by Steve Bechtel
Most climbers don't have, and might not need, a really solid plan going into the gym. For many of us, it’s a social time and a time for some fun exercise. Often, if you go consistently for several weeks, you’ll see some improvement. If this is you: prioritizing friends and an occasional great send, this article is not for you. If you’re like me, though, and enjoy the process of building up to really big goals and new levels of strength, you probably need to get organized.
When we think of organization, most of us think it means a detailed year-long training plan. Although this can help, getting your individual training sessions right is the first step. What we are trying to do here is to make sure we optimize the body’s ability to adapt (by warming up), overload the body properly (by making sure we aim at the right target), and then do the right amount of work so that we can effectively come back and do the next session.
Often, when an athlete seeks out coaching, a simple look at the structure of their, say, Monday/Thursday session format is all it takes to see where they are stuck.
They warm up just by climbing.
They climb only on limit problems.
They stick to one training board, often only at one angle.
They boulder well past the “stimulus” point.
The big issues here are that most of us think we don’t need to improve our skills, think training longer is somehow going to make us stronger, and we end up with the need for extended recoveries between sessions.
I already climb V7. Why would I need to do skill work?
Many climbers think that once they get to a certain level, they “know” how to boulder. They developed this ability by just climbing a bunch, so why would they need to go back and learn movement and positioning? Instead of practicing climbing, they start to train to physically be able to handle the demands of their current skills. Imagine a swimmer who is wearing bluejeans that is entirely focused on getting physically more fit rather than trying swim trunks. Or a climber who insists on wearing Crocs on each boulder. Or a runner wearing flip flops.
Every one of us is a candidate for developing better skills, whether they be simple body positioning exercises, learning to better use momentum and timing, or being better at moving on certain hold types and angles.
I’m not saying you need to do heel hook practice for an hour, but you do need to address movements, holds, angles, and positions that give you trouble. All I am asking is 10-20 minutes per session. The simple prescription here is to isolate one skill, do it for ten minutes per training session, and repeat that practice for ten sessions before moving on to a different skill.
Sorting out which skills to address can be daunting, but we generally can find the answer in the things you try to avoid. If you think of yourself as a well-rounded climber, you can do a simple comparison of performances. What grades can you climb on slab, vertical, 45 degrees overhanging, and horizontal? How about comparing crimps, slopers, compression, and pockets? Comp boulders versus board problems versus outside boulders?
It doesn’t take long before you have at least a couple of things in mind.
Why would I want to do supplemental exercises along with my boulder days?
There is a lot of resistance to the idea of weight training for climbing (get it!?). This generally can be traced back to one of two cognition traps:
- A climber got this good by just climbing, so no other training, especially non-climbing training could possibly help.
- A climber thinks of bodybuilders when he imagines using weights, not understanding that bodybuilding is very different than strength training. I equate this to uneducated people thinking of rock climbing and bungee jumping as similar sports.
We do supplemental strength training to prevent injury, build a strong base of training capacity, and to enhance the training process. More and more, I feel like climbers can add a little bit of strength training into a climbing day rather than dedicating a whole separate session to it.
Below are three session formats that include lots of movement, some supplemental strength and power movements, and attention to development of sport skill.
Session 1: Brick-Style Training
In the brick sessions, we do a short block of bouldering training alternated with a set of strength exercises or mobility drills. The goal here is to be efficient with our time and to bolster rest between hard boulder problems. The standard format is to spend about 10-15 minutes per brick and to train for 3 rounds of each.
Warm-Up: Movement Prep - 5 minutes, followed by a boulder ladder starting at 3 grades below your onsight level. Once at OS level, do 3 problems. (e.g. V1, V2, V3, V4, V4, V4)
Skill Set: Spend ten minutes practicing a critical skill. There are dozens of resources available for learning drills that can improve your bouldering, but the main aim is to select a discrete skill, practice it, assess your performance (possibly video), plan your next set of practice, and start the process again. Often, I’ll only do 3-4 problems in ten minutes of practice.
Boulders: 6-8 Medium to Hard boulders.
Strength: 2 exercises, 4 sets each, 5-8 reps per exercise. (e.g. Bulgarian Split Squat + Knees To Elbows)
Boulders: 6-8 Medium to Hard boulders.
Strength: 2 exercises, 4 sets each, 5-8 reps per exercise. (e.g. Power Push-Ups + Inverted Rows)
Boulders: 6-8 Medium to Hard boulders.
