 years (from yielding / hangs) is that the overcoming/"active grip" style is extremely fatiguing. That style isolates your muscles to a greater degree than hangs, and the fatigue curve is different as a result—way more linear degradation akin to traditional exercises, not the rapid drop-off into mega pump you get with hangs. That's not to say it's bad—I definitely think it's the better training method. But it's worth noting that it is a bad way to climb. Sometimes you need to just isolate holds and waste energy, but generally speaking when I'm trying to climb hard, I consciously try not to climb in the style I train off-the-wall.

FWIW the c4hp crew have shared what looks like good evidence around this using the NOXX device to measure O2 and NO fluctuations when training with the two methods. Definitely something for others to validate more scientifically. Anecdotally feels right  

Edit: Here’s a post from Chris Beardsley on CA+ fatigue, which you get more of when climbing in the dangling eccentric/drag style. The statement about the exponential nature of the fatigue curve rings very true to me—most of the pump comes right at the end before I fall, compared with metabolic fatigue being more consistent / linear.

https://www.patreon.com/posts/66617627?utm_campaign=postshare_fan

I’m getting close to being able to actively hang. I need to take off 10 pounds with a band to hang open hand crimp or half crimp. With this I can hang for about 15 seconds on the 20mm edge.

30mm can hang 12 then 8 seconds within 30 seconds unassisted before my fingers “drag”. Edited… progress…

End of climbing session today. 15 seconds 25mm before fingers started to drag.

Getting excited that the drag hangs got me here, but will definitely start hanging half crimp.

Dan Schmidtwrote:

Slightly off-topic but something I've learned from switching to overcoming isometrics over the past 1-2 years (from yielding / hangs) is that the overcoming/"active grip" style is extremely fatiguing. That style isolates your muscles to a greater degree than hangs, and the fatigue curve is different as a result—way more linear degradation akin to traditional exercises, not the rapid drop-off into mega pump you get with hangs. That's not to say it's bad—I definitely think it's the better training method. But it's worth noting that it is a bad way to climb. Sometimes you need to just isolate holds and waste energy, but generally speaking when I'm trying to climb hard, I consciously try not to climb in the style I train off-the-wall.

FWIW the c4hp crew have shared what looks like good evidence around this using the NOXX device to measure O2 and NO fluctuations when training with the two methods. Definitely something for others to validate more scientifically. Anecdotally it absolutely rings true to me!

Interesting.

https://www.camp4humanperformance.com/

Fingers don’t feel as “worked”. Going to try more repetitions and smaller edges than 30/25mm. Will try 20mm tomorrow.

Li Huwrote:

Fingers don’t feel as “worked”. Going to try more repetitions and smaller edges than 30/25mm. Will try 20mm tomorrow.

Your fingers shouldn't feel "worked" after a regular finger boarding session. They should feel fully warmed up and that you are ready to climb hard.

Xi Yinwrote:

Your fingers shouldn't feel "worked" after a regular finger boarding session. They should feel fully warmed up and that you are ready to climb hard.

Got it…

Using fingerboard as a warmup worked well for me. Found a grip that works best to reduce the strain on my tendons and pulleys. Trying to maintain optimum anatomical positions.

Got pumped leading a subsequent easier climb, cause I may have done too much “warmup”?

Getting beta on this harder 5.12c TR problem, and will be my project this week.

Going to start back on the system boards next week. Will start on Kilter and Tension board 2. Graduate in a month to Moonboard? I can almost get a “moon” V3, but it’s really difficult…

25mm 60 seconds, used a band taking roughly 25 pounds off. Stopped cause I got bored. Maybe too comfortable?

The rest of the climbing session went okay. Climbed 4-5 hours today.

According to the app, it says I can do V3 comfortably, that’s about right. V3 on the -40 degree Tension Board is possible.

Beastmaker 2000 centre holds using active gripping with plus 25 pounds for 7 seconds 8 reps by 6 sets. forearms are definitely being worked. Will reduce the reps to use as a warmup.