More evidence supports finger strength priority

[tedwelser]

I saw this study mentioned on FB recently.   It is cool to see a study like this and the findings support that rock prodigy program and emphasis.


The basic protocol was to establish a test route with relatively consistent difficulty of moves, and then compare within case variation of a control ascent vrs a pre-fatigued ascent of the same route.  Across the study group, prefatigue of finger flexors cut the # of moves before failure in half, elbow flexor fatigue resulted in 75% of control moves before failure, while shoulders and core both reduced moves completed to about 90% of control moves.

A pdf of the paper can be downloaded from Timmy Fairfield's page.  

[joshvillen]

I can't believe elbow flexion is the second most important over shoulder abduction. Time to start taking chin ups and preacher curls more seriously

[jessebruni]

I would think the angle of the route would affect elbow flexion vs shoulder abduction a lot. In this case it says it was a 40 degree overhanging 5.11b. Certainly seems with such a steep route elbow flexor fatigue would be more likely to cause failure than shoulders. I bet this would change a lot on a more vertical route.

[tedwelser]

The authors were surprised by the seemingly modest effect of shoulder pre-fatigue.  They raise some possible explanations which could be tested in future studies, including altering the difficulty of the test route (was 11b), changing the nature of pre-fatigue exercise to be more specific to climbing, and something else that I forget.  lol.   

I wonder if the footholds were made to be relatively worse for the same grade if the shoulders would play a more central role.  I find that if the feet are good I can drive my movement with less need to stabilize and leverage through the shoulders.   But that on hard routes with less helpful feet my shoulders are working a lot more.

[MarkAnderson]

Cool study!

I don't want to come off as dismissive, because I understand in the research community this sort of study is necessary to laying the groundwork for future studies, but I long for the days, in the far distant future, when all the obvious stuff has already been proven so the few scientists interested in climbing can get to the questions we don't already know the answers to