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Post by Otis on Jul 22, 2014 10:54:41 GMT -7
Hello Mark and Mike,
Excellent job on the book. I climb low 13 and up to V6-7. In trying to climb past these grades, I am finding more and more tiny crimps that I need to pull on. I can hang from the crimps on your RPTC board (open handed & full crimp, but not half crimp) but I struggle with crimps that small on routes. Any advise for the best way to build up crimp strength and to apply it to climbing in the safetest possible manner? I've dealt with pulley injuries before and want to avoid further injuries if at all possible.
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Post by MarkAnderson on Jul 24, 2014 9:16:44 GMT -7
Otis,
There is a certain amount of technique to using crimps efficiently. Generally I'm speaking of body position and keeping your center of mass close to the wall so your feet and legs can do most of the heavy lifting. Most of the really crimpy climbs I've done have depended primarily on this ability to maximize the weight you can place on your feet. At least relative to my own finger strength, I've never been strong enough to yard up routes on small crimps. I use crimps to keep myself into the wall, but I use my feet to take my weight. I imagine you know this already, but it seems to me that if you have the strength to dead hang the RPTC crimp, you have the strength to use the sort of crimps you will likely encounter at the grades you listed (I could be totally off-base about that--it really depends on the nature of the routes you're climbing). My memory is certainly shaky, but it seems like I didn't encounter crimps of that size on a regular basis until I was trying 5.14s.
Anyway, here is what I would suggest for practicing using your feet to take weight: On a vertical indoor wall, install a bunch of small, rounded jib footholds, and a bunch of non-positive edges for handholds. You can place some vertically-oriented edges (sidepulls or gastons) that are neutral or slightly incut. These handlholds should be bad enough that you can't really pull hard enough on them to propel yourself upward, but just good enough that you can keep yourself into the wall. Practice climbing on this terrain, using your feet to carry your weight, and using your hands to keep yourself into the wall. Practice making many small, ticky-tacky foot movements -- this will allow you to keep your hips into the wall and facilitate a good angle for pulling on your pitiful handholds.
If that all sounds like a bunch of bullshit, another option is to simply improve your crimp strength. To do that I would do the same as for any grip: use the hangboard! The difference is of course, that crimping is inherently dangerous because our fingers really have not evolved to function in a crimp position. Start by removing TONS of weight, and take it slow. If you are patient, eventually you will make enormous gains in your crimp strength, but it will should take some time (years).
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Post by Otis . on Jul 24, 2014 10:45:00 GMT -7
Mark, thanks for the advice. I think I will use a combination of both methods. My guess is that my finger strength in most grips is slightly ahead of my actual climbing ability, but not significantly. I know I have a tendency to let my hips sometimes fall too far away from the wall, so it is something I can definitely work on.
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Post by Todd on Jul 24, 2014 20:13:46 GMT -7
How are you at Campusing? I could be off base, but if you're climbing low end 5.13's and bouldering v6/7, then I'd think you're a bit weaker at bouldering and would likely benefit from power training. This could also explain why you can hang the crimps, but not pull on them. As Mark mentioned, body position weighting the feet and generating movement from the legs matters a huge amount on hard crimpy routes, as well as the contact strength at the end of the movement. These are trained well through bouldering.
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Post by Otis . on Jul 25, 2014 12:21:50 GMT -7
I haven't done much campusing. This fall will be my first periodized training cycle. Before it has just been a mixture of bouldering (PE-full routes), laps (ARC) and 50' single pitch climbing with some hangboarding thrown in for "training". Due to past injuries, I have a tendency to avoid tiny crimps, but am finding it necessary to get better at them.
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Post by Chris W on Jul 26, 2014 18:03:41 GMT -7
I use crimps to keep myself into the wall, but I use my feet to take my weight. What are your elbows doing when you are pulling like this? Are they pointed out (away) from the wall? Good idea, bad idea? |
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Post by MarkAnderson on Jul 27, 2014 14:53:27 GMT -7
I try to keep my elbows as close to the wall as possible. Some moves require outward elbows, like gastons and such.
