We have started by looking at things like their diet, body fat levels, current training structure, current climbing grade, strengths and weaknesses, reoccurring injuries and access to training facilities. Using this information we have design a program that will help them achieve their target.

We will come back and review everyone once every two months, looking at their training and if its helping them achieve their chosen targets. At the end of the year, we hope we can all celebrate as we hit our 2012 goals!

Gareth Hanson – Current Grade VS

Gareth on Pork Chop Slab, Almscliffe

Gareth is 40 this September and wants to be in the best shape of his life for his birthday. He indulges in cross country mountain biking, snowboarding, climbing and more recently kite surfing. His focus tends to shift from activity to activity depending largely on the weather conditions. If it’s windy he will kitesurf, if it’s dry he will climb and for everything else MTB seems to fit the bill.

He currently leads VS trad and 6a sport outdoors and particularly enjoys climbing slabs and walls. He has had relatively little leading practice lately so can find it harder to commit to moves above protection.

Gareth’s training is currently a mixture of indoor climbing sessions, weights, cycling and kite surfing, along with occasional trip out climbing. Up to this point his climbing training has had very little structure. He has a history of rotator cuff problems as a result of weight  training and other sport related training in the past.

Gareth is 5 foot 7 and weighs 72kg. His diet is generally healthy and varied.

Climbing Target – E1 Trad and 6c Sport

Gareth’s training at the moment isn’t specific enough to improve his climbing performance. Although weights do have benefits, they don’t target fingers, technique or stamina, which are key for improving his grade.

His diet and weight is healthy and will have little impact on his overall performance at his grade level.

Gareth’s new program has been designed to make him a more confident leader, improve his climbing fitness and overall finger/body strength. The program is as follows:

Monday – rest or bike.

Tuesday – Boulder at the climbing wall. Warm up really well on nice easy stuff. Then look at doing different types of boulder problems on roofs, overhanging/vertical, slabs. This will target the different muscle groups required for climbing and help build his technique on the varying surfaces. Finish with core and specific rotator cuff work.

Wednesday – Rest or bike.

Thursday – Leading at wall. To help him improve his confidence and stamina he will do leading pyramids as follows with a 10 min rest in between each route.

5b, 5c, 6a, 6b, 6b+, 6b, 6a, 5c, 5b

Finish with core and rotator cuff work.

Friday – Rest.

Saturday – Climb outside or climbing specific weights.

Sunday – Climb outside or Power endurance circuits, composing of 5 sets of a 25 move circuit with 6 minute rest inbetween.

Menna Pritchard – Current Grade VS

Menna climbing at the Gower

Menna is a single mum to a toddler.  As the same time she is also studying full-time for a degree in Outdoor Education, as well as working as an Outdoor Instructor and doing
some volunteer PR work for a few companies. As a result getting spare time for climbing training can be difficult.

Menna currently leads VS outdoors and although she does lots of swimming and weight training, she doesn’t do much climbing specific training.

Menna is 26 years old, 5 foot 4 and weights 61kg.

Climbing Target – E1 Trad and improve her overall bouldering ability

Menna is in a similar position to Gareth in that her training should be more specific to climbing. Time pressures will sometimes make it difficult for her to train regularly, so her priority will always be climbing outdoors, where she can gain the best overall improvement in her climbing ability.

Her diet and weight is healthy and will have little impact on his overall performance at his grade level.

Menna’s new program has been designed to improve her climbing fitness and overall finger/body strength. The program is as follows:

Monday – rest, swim, ride or surf.

Tuesday – Boulder at the climbing wall. Warm up really well on nice easy stuff. Then look at doing different types of boulder problems on roofs, overhanging/vertical, slabs. This will target the different muscle groups required for climbing and help build her technique on the varying surfaces. Finish with core.

Wednesday – rest, swim, ride or surf.

Thursday – Leading at wall. To help her improve his confidence and stamina she will do leading pyramids as follows with a 10 min rest in between each route.

5a, 5b, 5b+, 5c, 6a, 5c, 5b+, 5b, 5a

Finish with core.

Friday – rest, swim, ride or surf.

Saturday – Climb outside or climbing specific weights.

Sunday – Climb outside or Power endurance circuits, composing of 5 sets of a 25 move circuit with 6 minute rest inbetween.

Tony Rees – Current Grade E3

Tony on Lucky Strike, Pembroke

Tony is a full time climbing instructor on Gower, which gives him excellent access to both rock and partners. He has a young family, but has a lot of flexibility at home. His other hobbies include the regular trappings of outdoor folk such as paddling, surfing etc.

He has lead up to E3 trad in the past, but has recently been plagued by golfers elbow. This has had a knock effect on his overall climbing strength and fitness, as his training has been limited.

His main climbing strengths are his technique and overall stamina, but feels as though his ability to climb through hard crux sections of routes his main limiting factor.

Tony’s training sessions are generally weights based in an effort to improve his climbing strength. These sessions have directly led to his current elbow problems.

Tony is 32, 5 foot 8 and weights around 11.5 stone. Although his diet is healthy he does confess to eating any chocolate or sweets he can get his hands on.

Climbing Target – E5 Trad

Tony’s first priority is to resolve his elbows issue. Since he got the problem he has stopped any climbing specific training for fear of making them worse. This is a common mistake climbers make when they get injured. He really needs to climb at a lower level that doesn’t affect the elbows to help strengthen the connective tissue and aide healing.

