ARC during Power phase

[coachseiji]

First off to the Andersons, awesome job on the book, best of its kind as far as I am concerned. I know Udo lead the way but this is a way, way sharper tool so kudos to you guys. I am a trainer to professional athletes in other sports but my true love is climbing and as part of my job, I was asked to write a book on training in a specific sport and man, it is a massive undertaking and is a labor of love for sure so I am really impressed and cannot thank you guys enough. I would consider your book mandatory for anyone climbing with performance goals in mind.

I have a specific question on ARC during Power phase. I understand your reasoning behind concentrating your available time and energy stores on just executing power training exclusively during this period but borrowing from training theories in other sports, what is your specific reason for omitting ARC training during this phase? I do understand when you say power and endurance development are at opposite ends of the scale and that it's a give and take there but just wondering your logic or thoughts on losing the lactate shuttle systems that were developed during prior phases and are key in the power endurance phase. I am not a rock climbing trainer at all (that was my first dream/job after graduating college but soon realized I would always be living in my truck) so not at all arguing your expertise, just wanting to know for almost professional reasons. All this depends of course on whether or not you even subscribe to the lactate shuttle thoery.

Thanks and again, great job on the book and wishing you guys all the success with it and this site!

-Coach Seiji

[MarkAnderson]

Coach,
Thanks for the flattering compliments!

To answer your question, I would NOT advocate completely abandoning ARC training during the Power Phase. I begin each workout through the Strength and Power Phases with a 15 minute warmup that is essentially an ARC set from a physiological perspective. We may have created some confusion in the text by being vague. I don't have the book with me and I don't recall what terminology we settled on, but at one point we described the warmup activity as "ARCing", but I think we went away from that because we thought it would be confusing to some (oh the irony).

It's certainly debatable whether a 15 minute set is sufficient to maintain fitness over the several weeks it takes to get from the end of the BF phase to the PE Phase. It seems to work well for me though, and ultimately we've tried to base these ideas on what we've actually done, and what's actually worked. Is there any clinical data pertaining to maintenance or longevity of lactate shuttle capability?

In my experience it helps to start with a solid base fitness level, and I suspect there is some manner of Reminiscence Effect or Muscle Memory that facilitates a rapid return of fitness once you begin PE training. Of course, it always comes back to your goals, and I'd enduro climbing is your main pursuit it would be wise to place somewhat more emphasis on ARC training at all points in your cycle.

[Chris W]

Mark,

1) When you're doing your ARC warmup, are you on your vertical wall or your past vertical (overhang) wall?
2) Would a 15-20 minute ARC session on a rest day have the same benefit throughout the strength and power phases?

I finished my summer season two weeks ago, which served as my intro to Rock Prodigy training season. I skipped the ARC warmups during the strength phase and definitely noticed a difference when I tried to hit the wall for the power phase. I was shocked, however, at how quickly things came back when I worked on power endurance.

Reviewing my notes (first time I kept a training log), I may try to keep some type of ARC in during the strength phase, but I may do it on a rest day.

[MarkAnderson]

Chris,
1) All of the above.
2) During the Strength Phase you're hardly climbing at all, so the ARC warmup and ARCing on rest days helps maintain your skill level and "feel" for the rock. It also likely has some physiological benefit. During the Power Phase you will be climbing regularly (albeit mostly on plastic), so in a sense you won't get the skill maintenance benefit (because you're getting that already through bouldering, etc, although ARCing and bouldering often call on different skills, perhaps different enough that it's worth doing both for the sake of skill maintenance). That said, whatever physiological benefit there is to ARC maintenance would likely exist in both phases. But it's also possible that too much ARCing during the Power Phase will undermine your power training.

[coachseiji]

In the past, I haven't heard of this specific circumstance in the literature but when I have time I will look for sure. I do remember that things like increased blood pressure, a certain concentration of H+ ions, etc that will occur in power/PE training actually damages and destroys the capillary walls (only one cell layer thick) so you have to at least do maintenance to rebuild what you break down or you can diminish the lactate shuttle. Again, I will look when I have some time but athletes with a lot of experience and body awareness almost always find things out before the scientists so I would assume that what you have experienced is correct, that it takes very little ARCing to maintain what you have built up during base training. My experience and studies would say that this is, like you said, is specific to your event. Cyclists still have to do the equivalent of ARCing during later phases in durations that mimic their race duration so a similar thing here, but they also do it pretty frequently, much more so than say P/PE workouts. My gut tells me that if you do ARCing as warm up/cool down of duration that mimics routes (so 10 min is plenty usually) but do multiple reps (one warm up, one cool down possibly) that this may maintain the benefits. Experience will tell in the end. Thanks again!

[Chris W]

Coach, please let us know what you find when you look this up. Do you know what kind of swing in pH you're looking at? Systemically, the body should buffer any change in pH to prevent damage, but I don't know about local (capillary bed) pH changes in the short term. Also, would you expect any damage in capillary beds acquired through this process to be recognized by the body and repaired? I need to find my old physiology text (I'm a Guyton and Hall fan).

[coachseiji]

Still researching but just randomly read a study from Denmark, 2004, that showed in quadriceps muscle undergoing 4 weeks of high intensity exercise ONLY (90% and 150% of VO2max, so very high)showed increased capillary density. So, maybe, at least this adaptation, isn't mutually exclusive in terms of endurance vs. power training. I read these things a lot for work so I will keep prying on the ARC during Power phase question.

[coachseiji]

Ha, well OK, just randomly read another study, 2012, Denmark again, stating in same muscle groups that 4 weeks intense exercise following a training protocol of moderate intensity reduced the growth factors that trigger capillarization...didn't state any loss of capillary density, just the concomitant reduction of capillary growth factors along with the increase in growth factors for anaerobic mechanisms...the search continues.