Eric Horst's Climbing and Training Blog
As a climber, have you ever wished you were a little taller so you could
make a big reach, or a little more flexible for a high step? Have you
ever resorted to picking up your foot and placing it where you wanted it
to go because you didn't have the flexibility to get there in the first
place? By adding Pilates to your cross-training, you'll find that
monster stems, killer high steps, and sketchy
In the last few articles you’ve learned how performance operates
from the inside-out. Your beliefs, focus, fears, confidence, motivation,
and for that matter every thought that crosses your mind, form the
foundation from which you will either succeed or fail on a climb.
Therefore, succeeding on a project or advancing to the next grade level
is often more a matter of the mind, than it is the body.
If you are reading this blog, then you are likely as passionate about
climbing as I am. Still, it's not unusual to occasionally experience a
drop-off in motivation, despite your love of climbing—do any
activity on a regular basis for a long enough time and you will
eventually experience periods of low motivation. Often times, such a
lapse is simply the result of mental or physical fatigue,
If you are like me and many other climbers, you are mildly obsessed (or
worse!) with climbing, and you mind and fingertips are never far from
the rock. However, over the course of a year, accumulating physical and
mental fatigue grows to a point that you can no longer recover fully
just by taking a couple of days off. This is true for serious athletes
in every sport, which is why all professional
Wolfgang Gullich, the first person to climb 5.14d, often remarked that
the brain was the most important muscle for climbing. Unfortunately,
many climbers overlook mental training since exercises are less tangible
than, say, doing campus training for power or lapping routes for
endurance. What’s more, thought control is hard work and takes a
long term effort and lots of self-discipline. Surely it’
When working on a route near your limit--often called projecting--you
will sometimes hit a crux sequence that seems beyond your ability.
Suppose there's a blatant lack of good holds, the sequence is uncertain,
and that voice inside yourself is screaming to "back off!"
What will you do in this frustrating situation? Fish or cut bait-or, in
a climbers' lingo, climb on or take dirt? Hopefully
Climbing near your limit can be stressful. Desperate moves, risk of
falling, and the uncertainty of what’s next can foster
unproductive thoughts and physical tension that snowballs at a rapid
rate. Left unchecked, such rising tension will cause you to pump out and
fall. While every climber has this experience, it should become less
frequent as you improve. Increasing confidence and experience
The "dangling arm" shakeout is commonly used to facilitate
forearm recovery while on a climb. A few seconds or, hopefully, a few
minutes of "shaking out" provides some recovery, but often not
enough. The effects of a muscular pump can take frustratingly long to
subside and, when hanging out at a marginal rest, it's possible to
expend as much energy hanging on with the one arm as is being recouped
Want to recovery faster between boulder problems and routes? If so, then
"keep moving." That's the beta from several climbing
researchers who have studied different recovery strategies. In my book
Training for Climbing I explained the advantages of engaging in active
recovery between climbs compared with the common practice of sitting
down and resting passively. The effectiveness of active
Complex training is a cutting edge training method used by elite
athletes in many other sports, including most power-oriented Olympic
events. Applied to climbing, the complex training protocol described
below is one of the most advanced strength-training concepts available.
Since introducing Complex Training to climbers in 2002 (in my book
Training for Climbing), I have heard back from hundreds
If you've ever hiked with a heavy pack or carried someone on your back,
you've experienced the negative effects of increased weight on physical
performance. Conversely, a reduction in percent body fat or excessive
nonfunctional muscle mass can have a positive effect on performance,
especially in a sport such as climbing where a high strength-to-weight
ratio is fundamental. The optimal body fat
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