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forcing and measuring progression

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mike1979 20 Dec 2016
The recent post about testing finger strength along with a couple of other things I've read recently have got me thinking about progression in training.

I'll start with the easiest one in my opinion - Fingerboarding. When fingerboarding it's fairly easy to see, and indeed force, progression by increasing weight or decreasing hold size. (I've found the Bäm fingerboard great for slow and incremental reduction of grip size.)

I have come to really enjoy bouldering and I see it as good training for climbing but it's all too easy to potter around completing things that can be climbed in 1 to 8 tries. I'm not convinced that this approach - if practiced for weeks or months on end - really leads to progression. Furthermore grades in the gym are subjective and tend to fluctuate somewhat over time depending on who's setting etc. so it's hard to evaluate whether you're improving or not without testing strength more objectively. I've never really done this to date and intend to start. How do people force and measure progression here? In my gym the boulders are colour coded and the next colour up is a big jump in difficulty. If I can't even do individual moves then I'm out of my depth. This is a shame as one of the biggest jumps in my roped climbed outdoors came following a decision just to try harder routes. Moving everything up a notch so to say. My body just went with it a became used to it.

Another problem I have is progressing at campus boarding. I am fairly pathetic at this and have slowly managed to work my way up to 1-3-5 on the metolius medium campus rungs, but anything harder than this in terms of rung spacing or size feels untouchable!

Of course this is all viewed in terms of the activity rather than the energy system as such, but I have similar difficulties forcing and measuring progression when training different aspects. Largely I suppose because lots of the training I do is on indoor boulders which aren't reliably graded and often reset. Foot on campus boarding to train ancap, or power endurance would be an option here, I suppose - at least to test progression even if not to actually train. (I tend to prefer 'actual' climbing to complete this type of training as a) it's more fun and b) it seems more specific.)

Hope my ramblings makes some sense and any it would be great to hear about other experiences and approaches...

Mike


 LJH 20 Dec 2016
In reply to mike1979:
Just mentioned 1 alternative approach to this elsewhere regards finger strength:
I didn't invent this, gymnasts have done this for many years.

Mark a set of dial read bathroom scales with finger an thumb locations to train and measure pinch grip. You have to hold both sides of the scales and press with both hands. If you mark finger/thumb locations in a few different places its possible to train/monitor open hand strength as well as finger tip pinch strength.

You can target either certain pressures for various times or just go for max reps.
It also helps if you hold you arms straight as it keeps the wrist angle the same which can help or hinder.
 kenr 20 Dec 2016
In reply to mike1979:
> Another problem I have is progressing at campus boarding.

I think that's because most campus boards are simply not designed well for ordinary mortals to do with "progression". Most campus boards are designed formacho show-off; or Euro 8a climbers.

Mainly because the rungs are too far apart for progression. Change the vertical spacing from 22 cm to 11 cm, and all of the sudden it gets progressive.

You might think this requires twice as many rungs, but if you chop each rung horizontally into three or four pieces, then mount each pair of pieces on the same level with some spacing between them (or a different depth/thickness chopped rung piece between them), then you get progression without cost.

There's other ways to re-design a campus board for incremental progression instead of macho show-off.

Ken

P.S. The "progressive" solution for more climbing-specific moves and sequences is to build your own System board.
 1poundSOCKS 20 Dec 2016
In reply to mike1979:

> I have come to really enjoy bouldering and I see it as good training for climbing but it's all too easy to potter around completing things that can be climbed in 1 to 8 tries. I'm not convinced that this approach - if practiced for weeks or months on end - really leads to progression.

Pottering around will rarely help you progress, for any sustained period of time anyway. However doing easier boulders doesn't have to be pottering around.
 UKB Shark 20 Dec 2016
In reply to mike1979:
Fingerboard is a good mechanism to progress insofar as you can incrementally add and subtract small amounts of weight or hold depth (depending on the board) whereas campus progression is less flexible to calibrate to your ability as the gains tend to be step gains rather than incremental ones though a weight off pulley system is possible and alternative exercises to laddering are possible.

Progression can be in terms of intensity, density and volume of work you can perform A balanced approach also requires to train both strength and power as well as energy systems for successive moves and it gets as complicated as you allow it.