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Post by Chris W on Jul 27, 2014 16:41:21 GMT -7
Wouldn't that put a lot of stress on your on your forearm extensor muscles (weaker), as opposed to your shoulders and back (stronger)? I've tried pulling each way while grinding through long ARC sessions and my elbows seem to like to move down and out, especially if I'm getting fatigued. I've read before that you should try to keep your elbows in, but it doesn't seem to make much sense to me. What's the reason? BTW, I'm pretty weak at crimping.
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Post by emperorsnewclothes on Jul 28, 2014 12:39:04 GMT -7
The "elbows down and out" or chicken wing is a common tendency as fatigue builds up. This is because your grip strength is actually stronger in this position; however, extensive climbing on crimps while chicken-winging can lead to elbow tendonitis[1,2] In addition, climbing with your elbows down and out limits your ability to pull up. From a biomechanics perspective, you want your elbows pointing primarily down[3]. Now, any grip you are struggling to hold (and thus chicken-winging) is going to be hard to pull up on regardless of elbow position, but I would still recommend trying to climb as "clean" and technically correct as possible. Only perfect practice makes perfect and whatever habits you form while ARC-ing will stay with you on the rock (especially if it's the last thing you do in the day). Steve Bechtel mentioned that your body imprints the patterns from your last couple burns on a project, i.e. it doesn't matter how good the first 5 burns went, you body only remembers how it moved on the last two bad ones[4]. Plus, if you learn to hold it together when you're pumped, that will serve you well(especially if you climb at somewhere like the Red)! Finally, I recall reading once that extensive chicken winging can also lead to/be symptomatic of a muscle imbalance between your inner and outer rotator cuff[?] This is something you want to be careful of because an imbalanced rotator cuff leads to injuries really quickly[5,6]. Hope this helps! -P [1] www.nicros.com/training/articles/treating-lateral-elbow-tendinosis/[2] thomasbondphysio.blogspot.com/2013/02/medial-and-lateral-epicondylitis.html[3] I tried doing pullups with the elbows flaring out. It went poorly. [4] trainingbeta.com/media/tbp-007-steve-bechtel-training-power-endurance-running-weight-loss/?portfolioID=3838[5] www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19773527[6] www.ukclimbing.com/articles/page.php?id=6022 |
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Post by Chris W on Jul 28, 2014 16:23:59 GMT -7
My memory is certainly shaky, but it seems like I didn't encounter crimps of that size on a regular basis until I was trying 5.14s. Does this mean you wouldn't recommend using that crimp until you're ready to send a 5.14?
I experimented again this AM during my ARC workout and it seems I do [mostly] pull down/elbows in. |
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Post by Chris W on Jul 28, 2014 16:24:09 GMT -7
My memory is certainly shaky, but it seems like I didn't encounter crimps of that size on a regular basis until I was trying 5.14s. Does this mean you wouldn't recommend using that crimp until you're ready to send a 5.14?
I experimented again this AM during my ARC workout and it seems I do [mostly] pull down/elbows in. |
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Post by MarkAnderson on Jul 29, 2014 9:58:14 GMT -7
My memory is certainly shaky, but it seems like I didn't encounter crimps of that size on a regular basis until I was trying 5.14s. Does this mean you wouldn't recommend using that crimp until you're ready to send a 5.14? I wouldn't go that far, but it is a fact that I didn't start training closed crimps until after I had already climbed 5.14. In the past I used to be more reluctant to recommend crimp training, but over the years I've heard from a lot of climbers who have benefited from doing it "earlier" in their careers. However, based on my experience, I know its absolutely possible to reach the 5.14 level without training closed crimps on a hangboard. I would say anyone who has not been training systematically for many years should be VERY careful training closed crimps. You need to be really good at listening to your body, and that takes experience. Be very conservative in terms of resistance for your first several YEARS of training this grip. |
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