Posts
The Hierarchy of Training Programming
Tags: General Training, Indoor Climbing, Planning, Program Design, Tactics, Templates
by Steve Bechtel LEVEL 1: Anything Goes I remember working out out in the huge weight room in the basement of my high school. It was dimly lit, had a track around the outside, pegboards on the wall, and dozens of machines designed to help make us “better.” We’d go down there for “weight training”…
Concentrated Loading
Tags: Advanced Training, Bouldering Training, Concentrated Loading, General Training, Planning, Program Design, Tactics
by Steve Bechtel It doesn’t really matter what I write. It seems that within two hours of putting an article up, I get a “yeah, but…” email explaining how whatever I wrote just won’t work in x program and could I please explain how one might do y… Clearly, most of us have all the…
Advanced Strategies for Progress: Volume Variability
Tags: Bouldering Training, General Training, Indoor Climbing, Planning, Program Design, Recovery Weeks, Tactics, Volume Variability
by Steve Bechtel All you have to do is read the title to know that this isn’t one of those lovely “simplify it” articles. It’s no secret that I’m a fan of simple plans – yet sometimes, at the very tippy top of your ability, things need to get complicated when you try to move…
Brick Programming
Tags: Density Training, General Training, Periodization, Planning, Power Endurance, Program Design, Tactics
By Steve Bechtel Going bouldering is not training. If you’re one of the lucky few, you can hit the gym a couple of nights a week and continue to get strong, avoid injury, and enjoy the sport. Most of us, though, will reach a plateau where progress is no longer possible on the “whatever” plan,…
Get Out of Your Rut
Tags: Change, Habits, Quality Training, Supercompensation
By Steve Bechtel Do you remember back when you used to get better at climbing? Month after month you could climb harder routes, you could feel yourself get better at jamming, at lock-offs, at edging, and it felt like the sky was the limit. Now you know that the limit is right about 12a, and…
Direction
Tags: Planning, Principles, Quality Training, Training
By Steve Bechtel Once the fever to train sets in, awareness of one’s body becomes paramount. Buying into the excitement and perhaps difficulty of this or that training fad, an athlete can actually change direction and drift further from his goal by training harder. Unfortunately, in the world of difficult climbing, simply working hard does…
Pre-Climb Rituals
Tags: Planning, Rituals, Stretching, Training, Warm-Ups
By Steve Bechtel I like to go to competitions. I like them for many different reasons, but mostly it is to watch people as they prepare to compete. See, the vast majority of pre-event activity is nothing like the way we prepare for training. At bouldering competitions, we see all kinds of craziness, and pre-climb…
Progress
Tags: Cragging, Planning, Programming, Redpoint Pyramids, Training
By Steve Bechtel It happens every year at a hundred different climbing areas. There is a glimmer of talent, a hint of drive, and a motivated climber is born. He cruises up through the grades, doing several 5.10 and 5.11 routes with his friends, he makes progress, and then he starts to pull ahead. Finally,…
E-Stim Might Make You Weaker
Tags: E-Stim, Endurance, Recovery, Training
By Steve Bechtel I am as excited about the next big thing in training as the next guy. When Electronic Muscle Stimulation (E-Stim) came on the scene, I could almost feel my forearms getting stronger just thinking about it. It was a great idea for climbers; a way to train the forearm muscles when you…
Change
Tags: Change, Habits, Planning, Quality Training
by Steve Bechtel This site is filled with our best training ideas and advice. There are dozens of books on systems for improving your climbing. You could watch quality training videos online for a whole day and get ten lifetimes worth of good advice. So why do so few climbers reach their goals each year?…
How Hard Do You Try?
Tags: Habits, Intensity, Motivation, Pain, Planning, Quality Training, Training
By Steve Bechtel Why is it that some people just keep getting better while the rest of us are stuck? Further, why can I follow the same program as another climber and watch him rack up the grades while I still fail at the same level year after year? As hard as it is to…
The 1-6-3 Rule
Tags: Habits, Intensity, Motivation, Pain, Planning, Quality Training, Training
By Steve Bechtel Training can be fun. It can also be a huge effort. Usually, it’s somewhere in between. One big mistake first-time trainees make is thinking that it’s going to be fun the whole time. Think about it…remember how exciting the first day of school was? That first kiss? The day you bought a…