Better to work backwards by starting with your goals and the gaps you need to fill in to achieve them. No point devoting training time to becoming an enduro monster if your goal is a specific 5 move boulder problem.
Post edited at 13:48
 zv 20 Dec 2016
In reply to mike1979:

In terms of general progression I have a spreadsheet for each year with my grade pyramid. On it, I record every individual completed route both indoors or out.

I have one for bouldering as well, however on it, I only record outdoors boulders over V4.

It's quite easy to see general progression on these grade pyramids and know exactly how many 7s let's say you've done this year compared to last year and in roughly how many tries or as an O/S etc.


In terms of of fingerboarding ...I've mainly been working on openhanded strength without adding any weight, so I've just been using the middle bottom ring of the Beastmaker 2000 and doing assisted 1 arm hangs with a finger in another pocket steadily decreasing the total number of fingers for the hang.

Campusing - I only use the campus board at the moment for power endurance foot on campusing to failure on a set sequence for a few times, quite easy to measure progression with your PE there by recording your max. time for a difficult sequence.
 stp 23 Dec 2016
In reply to mike1979:

Totally agree with you about bouldering and doing too much relatively easy stuff. I feel the same about the next colour code up at my local wall. It seems desperate and too out of reach. However recently I went bouldering with a friend who's much better than me and I ended up on stuff I wouldn't normally go on. I didn't get up anything but I could definitely see with some work I would be able to do some of the harder problems over a few sessions. I've used this approach in the past and definitely got stronger that way.

So I think you have to force yourself to get on the harder stuff, even if it means not getting up anything for a while. Break the problems down. Can you do all the moves? If not then how far off those moves are you? Can you touch the next hold? Or how far off are you? You have to try those moves repeatedly. And while trying you have to really psyche yourself up to try really hard. There is a mental aspect to trying really hard, just like any high intensity exercise. It also helps if you can see other climbers do those moves, or even better chat to them, so you have a good idea that you using the right technique and you're not missing some subtlety. Once you know what to do you can really concentrate on giving a move maximum effort. Even if you don't do it, think of trying it repeatedly as kind of specific exercise. When you come back a day or so later you'll be slightly stronger at that move. After a few sessions you'll hopefully be able to do it so then you can work on the whole problem. If you do this with several different problems you'll be getting stronger/better at all of them. If you finish the session and you feel worked, maybe some muscle soreness the next day, you know you've had a productive session, even if you didn't get up anything.


I'm no expert on campusing but I'd have thought general exercise principles apply. You need to change what you're doing. Increase the volume, change the exercise, train more days per week, or increase intensity. There are loads of different exercises you can do on a campus board so don't just stick with 1, 3, 5.
 Si dH 23 Dec 2016
In reply to stp:

Spot on re: hard bouldering. The other piece of the jigsaw is sufficient rest between attempts. Even on a short up problem, if it's at my limit, I've learnt that minimum 10 minutes rest is required immediately beforehand if I'm to give it full beans. I might feel fine after 1 minute, but on the problem I won't pull as hard.

I'd add that if you can do all the moves in isolation on a hard problem in your first session (and bycthat i mean 1-2 hours dedicated to that problem) then it's not at your limit.
 Si dH 23 Dec 2016
In reply to mike1979:
Measuring progress at actual bouldering is really hard, all I've been able to do is measure progress anecdotally over the course of a year by what I've been able to climb. However it's not easy and doesn't always work. For example in 2016 I've bouldered a grade harder than 2015, but that was at least partly through improved projecting tactics and spending more time dedicated to specific problems, so I have climbed far fewer problems in 2016 at the next level down, ie my 1-2 session max grade. I'm not sure whether I'm actually stronger now or not. Sorry that isn't much help!
I had one point I thought worth making on your opening post, about foot on campusing. I found it more effective than any actual climbing because it is so 'easy' that you never fall off due to a tricky move, but only when you reach absolute max pump. Even on a well-set circuit board this is hard to achieve. FoC is also really measurable, takes less time and is much friendlier on your skin as long as you have a well made wooden board or rungs.
Post edited at 09:33

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