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Post by joev9 on Sept 25, 2014 10:59:25 GMT -7
I am a boulderer, mostly by necessity as I have great bouldering close to home and roped climbing is far (have kids and a job and all). I have always tried to get down to 143 or 144 for peak sending season (I'm 5'10") from a typical weight of 146 to 148 (150 if I go on a craft beer kick). I'm finishing up my first Rock Prodigy HB phase (did a half-assed self-designed HB phase back in May) and am starting to question whether those 3 to 5 lbs are going to matter much for my bouldering projects. In 10 HB sessions, I have added 340 total pounds to my hangs (over 8 grips, 2 hangs per grip). Average second set grip increase has been +26 lbs with a max of +40 lbs on the three finger pocket). If I can add that much weight over 27 days, will 3 to 5 lbs matter at all??? Seems like 2 sessions on a project would overcome those few lbs... |
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Post by Jack Ziegler on Sept 25, 2014 11:48:09 GMT -7
Yeah, I've been wondering the same. How does one determine the optimal sending weight? From the book, it seems that you should go as low as you can without seeing a performance loss, and if you get down to essential body fat percentages you should only stay there during your performance phase. I'm 5'8.5" and 150, trying to get to 145 which for me will involve losing some muscle mass. I figure I'll feel weaker at first but in the long run maybe it's better to have zero bulk? It seems that a small amount of weight loss will only help now (which is important when are trying to send) but getting stronger will be forever.
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Post by ehowell on Sept 27, 2014 13:12:53 GMT -7
To me (not an expert!), the issue of weight management seems more relevant to redpoint climbing on a rope. Maybe I'm generalizing, but I think someone who's dedicated to bouldering will want to embrace a higher muscle mass for max power and strength, and therefore a few extra pounds. If you're only doing 8-12 moves (vs 40 or more for an endurance roped route), I don't think the few pounds will matter much. Mike or Mark might come in here and shut me down on that though!
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Post by tedwelser on Sept 30, 2014 22:38:36 GMT -7
I am 6ft 170 and have pretty much decided that I am going to focus more on building strength in the short term and keeping my weight constant. I figure another season or two with my current weight will only aid my training, and my sending goals are moving along fine. I see my photos from my 20's and my legs were super skinny, which certainly made it easier, but I am not yet able to give up soccer for maximum performance. I figure I should be able to get up to 13b without loosing much weight and that is fine for me now.
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Post by RyanJohnson on Oct 1, 2014 14:09:40 GMT -7
When you're getting very close to doing a project and you've hit the wall, it's hard to decided which way to go. Do you try and get stronger or shed a few pounds? I generally prefer to take the long term solution and get stronger. but getting stronger takes time and often means that I'll have to live with all the one-hangs and near sends until the next season. There have been times in the past where dropping only 3-5 pounds has produced a noticeable spike in my power while bouldering or my endurance/recovery while sport climbing.
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Post by MarkAnderson on Oct 9, 2014 12:19:01 GMT -7
I think 3 lbs probably doesn't make a perceptible difference, but ten pounds makes a huge, tangible difference. The problem is that ten pounds is pretty much just 3 pounds three times. It can be a slippery slope where you start saying, "oh, one or two pounds won't make a difference, I'll have another croissant". Then after a few weeks of this mentality you're suddenly 10 pounds heavier. So, if you truly are only 3-5 pounds from your ideal performance weight, it's probably not going to be the determining factor. But if you let it keep slipping away, it can become limiting. My preferred approach is to focus on gaining strength, and then only diet seriously when I'm really at my limit and the goal is really important. Unfortunately I seem to think I'm in that situation every season  Aggressive dieting has the potential to suck all the fun out of climbing, so I think it's best to use it sparingly. However, it's pretty easy to maintain a healthy, lean body composition by simply making good eating choices and limiting non-essential calories like sweets and alcohol (as opposed to completely eliminating them). Any performance-oriented climber can and should do that, but you don't need to have veins in your teeth 365 days a year. As for the importance of weight management for different disciplines, I think that wall steepness matters much more than route length. I notice a huge difference in bouldering and PE route climbing on anything that overhangs more than 10 degrees or so. I have boulder problems on my 33 deg wall that I can't even touch unless I'm 145 or less. Closer to vertical, where my feet can take the (extra) weight, it seems to make less of a difference. |
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Post by joev9 on Oct 10, 2014 12:18:58 GMT -7
Thanks Mark, I do know what you mean about weight control getting out of hand with that kind of thinking. I'm working my weight down a bit, but not going crazy at the moment. Once I get into project mode, I might go nuts for a week or two and see where that gets me.
