Everything climbing, mountains, and the outdoors.
Will Gadd on general fitness and weight training versus climbing specific training: I’m going to get real blunt here: If you want to be a better climber then damn well go climbing. Especially a better rock climber. I would bet any amount of money that if a person spent, say, 20 hours a week training […]
Gregory Thaczuk writes about what it takes to climb 5.12. Sure I went climbing regularly but I wasnâ??t really trying. I took the easy way out. I toproped whenever someone else was willing to lead. I climbed the same routes regularly. If I was leading and my knees where at a bolt I would take […]
I’ve started reading the book One Move Too Many as it was recommended to me by several different climbers. I’ll be posting my full thoughts when I’ve finished the book, but I can already tell you that this is a must have for any climber, especially those dealing with specific injuries. One idea from the […]
Dave MacLeod is writing a series of introductory articles for the Mountaineering Council of Scotlandâ??s magazine and site. You can find the first three parts here and the fourth is due this August. The articles are PDFs and contain some great tips for climbing and training from the Scottish hardman.
I’m always going through a lot of tape for my fingers, but buying it at REI or other retail stores is getting ridiculously expensive. I did manage to find a great deal on Amazon a few days ago, but I was almost skeptical at the low price per roll. My order just showed up and […]
Sean McColl writes about warming up for competitions. He has some good advice that can be adapted to any climbing warm-up routine. My 75 minute warm up starts with 5 minutes of cardio. You can do anything, jump up and down, go for a run, jump rope, anything to get your heart going. For the […]
Gabor Szekely discusses something we all run into at some point: an unexplained slump in climbing performance. Every year, as my climbing schedule is pretty demanding, I go through an annual slump. For those of you that don’t know, a slump is a period of time (for me usually lasting a month or two), when […]
Over the years, I think I’ve read almost every book on training for climbing. Always looking for that missing element to my training plans or that hidden technique I never knew existed. Obviously, there never has been a magic bullet, though many books would have you believe so (although I do recommend Training for Climbing). […]
Here’s a good 8+ minute video showing how Sonnie Trotter trains in the climbing gym with an intense campus and hangboard workout (via TubeGuide).
I’ve been known to have a beer or two after climbing, so it’s encouraging to read that I may not necessarily be hurting my fitness. New research suggests that beer may be a decent source of hydration after a workout. Researchers from Granada University in Spain published results from a recent study that tested the […]