UKC

Hi all,

I'm thinking of getting monthly passes to my local wall. Day after day climbing seems to start taking its toll quite quickly at the moment. I think the main problem is that we always climb until failure, meaning I'm still aching the next day. Are there any good tips for daily climbing? Stretching, time limits, not doing/ avoiding certain things etc? Any thoughts or experiences would be greatly received.

Thanks, Dave.

In reply to greycarsdave:

Any tips? Don't climb every day.
You'll get better quicker if you let your body actually recover.

In reply to greycarsdave:
If you do the same thing you will find yourself in a downward spiral of declining performance and be prone to injury. Its OK and even desirable to not be fully recovered between sessions but you cant expect to suddenly be able to climb 7 days a week like the pros but build it up over a few weeks/months. Factor in "active rest" sessions where you do super easy traversing around as a form of recovery day. Focus your sessions on one thing and alternate them each time you go eg start the week with the most intense session (typically bouldering)then the next day maybe a hard route climbing session then the day after volume route climbing. Try to factor in an easy week once a month to allow your body to catch up. Stop strong at the end of bouldering sessions and perhaps till your body adjusts for the route climbing too. Lots of climbing is a great way to improve and sometimes will leave you a bit haggard. The trick is to try and discern the diffrence between training fatigue (good) and the symptoms of injury (tweaks).

In reply to greycarsdave:

Make sure you make efforts to improve recovery: have a nutritous meal right after climbing or drink some protein recovery drinks, and get enough sleep.

Also, make sure to vary your climbing between days. So vary between bouldering / rope climbing, angle and type of grip.

In reply to greycarsdave:

My first tip would be: Don't. Your body needs time to recover and it'd be unbearably tedious.

If you must then: Climb less, quit early, mix up your sessions so some are active rest. Look after your skin and listen to your body, take time off when it's needed to fix injuries. Which brings us back to don't

jk

In reply to greycarsdave:

Look after your skin, and accept that you won't be pulling hard every day.
It you're only bouldering I personally don't think climbing every day is going to seethe greatest improvements, rest days are important.
I climbed every day for 2-3 years and I definitely wasn't at my strongest until I'd had some quality rest days.
Obviously strength isn't everything and your technique/ trad head/ gear placements etc will improve exponentially.
I climbed a fair bit of trad over this time and trad days were counted as rest days.

I wasn't climbing every day to be a better climber though, it was just 'cos I wanted to do loads of climbing

In reply to greycarsdave:

And to all the people that are saying don't.
Just because you're not goin to see the fastest improvements doesn't mean you shouldn't do it.
I mean aren't we climbing because we enjoy it?

In reply to deacondeacon:

I enjoy climbing, and hope to be able to do plenty of it in the future. As such, I feel that not using rest days would not work in my favour in that respect. I have found that 2 days on, 1 day off is an excellent compromise for me, and I can fit in an extra swim on my rest day, or do yoga or some-such.

Maybe it's because I struggle to have days where I just climb easy things, but if I do any more than 3 or 4 days of climbing (well, generally bouldering) in a row, I start to accumulate little nagging pains in my wrists, elbows, shoulders or fingers. I've been laid out by tendonitis before, and I really don't fancy getting it again.

In reply to greycarsdave:

As others have said... a couple of days break between sessions can be good.

Personally when I feel a bit tired after a climb the day before, for example, I stick to slab routes to work on my technique/balance without getting too tired.

In reply to deacondeacon:


Part of why I say don't is that it would very quickly get to be a chore rather than a pleasure.

jk

In reply to jkarran:
Indeed, I'd rather mix up physical stuff than climb every day. Climb two days on a run and I tend not to enjoy the second session because I'm too knackered.

Neil

In reply to greycarsdave:

My main tip for climbing daily is avoid getting a girlfriend!

In reply to jkarran:

Yep different strokes for different folks although I never found it a chore and wish I was in the same position to be honest ( I had to get a job). Also at least half of my climbing was outside so having an easy trad day is much more enjoyable than having an easy wall day.

In reply to shark:


Thanks for the reply, sounds great, and totally within reach. Cheers

In reply to greycarsdave:

Cheers all for the replies, I understand rest is important and I'll factor it in as and when I need it. Dave