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Post by Charlie S on Oct 13, 2014 7:54:02 GMT -7
My preferred approach is to focus on gaining strength, and then only diet seriously when I'm really at my limit and the goal is really important. Unfortunately I seem to think I'm in that situation every season Aggressive dieting has the potential to suck all the fun out of climbing, so I think it's best to use it sparingly. However, it's pretty easy to maintain a healthy, lean body composition by simply making good eating choices and limiting non-essential calories like sweets and alcohol (as opposed to completely eliminating them). Any performance-oriented climber can and should do that, but you don't need to have veins in your teeth 365 days a year. Thanks for this explanation. I'm 6ft, 165 lbs. I attempted to go down, briefly touched 157, and had absolutely no energy to do anything. Perhaps a longer-term loss would be easier for the body to take? |
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Post by kerwinl on Oct 13, 2014 15:30:07 GMT -7
One other thing to keep in mind in mind is that climbing is a very dynamic sport. Increases in static strength (although large) often times dont transfer directly to dynamic ability while climbing. A linear increase in weight, should only result in a linear increase in force required to hang on to a given hold, but it often does not feel that way.
Personally for me 5lbs is a huge difference bouldering, but not so much trad climbing.
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Post by jessebruni on Nov 13, 2014 11:39:49 GMT -7
Just my two cents. I think it's pretty important for people to be honest with themselves about how much of their weight is useless body fat and how much is not. Personally, I almost never see someone cranking 13's with any useless body fat, they are typically lean and quite muscular. On the flipside though I see plenty of people climbing 12+ or lower with plenty of useless fat which they could lose. I do think there gets to be a cutoff point where if you're climbing this hard you're probably already pretty lean and from what I've seen that point is typically V8/9 and 13b/c.
So in my opinion the need for serious weight loss is greater at the lower grades, where people are much less conditioned athletes and much more likely to be climbing with useless weight (sometimes it's muscle, not just fat). A great example of this is to look at Dan Brayak's blog where you can see examples of him climbing 12d and 13a at almost 200 pounds. Compare that with where he's at now, pushing into the low 150's and high 140's and he's easily onsighting those grades. Most people climbing 12d probably don't have 50 pounds of non-climbing specific weight to drop, but in my experience there are plenty of people climbing at that level that have 10-20 pounds of non-climbing specific weight they could drop, and that really would make a huge difference. So yeah, the higher in grades you go the more important it will be to lose useless weight to continue improving, but also the less likely you are to have any useless weight to lose in the first place. For me 15 pounds of useless fat was the difference between sending V6 in a day or two and flashing V6. The difference between yearlong projecting 13a and sending 13a in 2 days.
Having said all this, if you happen to be one of those few people that has 10 pounds of fat on your gut just hanging there, and are sending 13's or 14's you'll probably see a greater improvement in a shorter amount of time by dropping that weight off than you would with just about anything else.
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Aggressive dieting has the potential to suck all the fun out of climbing, so I think it's best to use it sparingly. However, it's pretty easy to maintain a healthy, lean body composition by simply making good eating choices and limiting non-essential calories like sweets and alcohol (as opposed to completely eliminating them). Any performance-oriented climber can and should do that, but you don't need to have veins in your teeth 365 days a year.