The first part of Tony’s program is based around gentle bouldering, gradually increasing the standard as his elbows get stronger. This is combined with eccentric work specific to the injured tendon, regular icing after training and massage of the finger/elbow flexors.

As Tony moves into the E5 category power to weight become much more important. Any reduction in his weight by cutting out sweets and chocolate would help his progression.

Once his elbows are stronger, Tony will start doing more specific climbing orientated training, targeted towards his weakest area, bouldering strength.

Monday - Rest, cycle etc

Tuesday - Bouldering on a Moon Board and then finish with a power endurance session on a finger board.

Wednesday - Rest, cycle etc.

Thursday - Bouldering on a Moon Board

Friday - Rest, cycle etc.

Saturday - Routes outside or power endurance circuits. 4 sets of 25 move circuit with a 7 min rest.

Sunday - Routes outside or power endurance circuits. 4 sets of 25 move circuit with a 7 min rest.

Rob Lonsdale – Current Grade Font 7c+

Rob climbing Brad Pitt, Stanage

Rob works full time, as an IT Support Technician at an Independent School. He started off trad climbing 10 years ago, and then progressed onto sport routes for a couple of years. He finally decided that bouldering was the way forward, finding this to be by far the most fun and social side of the sport. When he’s not bouldering he mountain bikes in the summer and snowboards or ice climbs in the winter.

Rob has recently bouldered up to 7c+, with his focus predominately on gritstone. His training is purely bouldering based with extensive sessions on the competition problems at his local wall.

He has ruptured a pulley in the left ring finger, requiring surgery to fix. As a result the left hand is significantly weaker as a result. This particularly shows up on a campus board where he can do 1-4-6 static with the right and only do 1-3-5 with the left. He also has had shoulder problems in the past.

Rob is 29, 5 foot 5 and weighs 10 stone. His diet is generally good, although he confesses to having a weakness for crumbles and cooked school lunches!

Climbing Target – Font 8a

Currently Rob’s training is based around competition circuits at the local walls. His climbing style is generally very static and controlled with good locking ability. This suites him very well on his favourite rock type, gritstone.

Robs two main weaknesses are the lack of strength in his left hand/side and a lack of ability to move quickly for holds. As a result left hand specific work and campusing/plyometrics will be introduced into his program.

His body fat percentage has been measured at 14%, which is at the top end for an athlete. Any drops in this area will certainly give him an edge on the hardest boulder problems.

To aide recovery and muscle growth Rob will take a protein shake within 30 minutes of the session end.

Monday – Rest

Tuesday – Boulder and campus board session. This will be a mixture of laddering, touches and double handed work. To strengthen the core Rob will also introduce front lever training into his program. Finish with core and rotator cuff exercises.

Wednesday – Rest

Thursday – Bouldering. Including specific work for the left side, such as long moves off small finger holds, dynamic moves to marginal holds leading with left hand and systems training.

Friday – Rest

Saturday – Bouldering indoors or out

Sunday – Bouldering indoors or out.

Paul Fearn – Current Grade 8a+

Paul on the start to Caviar, Rubicon Wall

Paul works at home for a Chinese mobile phone startup. Although he has a 9 month old, working from home provides him with plenty of flexibility for his climbing. From his roots in trad climbing nearly 25 years ago, he now mainly focuses on sport climbing and bouldering.

His hardest sport route is 8a+, climbed last year. His climbing has been blighted by back and shoulder injuries until recently. Following lots of conditioning work he now feels that this winter will be his first uninterrupted period of training for 15 years.

Traditionally Paul has focused on training his strengths and little time on his weaknesses. As a result he has strong fingers, but poor upper body strength and power endurance.

Paul is 40 years old, 6 foot 2 and weights 73kg

Climbing Target 8b+ sport route

Pauls focus over the winter will be on improving his weak elements. Before Christmas he went through a block of strength training, including bouldering, plyometrics, campus board, bachar ladder, weighted pullups and front levers.

For the next eight weeks he is going to focus on power endurance, with a one week break inbetween for a bouldering trip to Spain. To maintain his current strength he will continue to do one strength session a week.

To try and stay away from injuries he will spend a lot of time working on his core, rotator cuff and lower traps and back flexibility.

At the moment he is the heaviest he has ever been. During the climbing season he will lose 4kg to improve his power to weight. At this level of climbing losing 4kg can help give you the edge needed to reach the next grade.

Pauls training for the two blocks of power endurance is as follows:

Monday - Rest

Tuesday - 25 move 8b+route circuit on his board. Initially he can’t do the circuit and has to do it in three overlapping sections. He will take a 15 second rest between each section and then have a longer 15 min break inbetween. As he gains more power endurance he will be able to eventually complete the circuit and use it for intervals. Finish with four sets of power endurance on a finger board, front levers, core and rotator cuff/lower trap work

Wednesday:  Rest. He finds repeated days of power endurance hard on his forearms, so needs to adopt a one day on one day off approach.

Thursday - Repeat Tuesday, but finish with PE on the campus board.

Friday -Rest

Saturday -  Bouldering on a Moon Board. Campus and plyometrics. Finish with intervals on route length boulder problems (20 moves) around 7c-7c+

Sunday – Rest and then repeat

We are all going to meet up at a climbing wall in 2 months time and check on our progress. We will let you know how it goes!

