Post-activation potentiation effect?

[Sander]

Hi guys! It's been a while since I posted here... That's mostly because I've been away from climbing for almost a year for all the wrong reasons, but I've found new motivation (loads of it actually) and I'm training hard again for two months.

Today something interesting happened. I decided to give 'hypergravity' training a careful try and did some easy to moderately hard bouldering during the first half of my training (a total of 25 minutes) with an additional 5 kg. Unsurprisingly, everything felt a bit harder, especially on the moderately hard boulders. I have a habit of tying in to a two meter rope and clipping draws while bouldering on easier boulders (all on my 40 degree home wall) regularly and I also did that today. Clipping in difficult positions proves to be much harder with 5 kg more to carry around

The interesting thing happened when I removed the weight though. I progressed to harder boulder problems (all still part of a long, progressive warm up to a max hang session on the fingerboard) and I cruised boulders that I normally struggle on! It was remarkable how much easier they felt. I did this for about 15 minutes and then started the max hangs. The first hangs (10 minutes?) felt very strong, the remainder of the session quite 'normal'.

I do realize that one session from one guy has a spectacularly low statistical validity, but nevertheless I am wondering: could this be a post-activation potentiation effect? Does any of you have experience with this or something similar? I'll play around with this a bit more to get a better idea whether this was just coincidence or really something predictable, but in the meantime I am very curious about your experiences!

Cheers,
Sander

[MarkAnderson]

Interesting. My initial guess is that you fast-tracked your warmup, meaning you got warm faster than usual, by doing effectively harder problems earlier in the warmup. As a result, you felt more ready-to-crank than usual when you jumped on the harder stuff, so it felt easier. How old are you and how long does it usually take you to get truly warm (to the point your power is at its very best)?

[Sander]

Thanks Mark! Interesting hypothesis. Occam's razor rules in favor of yours

I'm 32 years old. Getting truly warmed up usually takes quite some time. I often use up to 40-45 minutes of progressive bouldering before I hit the fingerboard or the campus board. Even then I don't start at peak strength or power. So during the board sessions it usually builds up a bit first and then starts to diminish.

I used the additional weight during the first half hour of the warmup (followed by the 15 minutes of harder bouldering without).

Would you have a suggestion to distinguish between the faster warm-up and the PAP effect?

[MarkAnderson]

Sounds like you warmup like me—slowly!

I would try doing the same thing after you’re already totally warmed up and see if you have the same experience.

[RobF]

Sounds good- have used a similar effect for years. I would typically do a few deadlifts or partial deadlifts (<30 reps total in sets of 5 --> 3 --> 1) working towards roughly 90-95% max then a few inverted rows or weighted pull-ups then into session. Definitely feel the benefit from pre recruiting the harder to activate fast twitch fibres and with there being so few reps doesn't really take from the rest of the session.

For various reasons am going to be doing more early morning sessions this autumn / winter. Anyone got any good fast track warm up routines? Don't fancy hopping out of bed at 6am into double body weight deadlifts :-)