One of the main points I try to make is that simply doing exercise, whatever it may be, is not the same as training. I can go hard all week, boulder twice, do a couple of CrossFit classes, run hill intervals, and do three sessions of repeaters on a hangboard, and still not be training. Why? Because training requires systematic and progressed overload through a series of sequential sessions.
The most important lesson you can take from this is that there is less magic in motivating for a hard session than there is in committing to a series of sessions that might or might not require high motivation, but that will progress over time.
I've seen both ends of this spectrum. In our gym, I see climbers come in an absolutely crush a ridiculously hard session, but not come back again to do anything like it afterward for weeks. Sessions like this tend to be responded to as a trauma rather than a stimulus for growth by our bodies. Likewise, there's a climber that comes in the gym several days a week and does the same exact workout each time. Same exercises, same order, same load. Almost a zen experience more than a session. And of course there is no progress.
Both can have their place in a person's life, but they aren't hitting a key component of training, and that is what we're looking for when we want to improve. Training involves a series of progressive sessions aimed at creating a relatively permanent change in physical potential. We need to chase the adaptation, not our response to it.
Step One. Start Too Easy.
Build your session calendar and add a couple of exercises that you'd like to improve. These can be lifts in the weight room, stretches, finger hangs, or a type of boulder. Plan on hitting these new exercises twice a week for about 6 weeks. Your first session should be a couple of clicks easier than you could currently do. For example, you might be able to do 5 pull-ups with an additional 20 pounds on your waist. Let's start with just bodyweight for 5 reps. Same on the boulders. You might be able to average 20 problems at V5 after warm-up, so let's back off to average V4. The goal here is to do the exercises well, let the body know some work is coming, and give yourself room to improve.
Step Two. Do The Training.
The first session should feel simple and like you have not done enough. Note how each exercise felt, things that went well, and anything else relevant in the session. Remember, we are only interested in chasing a couple of primary changes, but you can still do other exercises along with them. Just don't get fixated on progressing everything.
Session two will see small increases in your main exercises, and by session 3, you'll probably be working at about the loads where you think you should have started the training cycle. Sessions 4 and 5 will see you pushing harder.
Rest plenty before your focus sets or problems. If chasing higher average grades, your volume of attempts might drop off. If chasing higher numbers, stop when the sets are not clean. You can add additional sets of exercise if you start to hit your limit. This might look like 3 sets of 5 reps for the first few sessions of the cycle, then moving to 4 sets of 4 (more rest, fewer reps, but about the same total volume), and then even 5 sets of 3.
Step Three. Be Flexible.
Sessions 6, 7, and beyond might be really tough. Be willing to take extra rest between sessions, more rest between sets in the session, and even accept that these sessions might be "flat," with little discernible progress from the previous one. This is OK, and will become part of your life as an athlete. The essential part is that you're pushing against the ceiling. You might go up in one lift, get one hard boulder, or the like...but feel flat otherwise.
Eventually, if you get the intensity right almost every exercise you're chasing will go flat for a time. We need to lean into these for a few sessions, then cycle back and hit a new training phase. The plateau is simply an indicator that you’ve started making complex adaptations, not that you’re doing something wrong.
We eventually have to come at any worthwhile adaptation from several angles. We might have to build general grip strength, and back strength, and core strength, and finally bring them all together for a better ability to lock off on a boulder. The key here is that each must be trained, not just done once.
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This is training. It is building a plan to address specific needs, addressing those needs, and then stepping back to see if those needs are still critical limiters or if something else requires our attention.
There is some advice floating around out there about reading books that always agitates me. It’s this: if a book doesn’t seem easy to read or you’re “just not into it,” you should move on. I reject this. I think that there are essential things we need to do to learn or progress that are not easy. That require discipline. That stall out or don’t feel right. And yet knowledge, or strength, or wisdom are on the other side.
Because something is difficult is no reason to bail out. It’s reason to assess our own limiters and make a decision. Do I like where I am, or is what I want on the other side of training?