Follow 5 Climbers: Try and Achieve Their 2012 Targets is a post from: Rock Climbing UK, an online UK climbing magazine, written BY UK climbers FOR UK climbers.

If you liked this post, you might also like:

1. Turbo Charged New Year’s Training Resolutions
2. Steve McClure on Training Power Endurance
3. 12 week progression to insane grip strength – guest post by Paul Wilson

Steve McClure on a power endurance route at Raven Tor. Photo copyright Steve McClure

As part of our training series this week we are going to focus on power endurance. Often overlooked by many climbers, training power endurance, is critical to getting you up most UK sport routes where the hard sections are usually no more than 10 to 30 moves.

Steve McClure needs little introduction to most climbers. Having climbed the UK hardest sport route, Overshadow at Malham Cove 9a+, and onsighted upto 8b+ he can certainly be considered to have excellent power endurance! Steve recently kindly spared me some of his time to do an interview on the training techniques he and others use to enable them to get up some of the hardest power endurance routes in the world.

What techniques do you recommend for training Power Endurance?

As a first stage I would suggest the ‘getting really pumped’ method. The key is monitoring the time period. It needs to be about 90 seconds to 120 seconds, from start to failure. The movement needs to be either the same, or on a circuit with absolutely no change in difficulty. This is the problem with circuits, as often it ends up being too easy and then too hard with a fast build-up of fatigue and failure due to being ‘powered out’ rather than pumped. The campus method has worked very well for me and many others. This must be done with feet on, or it will be too hard and you’ll be bouldering! Feet can be on specific footholds or a chair or whatever. Aim for 3 – 4 reps of this, each taking around 90 – 120 seconds. Rest 5 – 7 minutes in between. The movement should be similar to normal campusing, but with feet on, like rung 1 – rung 4, rung 6 match, then back down again (worth putting in rung 2 on way down to cut out the crux move (dropping 4-1) and so you lead with a different hand each movement)

What happens if you don’t have access to a campus board?

It is possible on the fingerboard, you can do actual hangs with feet off, 7 seconds hang, 5 seconds off. However, it may be better to have assistance from feet on a chair or similar allowing you to use smaller hand holds and stay on the board with both hands on for about 5 seconds, then one off for 3, both back on again for 5, the other hand off for 3 etc. This is more applicable to climbing where you stay ‘on the rock’ rather than stepping down, and the hold size will be more appropriate.

What do you do during the rest part of the interval?

You can throw in some body tension exercises.

How do you help improve your recovery on the rock? Do you do try resting on large holds during the rest period, of the interval, and then going again?

On the board it’s useful to switch to a better hold (if available) and shake out to aid recovery just like on a real route. Typically stop the movement before failure at around 4/5 tired, and shake for 30 seconds (15 each arm) before going back in. Alternatively come off completely at 4/5 tired and rest on the ground for 15 seconds before getting back on.
Rest properly between each set though, where a set may include a few rest periods of 15 seconds on the ground or on a hold. Each ‘Set’ must be quality, starting the work feeling reasonably fresh. Just as if you were trying a route.

Do you vary the grip you are using on the campus or is it done open handed?

On the board I always use open handed, (though this tends to be a half crimp for the middle finger when all 4 pads are on a rung). Crimping repeatedly is prone to injury, especially when going for it really pumped.

How many times a week should you do this training during a power endurance cycle?

This must be done twice a week as a minimum, but 3 times maximum. It can be done after climbing, and in fact is a very good top up, as its relatively low impact and not too power orientated. It can also be done in its own right, though it’s an easy session really, and just doing this 3 times per week will give you more PE but less of everything else.

How should you fit it into your training week?

You can either fit it in after a climbing session or you can do a PE session the day after, to make your climbing volume go up slightly.

How long should you train using this approach?

Aim for a 4-5 week block, backing off if you start to feel too tired. If you make 5 weeks at this intensity you should feel the gains. Take a week off PE completely, then resume for another 4 or so weeks. Then you should be firing! PE will be great! Drop off this exercise to once a week at maximum, to maintain this PE level.

Do you use any other techniques for developing the PE required for the test pieces you are well known for?

Circuits are probably the best overall, but hard to make, and use in busy walls. Bouldering continually below your limit is great, drop off a problem and then within a few seconds (maybe 10) get back on. This can be done for around 5 problems. Make sure the level is correct to avoid failure too early.

Our thanks go to Steve McClure for taking the time to complete this interview. We wish him all the best for his climbing during 2012.

Steve is sponsored by:

Steve McClure on Training Power Endurance is a post from: Rock Climbing UK, an online UK climbing magazine, written BY UK climbers FOR UK climbers.

If you liked this post, you might also like:

1. 12 week progression to insane grip strength – guest post by Paul Wilson
2. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game: Week 5 – strength conditioning and grip (workout 2)
3. Turbo Charged New Year’s Training Resolutions

These objectives can be anything from doing your first E1, increasing your climbing grade from 7a to 7c or doing a specific route.

Using a Scoring System

Climber with a high ranked score for stamina on Ergometria – Sector Wildside Sella. Picture courtesy of Orange House Photos

To help you design a training program a good place to start is to look at your current ability. Try honestly (if you can’t be honest get a friend to do it for you!) giving yourself a score between 1 to 10 (1 being given to your worst attribute and 10 to your best) for each typical climbing characteristics such as finger strength, explosive power, lock off strength, power endurance, stamina, technique, body fat percentage etc. So for example if you find that you are getting pumped fiddling in wires on a E1 or making those clips on a 6a, but can crimp your way up Font 6c boulder problems, then score yourself a 3 for stamina and a 10 for finger strength.

