NEW TOPIC: **Conditioning for Climbing** (Auto-belay comments are banned)

Hey Maverick…someone is selling Metolius rock rings in the for sale forum for cheap.

Other than being very fit, the only way to get better at climbing is by climbing alot.

Otherwise read Mark Twight's body of work. He has a book called "Extreme Alpinism" which is filled with handy tips for the climber that is bitten with the fittness bug.

A must read for everyone is the great Outside magazine article The hell on earth fittness plan. That is an approximation of the title, the article is easily found on Outsideonline.com. I am unable to produce links or funny pictures with words on them. Would that I could.

Oh, I forgot to mention:

The quickest way to make climbing super shitty is to go all ape-crap with the forearm training and finger squeezers and crimping and hut, hut, hut and then all of a sudden comes a crippling case of tendernitis.

I got the tendernitis in both elbows and it blows man. And that shit sticks around like a bad roommate. The only cure is like 4 months of sitting around.

Watch out for over/bad training.

Dirty hippies don't need to train.

Never shake a dirty hippie. ever.

Some good suggestions, I've found this has merit and that is find a route which you have well in hand, say 5.6, 5.8 or whatever,a route you consider having wired, do this route and each time try to improve your movement,i.e. be the most energy efficient you can be, think of flowing or a vertical dance, expand your repertoire of moves to flags, back-steps, heel hooks, notice if climb frontally or are you shifting your hips in relation to the angle. And above all visualization is a powerful tool, be it watching better climbers or spending hours watching the plethora of climbing videos on line. Good Luck.

Reginald McChufferton wrote:[CENSORED]

Climbing can definitely be coutner-intuitive, especially when you're trying to work on fundamentals. Climbing really hard climbs until you can do them sounds good, but won't help you progress very fast, and will probably end up making you more frustrated than anything.

The best thing you can do as a beginner (and really any stage other than the very top level) is to climb what you know you can. The trick is to do it better every time. If the hardest boulder you've done is V3 then get on a V1. Climb it once and note where you struggle. Think how you can make that easier, use a different foot, turn your hips this way or that, change your grip, use different holds, change your sequence, or any other of the miriad of details in every movement. That change may or may not work, but this is trial and error. Repeat this process until you feel that you're climbing it effortlessly.

You can do this at every level of climbing, from the 5.0 to 5.impossible. However, it's very difficult to tax your body physically and mentally simultaneously. If you are struggling to hold on to a hold, you will likely be unable to adjust your hips, change your feet around, and think about how to improve your movement.

Don't frustrate yourself with this strategy (or any other), have fun and mix it up. Just remember that you practice fundamentals at the lower levels. Just like kayaking, I doubt you mastered rolling going through a class V rapid. More than likely it was in still or at least calm water.

Happy climbing.

Here's another suggestion for intermediates and advanced climbers.

To train onsite ability, do onsites. Sounds simple, but very few actually train for onsites.

1. Find an area with a lot of routes in your current grade and 1-2 number grades above (Shelf Road, for example.)

2. If the guidebook index lists routes by grade, it saves you work. If not, compile a list of routes by grade.

3. Start at least 1/2 number grade below your current ability, with the procedure that follows.

4. Climb new routes at your start level, going for the onsite. If you successfully onsite the first 70% of these routes, move to the next letter grade of difficulty.

5. If you fail an onsite, then you have to redpoint 90% (or 100%) of the routes at this grade before moving up. Adjust the numbers according to the reliablility of route concensus and whether there are very many crappy or contrived routes. There has to be a reasonable fudge-factor built in.

6. Continue with the next letter grade up, in the same fashion.

Sounds pretty simple, but doing this goofy exercise works surprisingly well. Onsiting is a game; like any game, how much fun it is often depends on how good you are at it. Getting into this exercise, you'll find yourself studying the rests at least as much if not more than the cruxes, and you'll end up yo-yoing a lot - but getting hard onsites!

Apologies to the OP for taking this slightly off-track, but hope there's some value to intermediate and advanced climbers. : )

One of my friends gave me excellent advice a few years ago when I was "muscling" up routes and not using any technique. He said to place my feet/toes as thoughtfully as I would grasp a hold with my hands. Initially, it takes a bit more time and thought. Eventually, you will develop more body (foot/toe) awareness and begin to place you feet much more accurately. Having better placed your feet, you will move more efficiently up the wall and the other, how to not over use your arms techniques, will become more natural and your will be moving upwards more gracefully.

Rick McL wrote:Who would put a 5.4 route on their "to do list" unless they were really a gumby? She's for real.