Remember that the goal of breaking the work up in this way is to reduce accumulated fatigue rather than to enhance your ability to “go deeper” into it.
Session 2: Integrated Boulder
The Integrated Boulder sessions are similar in structure to the classic integrated strength, except instead of simply hanging from an edge for finger strength, you’ll perform a couple of boulder problems. We also adjust the resistance exercises to more specific movements or loading. The idea here is to keep developing high levels of strength in the weight room, but to get back into the mode of movement.
We use strength-focused boulder problems in these sets. A strength-focused problem is one where difficult holds, hard body positions, or tension are the limiters. Avoid power-oriented, balance, or excessively long problems. Steeper walls with small holds rule here.
This is an excellent time to train specialized resistance. I like the following three forms of exercises:
- Unilateral Strength: Exercises done with one limb or side at a time. These are typically more core-intensive than bilateral exercises and help develop balanced strength. Examples include lunges, single arm push-ups, step-ups, or single arm pulls.
- Isometric Strength: Holding static positions under load. Holding a difficult position is a great way to build strength quickly, but ideally you’d do just one or two isometrics per session. 5-10 seconds holds are a good place to start, and a drive to exert maximum force is key to progress. A standard here is to practice lock-offs, but iso exercises can be done in almost any movement pattern.
- Concentric-Only Strength: In climbing, we are often pulling down hard under load, and then reach up with an unloaded arm to grab the next hold. This is a different load than we apply when doing typical exercises. An example of training this in the gym would be to do a pull-up, but instead of lowering from the top, stepping off onto a box. This is less taxing than a full up-down cycle, but strength gains are similar.
A typical Integrated Boulder group looks like this:
- 2x Strength-Focused Boulder Problems
- Unilateral, Isometric, or Concentric-Only Exercise
- Mobility or Flexibility Drill
The session set-up would look like this:
3 sets of each group, done circuit-style:
A1: 2x Strength-Focused Boulder Problems
A2: Deadlift with Drop, Mid-Thigh Pull, or Single Leg Deadlift, 2-5 reps
A3: Hip Mobility, 60 seconds
B1: 2x Strength-Focused Boulder Problems
B2: Single Arm Push Up, Isometric Bench, or Single Arm Overhead Press, 4-6 reps
B3: Shoulder Mobility, 60 seconds
C1: 2x Strength-Focused Boulder Problems
C2: Pistol Squat, Step-Up, or Squat Hold 4-6 reps
C3: Hip Mobility, 60 seconds
All told, you’d complete 18 boulder problems throughout the session. The climbing and the switching of shoes, not to mention the moving around the gym takes some time. If your sessions are limited to an hour or so, you can shorten these workouts by dropping from 3 sets of each group to two.
Session 3: Skill-Strategy-Strength
This is another session that combines skill focus and hard climbing, but with an emphasis on using our brains, intentionally, in the session.
The warm-up follows a standard sequence of general warming (rowing machine or ski erg are my favorite for 2-4 minutes), then some range of motion and light strength work for another few minutes.
We then do two skill exercises, one that is movement-based on the wall and one that is not. For example, I might do a drill that requires an inside high step (foot is placed within the frame of the shoulders, not out to the side) on easy boulders, followed by a band-resisted high step exercise on the floor. We’d simply alternate between the two for a total of about 20 minutes. With each set of the skill work, we’d then do a brief analysis. “How were my hips in this move?” “Am I pulling enough with my flexors?” We want to note any revelations, and keep focused on nuance.
We then want to actively consider when this skill might be best employed, and potentially try some harder problems where the skill may come into play.
Far too many experienced climbers dismiss skill training, even though it is very responsive to training…unlike many of our pet exercises.
After our brief skill block, I like to move into a strength-focused block such as an Integrated Boulder group:
3 rounds of:
A1: 2x Strength-Focused Boulder Problems
A2: Single Leg Deadlift, 3 reps each side
A3: Box Piriformis Stretch, 30 seconds each side
We then move into bouldering on medium to hard problems (OS-1 to OS+1) for 30-50 minutes.
Implement Slowly
Change is hard. We all generally think we’re doing the right thing most of the time. With this in mind, I suggest you start replacing just one session in your schedule every two weeks with one of the templates above. The improvements will come slowly, but they will come. If you like the formats, go on to do one per week, and eventually two per week. The more we address any specific skill, the sooner it will come around.