Then consider your objectives/target routes for this year. Let’s look at two approaches. One where you have specific routes in mind and another where you want to improve your grade to a certain level.

Targeting Specific Routes

For the specific routes, what type of climb are they? Are they long Gordale stamina test pieces or crimpy Peak power endurance routes? How do these routes compare with your key strengths and weaknesses? It may be helpful to score the routes with a similar system that we did for ourselves, with a 10 for the dominant route climbing characteristic and a 1 for the least dominant. Let’s try this with a typical Peak District sport climber wanting to peak for a holiday in Spain. The objective for the holiday is to a do 7b+ steep tufa stamina test piece. The scores may be something like the following:

Typical Tufa Pulling in Spain

Clearly we have a mismatch in the key strength attributes. To achieve success on the route, the climber is going to have to include much more stamina training on overhanging rock and include more bouldering/route work using pinches/slopers with long locks. Building these elements into your training program now will maximise the possibility of success on your chosen route.
Remember that the scoring system is specific to the climber or route concerned. So if a fingery 7a is your maximum grade, then you won’t get up a stamina 8a, by focusing on just your weak elements. You will also need to make gains in your strong areas, however these can be done at a lower level than your weak points.

If you have specific information about the route then you are at even more of an advantage. At this time of the year you need to be looking at replicating the types of moves found on the route within your training program. For example if the hard sections of the route are primarily small layaways, then create a systems type model using layaways or boulder problems with layaway holds.
If you have access to your own training board then you can be even more creative and build a replica of the types of moves found on your project.

Targeting a Specific Grade

There are two approaches to improving your climbing grade. The first is to use a balanced training program to improve all your climbing attributes. The second way is to focus your training effort improving specific attributes which will allow you to skip a number of grades.

Creating a Balanced Training Approach

This is the slowest way to improve your climbing grade but does result in a more balanced climber and one who is capable of operating across all the different route types within their grade.
To achieve this it’s important to develop a training program that has a mixture of all the different climbing attributes. The program must be specifically tailored to place strong emphasis on the weak areas. Remember to still train your strong areas, otherwise you will find yourself in a position where you just become good at your previous weak elements!

Focusing on Specific Attributes

Focusing on your strengths – a fingery, power endurance route in France

When looking at your score you may have one or two attributes that are particularly strong. For example you may be one of those lucky people who have naturally strong fingers, but have to put in a lot of work to make gains in stamina.
So why not focus on these strong attributes and select your routes carefully so you play to these strengths. Using this approach it’s certainly possible to jump your grade from 7a to 8a, with a good winters training. However the resulting climber will be fairly specialised in a certain style of climbing and the number of routes they can do at the new grade will be limited. You may well find yourself in a position where on some types of routes, that focus heavily on your weak points, that you still climb at your old grade.
To correct this at some point you will need to spend time focusing on the lower scoring attributes, before you will be comfortable at this new grade.

Over the next few months we will look at different training techniques to help you achieve your climbing goals and show how these can be incorporated into your training programs.

We will also provide our readers with advice on how they can best achieve their climbing objectives. Please post your comments at the bottom of this article and our contributors (including myself) will offer guidance on how you can improve your climbing.

Turbo Charged New Year’s Training Resolutions is a post from: Rock Climbing UK, an online UK climbing magazine, written BY UK climbers FOR UK climbers.

If you liked this post, you might also like:

1. Junior Performance Coaching with Mark ‘Zippy’ Pretty at Alter Rock, Bristol
2. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game: Week 3 – strength conditioning and grip
3. Climbing book review – Training for Climbing by Eric J Horst

Hey guys, my name is Paul Wilson and I am locally known in the West Midlands for my fat loss programmes and fitness systems. In fact in a recent survey from thebest.co.uk I was voted in the top 5 for most loved personal trainers in the UK.

I have also been bouldering now for 4 years and recently I noticed a huge improvement in my climbing after performing forearm-strengthening exercises that has increased the strength in my grip. I started to introduce these exercises into my weight training programme when I found that I was getting a lot of forearm fatigue when climbing.

Anyway enough about me, here are three awesome forearm strengthening exercising that you can do to achieve a stronger grip in an area that often needs some special attention.

Easy enough, now get out and do it. Below I have attached a 12-week progression program for these exercises.

Week 1 to week 4

(in these weeks have a 30-60 second rest in between sets. Take a 60 second rest in between exercises.)

• Towel Wide-Grip Pull ups
  3 sets of 6-10 reps
• Towel Leg Raises
  2 sets of 10-12 repetitions
• Towel Inverted Row
  2 sets 10-12 reps

Week 5 to week 8

(in this week you have no more than 30 seconds rest in between sets. Take 30-60 seconds rest in between exercises)

• Towel wide-Grip Pull up

1^st set -6 reps
2^nd set -1 rep
3^rd set -6 reps
4^th set -1 rep
5^th set -8 reps
6^th set -12 reps

• Towel Leg Raises
  1^st set -15-20 reps
  2^nd set -10-12 reps
• Towel Inverted Row
  1^st set -15-20 reps
  2^nd set -5 reps – with a 3-5 second hold

Weeks 9 to weeks 12

Now we are going to combine a 3-exercise circuit. This one is advanced, hence why you should have completed all previous weeks to reach this point. Perform each exercise back to back with no rest until you have completed all 3.

• Towel Wide-Grip pulls up
  8-10 reps
• Towel Leg Raises
  8-10 reps
• Towel Inverted Row
  8-10 reps

Rest for 30-60 seconds and repeat 5 times.

(Your ability to recover faster is a way to measure your level of fitness. Notice I have given you 30-60 seconds to recover in between sets. Keep on eye on how long it takes you too recover as you progress through the weeks – this will be an indicator of your improvements as the less time it takes you to recover. On weeks 9-12 you will perform all exercises back to back without rest. Good luck!)

Awesome, there you have it a 12 week progression to implement into your workouts that will build insane forearm strength and endurance while also focusing on back and core strength.

If you have any questions, I will answer them below in the comments, and for more of my articles you can take a look at my fat loss blog at www.trainwithwilson.com.

Be incredible,

Paul

12 week progression to insane grip strength – guest post by Paul Wilson is a post from: Rock Climbing UK, an online UK climbing magazine, written BY UK climbers FOR UK climbers.

If you liked this post, you might also like:

1. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game: Week 5 – strength conditioning and grip (workout 2)
2. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game: Week 4 – strength conditioning and grip (workout 1)
3. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game: Week 6 – strength conditioning and grip (workout 3)

I’m currently working on dropping around 5kg, which will have me at my leanest adult weight ever. I’m already 2kg down, with just 3 to go. Some of my friends mentioned they were using iPhone apps to help manage their weight, so I did a search and stumbled across the Livestrong iPhone app, which I have to say, is really rather good!

Livestrong is partnered with the Lance Armstrong Foundation, fighting to improve the lives of people affected by cancer.

The concept

The 'My plate' tab

The idea behind losing weight is a pretty simple one. If you burn more calories than you consume, you will lose weight. This app (and associated web site) provides a handy tool for tracking what you eat and the amount of exercise you do. It takes the data that you input and tells you whether you ate too many calories or had a deficit. It even has a handy progress indicator, which tells you each time you add some more food or exercise data, how many calories you have left for that day. The app is connected to a pretty huge database of exercises  and foods (625,000 according to Livestrong), so it’s pretty easy to record the data.

Price

The app is £1.79, which I think is more than fair. There is a free version, which I confess I didn’t try, so I don’t know which features you lose out on if you opt for that version. If anyone is using the free version, let me know.

Getting set up

The 'Food Search' tab

I registered on the web site, which has a calorie planner. You enter your age, height, current weight, basic life activity levels (without your workouts) and how much weight you would like to lose per week, and the site works our how many calories you should eat per day. You can add the information through the web site or straight into the account tab in the iPhone app.

Features

The app has 5 main tabs:

1. My plate – This is where you get a breakdown of the current day:
   Daily calorie goal
   Calories remaining
   Percentage indicator, showing how many calories you have left that day
Calories consumed
   Calories burned
   Net calories consumed (Calories consumed minus calories burned)
A break down of what you ate for each meal.
2. My weight – You can enter your weight as frequently or infrequently as suits, and the app will show you a nice graph of weight loss / gain.
3. Food – Here’s where you enter what you ate. You search for a type of food, e.g. eggs, and the app will provide a list of possible foods matching your query, and how many calories is in each of them. Once you’ve spotted the appropriate choice, you indicate what time and date you ate it and the app adds it to the calculation.
4. Fitness – This tab is where you enter your exercise. E.g. climbing (which comes up as rock climbing – ascending, 13.6 calories per minute), how long you spent doing that activity, e.g. 60 minutes and when you did it. The app then calculates the rest. You do have to think about what you’re doing here. It’s easy to say “Well I went climbing at 12 noon and climbed until 5pm, that’s 5 hours!” Unless you were climbing a big wall or working a route with someone else belaying the whole time, it isn’t. If you spent the 5 hours single pitch cragging, you might have spent 1.5 hours climbing, and the rest of the time belaying, chatting, drinking tea and shouting encouragement at your mates. I would say it’s pretty important to make this distinction or you’ll end up seriously kidding yourself.
5. Account – Here you can modify your goals and synch with the Livestrong.com web site.

On the web site you can see a detailed breakdown of the food you ate, including:

• Cals
• Fat
• Cholesterol
• Sodium
• Carbs
• Fibre
• Protein
• Sugars

The 'Fitness Search' tab

There’s also recommended levels for each of these, and you can see at a glance how your diet compares to these recommendations.

Will it work?

Good question! You have to be very diligent in entering the data, and it does require some thought. You might enter 2 slices of wholemeal toast for breakfast, you need to remember to record the butter too. The chances of being able to accurately guess how many calories there are in a sweet and sour pork from your local Chinese might be a struggle (the app does have a good go at suggesting options from a whole range of popular restaurant and supermarket chains, but the number of calories in these meals can vary wildly). That said, eating sweet and sour pork from the Chinese is not the ideal choice for losing weight anyway! I imagine that if for the majority of the time you make your own food and record it carefully, you won’t go far wrong. One friend did report losing half a stone in 5 weeks.

Best of luck with reaching your goals.

Product review – The Livestrong ‘Calorie Tracker’ iPhone app is a post from: Rock Climbing UK, an online UK climbing magazine, written BY UK climbers FOR UK climbers.

If you liked this post, you might also like:

1. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game: Week 1 – nutrition and weight management
2. Product review: The Mammut Mountain Safety iPhone app
3. Advertise

FigFour & Safety kit ready for use

The breeze was catching at the leaves and the birds singing softly in the distance as I contemplated the tools in my hands.  I was spending a morning at Rutland Outdoor Centre with Steve Boylan, having a go with the FigFours that Rock Blok, the centre’s outdoor climbing wall, have recently introduced.  “Why don’t we start with a bit of a warm up?” said Steve, pointing me in the direction of the traversing panels set out around a large tree.  With the centre being a popular spot for family activities, the traversing walls include plenty of large juggy holds suitable for new climbers, so we spent a few minutes just moving around, getting ready to get onto the main 8 metre tower.

With safety gear donned, I tied in and balanced the FigFours in my hands.  I’ve been lucky enough to try ice climbing, but never mixed climbing or dry tooling, and so I was a little apprehensive as I looped the stiff rubber strap over a friendly grey jug and started hauling myself up the first route.  The plywood handles are ergonomically shaped to provide numerous ways to grip them, and the rubber loop protruding from each ‘axe’ is flexible enough to mould around the holds as you use the FigFour, but it is still firm enough to remain pointing upwards as you grope around and attempt to loop it onto your next hold.  As a newbie, my choice of hold for the FigFours tended very much towards the jugs, but as Steve demonstrated, with experience and precision, the rubber loop can grip sloping or small holds for a more challenging climb.

Steve Boylan demonstrates two possible grips on the FigFours

You can use whatever footwear you fancy when you try out FigFours at Rutland Outdoor Centre; stiff winter boots are a popular choice, but I decided to keep it simple and stick to rock shoes.  The climbing tower itself is heavily featured, making foot placements straightforward, with one side hosting a chimney.  Steve confessed that he and his colleagues have to spend some of their time dissuading the local bird life from becoming too attached to the chimney and trying to build nests in it!  Gaining confidence as I became more used to the climbing style demanded by the FigFours, I followed an enjoyable route up into the chimney, gradually edging into the restricted space where footwork became more important.  As the holds peeled off into a different direction, I found myself adding a sideways pull to the FigFours, and then before I knew it – pop! I was off, swinging gently on the toprope.

I worked my way around the tower, trying out the routes suggested by Steve while he remained a reassuring and encouraging presence at the base.  Despite choosing climbing shoes, I was surprised by how dependent I became on the FigFours and this, along with gripping the handles too tightly, definitely contributed to how pumped my forearms rapidly became – after 4 or 5 routes, I was ready to put them down! I’m sure that having the FigFours available to practice with more regularly would help me to overcome this and achieve something like better style, as well as providing an enormously useful chance to practice technique before a trip out for real.

Steve starts up the route which becomes the chimney

Having introduced the FigFours during the winter climbing season, the centre hasn’t seen a huge demand for them but as the weather improves and the outdoor wall becomes a more reliable alternative for those looking to train in the dry tooling or mixed climbing disciplines, they should become a popular resource. Having the FigFours available for hire also allows climbers who might be contemplating a first trip using tools to try them out and understand the challenges that this sport entails; so I’d definitely recommend that climbers who might be considering it to take the opportunity and have a go.  If you are an experienced climber, you and a partner can turn up and hire out the kit, but Steve and his team are also willing to instruct anyone who’s climbing alone, or who would like a bit more guidance.  Climbing on an outdoor artificial wall next to Rutland Water is an enjoyable experience in itself, and with the range of other activities on offer, you could make a day of it, or keep non-climbing friends or family entertained too.

If you would like to try FigFours, head over to the Rutland Climbing Centre web site.

FigFour – Training aid for mixed climbing and dry tooling is a post from: Rock Climbing UK, an online UK climbing magazine, written BY UK climbers FOR UK climbers.

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3. Basildon gets a new climbing wall

This is not light bed-time reading, it’s a full on training manual. As such it requires you to take notes, fill out surveys, create spreadsheets to plan training macro-cycles. Prepare to get your hands dirty!

The book doesn’t pull any punches. After nearly 3 years I wouldn’t really consider myself a beginner, but I’m not sure I fit the profile of the accomplished climber either. The weekly schedule for accomplished climbers includes: 4 climbing sessions per week, 2 of which are all-day sessions! It does provide an alternative for weekend only climbers, but that’s essentially climbing all weekend. Bad news for your non-climbing girlfriend/boyfriend then!

The book is divided into the following main chapters:

• An overview of training for climbing
• Self assessment and goal setting
• Mental training
• Training technique and skill
• Theory and methodology of strength training
• General conditioning exercises
• Climbing-specific exercises
• Designing your training program
• Performance nutrition
• Accelerating recovery
• Injury treatment and prevention

Chapter 1 briefly delves into the history of training for climbing then moves onto the demands of the sport followed by some interesting information on genetic potential. There’s a diagram showing a bell curve, one end representing those with below average genetic potential, and the other representing those with superior genetic potential. What the diagram shows is that the majority of people fall somewhere in the middle. Eric goes on to say that most people are ‘normal’ enough to be able to manage a 5.12 or even a 5.13 (that’s anywhere from F7a to F8a+ to you and me) – I would be very happy with that!

Chapter 2 includes a self assessment survey to enable you to ascertain where your climbing weaknesses lie so you can focus on improving in those areas. The results are divided into: mental, technique and tactics, and physical. It then goes into setting short, medium and long term goals.

Chapter 3 is focussed on the Mental training, an area that most non-professional climbers tend to ignore (myself included). The book covers all mental aspects of climbing, including: separating self image from performance, managing risk, controlling stress and pre-climb rituals. Be prepared to go deep, there’s some very useful information which will benefit most climbers. After all, an improvement in your mental game can be the quickest to implement and can have the most profound effect.

Chapter 4 – Training technique and skill – As with the rest of the book, there’s a wealth of information, presented in a very scientific fashion. The information on motor learning and effective skills practice is fascinating. There’s a self-evaluation sheet to help you ascertain where you need to focus your attention. The chapter features an in-depth description of all the main techniques employed in climbing.

Chapter 5 – This section heads into the theory and methodology behind strength training. It is very scientific and provides a deep insight into how muscles adapt to strength training. If you don’t care and you just want some tips, there are yellow boxes scattered throughout with useful summaries of the information (this device is used throughout the book, which is useful as there’s too much to take in through just one read).

Chapter 6 – General conditioning exercises is focussed on training and exercise for general fitness, core strength and flexibility.

Chapter 7 – This is where you can down and dirty with some climbing specific exercises. Perfect for those of you who like to talk about ‘beasting’. Finger boards, hyper-gravity training, HIT, campus boards and finger strength specific exercises are the order of the day.

Chapter 8 – Designing your training program, deals with planning your workouts for the next year of training. The advice is centered on intelligent training where you plan to reach your peak condition on a road trip or a competition. The book provides training programmes for beginners, accomplished climbers and elite climbers. The macro training cycle requires you to draw out a spreadsheet to plan your training cycles for the year. To save you the bother, I’ve done this for you. Scroll down for Excel and PDF versions.

Chapter 9 – Performance nutrition. What use is training if your body isn’t getting the correct fuel? Eric provides an in-depth guide to sports and climbing nutrition along with a what to buy and what not to buy on supplements.

Chapter 10 – Accelerating recovery. To be able to frequently train hard, you need to know how to recover. This section deals with all aspects of recovery from rest to stretching and self massage.

Chapter 11 – Injury treatment and prevention. This section was made for me. Years of using the gym, snowboarding and mountain biking accidents combined with my latest hard training for climbing routine has left me pretty broken already. I found some sterling advice.

I suspect this is the most thorough climbing improvement guide that money can buy. If you’re after something you can skim for a few easy pointers it’s OK, but it’s far more useful if you treat it as a comprehensive training program and dedicate some real time to it. It is a blueprint for becoming a better climber. But like the sport itself, it’s deep and takes a great deal of patience and determination to get the most from it.

Here’s those docs for planning your training programme:

• Climbing-macroscycle pdf
• Climbing-macroscycle Excel

If you would like a copy of this book, head over to The Climbing Book Shop: Training for Climbing by Eric J Hörst

Climbing book review – Training for Climbing by Eric J Horst is a post from: Rock Climbing UK, an online UK climbing magazine, written BY UK climbers FOR UK climbers.

If you liked this post, you might also like:

1. Climbing book review: 9 out of 10 climbers make the same mistakes by Dave Macloed
2. Review of the intro to Craig Watson’s climbing Psychology workshops
3. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game (and mine)

Craig Watson bouldering

As we’re now approaching winter many of us hibernate indoors into the many climbing walls around the country investing time, effort and money in order to maintain and improve our climbing performance. It is a reasonable assumption to say that the majority of climbers focus on their physical performance and less on improving the psychological aspects of their climbing – just have a look at the climbing training literature to see the unequal division between the pages on mental and physical aspects.

Most climbers are aware of the importance the mind has in climbing in both success and failure yet the majority of climbers don’t incorporate mental preparation into their regular training routines. Dave MacLeod’s book ‘9 out of 10 climbers make the same mistakes’ has highlighted some of the key issues about mental preparation and barriers climbers may face which prevent them from improving but this is just the beginning…

The Harrogate Climbing Wall will be introducing me, Craig Watson, Psychological Performance Coach. I’ll be giving a free talk about mind training for climbing on January 4th 2011, 7.00-7.45pm. In the talk I’ll discuss some of the many issues climbers face, which prevent them from improving, some psychological techniques, which can be used to enhance performance and some hints and tips, which may help you to rethink your approach to both training and climbing.

From December to April I’ll also be holding a monthly workshop on various psychological aspects of climbing from fear to goal setting – Please see Harrogate Wall for details.

Mind Coaching for climbing performance at the Harrogate Climbing Wall is a post from: Rock Climbing UK, an online UK climbing magazine, written BY UK climbers FOR UK climbers.

If you liked this post, you might also like:

1. Mind Coaching with RCUK contributor, Craig Watson at Harrogate Wall
2. Climbing book review: 9 out of 10 climbers make the same mistakes by Dave Macloed
3. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game: Week 10 – Improving your mental strength

Belaying

Who would have thought that belaying could lead to back and neck pain?

Belaying, particularly if done one sided, can overload the muscles of the upper back and shoulder of your dominant side. Continuously looking up at your climber also stresses two areas of your neck:

1. The base of your neck as it meets your upper back. This can cause pain that spreads out to both shoulders and makes you feel like you have a coat hanger in your shirt.
2. The upper neck, where it meets your skull. Left untreated for long enough this can cause dull headaches, usually at the back of your head.

Climbing

Many rock climbing routes involve movement and extended periods of time on very small footholds. This causes your calves to take a beating and eventually become knotted up and shortened. This tension can lead to problems elsewhere in the body.

Hard pulls with our arms increases the load to the upper back and shoulders. Pulling on small, crimpy holds causes the muscles of your forearms work overtime. When these become tight enough they may refer pain down your arm into your fingers. Ah the fingers! The tendon attachments here are often sprained from over-stretch or over-contraction.

Preventative techniques

The most effective way for you to keep climbing is to look after yourself.

A small warm up before climbing and a stretching routine after will help.

If you have climbed really hard, conquering that route that had been your nemesis, and feel that you might have overdone it, when you get home, apply an ice pack. Put it over the area that aches for 15 minutes, 3 times a day for 3 days. Don’t leave the pack on longer and think it’ll speed things up, in fact the reverse happens! Remember to wrap the ice pack in something as it’ll burn your skin in this time.

Avoid going too hard too fast. You are most prone to injury when you increase grades or learn a new technique. Build up your strength, stamina and power slowly and you will avoid injury and the need to have take time off climbing to recover.

Try and get aches and pains seen to quickly. The sooner you have them treated, the quicker you’ll be back to 100% fitness. When you ignore or or mask a little niggle with painkillers, your body will cleverly compensate without ever leaving you a memo! Before you know it, that little niggle snowballs into a bigger problem that takes much longer to sort out.

The body responds well to manual therapy. Knots in muscles are worked out with deep tissue massage. Joints can be manipulated to free restrictions, to make sure they function well. Tendons and ligaments, (even the small ones of your fingers), can be worked on to improve healing of ruptured or strained fibres. It’s important, particularly in the case of sprains/strains to control the scar formation of the tendon/ligament. It maintains the elasticity of the structure so that it doesn’t become stiff in years to come.

If you respect your body and listen to the messages it gives you, it will enable you to climb for life.

Dr Jackie Cowie MTech (Chiro)
CHIROPRACTOR

Check out Jackie’s web site: Chiropractor Hull

Is rock climbing giving you back and neck pain? is a post from: Rock Climbing UK, an online UK climbing magazine, written BY UK climbers FOR UK climbers.

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2. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game: Week 3 – strength conditioning and grip
3. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game: Week 6 – strength conditioning and grip (workout 3)

In this truly inspirational climbing book, Dave MacLoed embarks on a step by step mission to destroy every excuse that stands between you and your success as a rock climber (or if you think laterally, between you and success in your job, or any other sport).

The book is broken down into 5 chapters:

1. Creatures of habit

Dave really gets to the bottom of some of the psychological reasons that climbers don’t succeed. If you really take it to heart and examine your own climbing, there’s some pretty tough things to come to terms with here. For me this is the most important section in the book. Climbing is such a psychological sport, if you’re not prepared mentally, you’ll never succeed. I loved the stuff about avoiding getting into the habit of only climbing the type of routes that you can look good on, or being afraid to climb in front of strangers who might be better climbers than you. This stuff is solid gold. I think most people will be able to admit that at some point, they have been affected by the issues in this chapter.

2. The big four: movement technique, finger strength, endurance, body mass

In this section Dave gets into the physical aspects of climbing. What’s really nice is that he has a deep understanding of motivation and external factors that might influence your climbing ability. He really takes into account that everyone has a different level of time and emotional commitment that they can give to the sport.

3. Fear of falling: the real problem, probably…

All climbers (humans) have a fear of falling, it’s hard wired into our DNA to keep us alive. However we all have different levels of fear and ways of dealing with it. There’s some really practical advice on dealing with the fear of falling here, complete with some drills to help you to overcome it.

4. The other big four: attitude, lifestyle, circumstances, tactics

This section smashes a few more of the excuses you might have about improving your climbing – think you’re too old? Forget that! There’s some top quality advice on training to be the best you can be whatever age.

5. What’s next coach? Planning your improvement

Here you’ll find a blueprint for planning your training and recovery. As with the other chapters, it’s real, easy-to-follow, practical advice.

I can hand on heart tell you that the advice contained in this book contributed to my improving my climbing performance by a good couple of grades. Those improvements largely came about from mental and attitude changes rather than some kind of physical regime, so they came pretty quickly.

If you feel like you have hit a bit of a plateau in your rock climbing performance and you want to find a way to push to the next level, I defy you to read this book and not find at least a couple of things which will help you to do it.

I’m proudly stocking it in my new, online climbing books shop. Buy Dave MacLoed – 9 out of 10 climbers make the same mistakes for just £15 – bargain!

Climbing book review: 9 out of 10 climbers make the same mistakes by Dave Macloed is a post from: Rock Climbing UK, an online UK climbing magazine, written BY UK climbers FOR UK climbers.

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1. Climbing techniques – a plan to raise your game: Week 10 – Improving your mental strength
2. Climbing book review: Peak District Climbing (Vertebrate Publishing)
3. Climbing book review: Scrambles & Easy Climbs in Snowdonia (Grey Stone Books)