UKC

So I'm thinking of finally trying to shed a bit of weight,  I weigh 72-73 kg and I'm 177cm, I'm definitely not skinny and I have a slight belly, I look pudgier than most other regular climbers.  I'm a very active person but i eat lots of cake and chocolate.  This is largely hypothetical because I'm not actually going to sacrifice too much in order to loose the weight, but, my question is how do other people gauge when they are at there optimal climbing weight? If i went on a diet how would I know when I've lost the right amount of weight,, 2kg, 3kg, 5kg 7 kg? I suppose the answer will come down to feelings and knowing your body but does anyone have any other opinions?

My opinion: you're in a healthy weight range and that's highly unlikely to be what's limiting your climbing.

Eat less cake & chocolate, but rather than replacing them with nothing and struggling with cravings & guilt, replace them with something with more nutritional value.

Strength to weight is important, so climb more and build up some more muscles and don't worry about the number on the scales.  Muscle weighs more than fat.  

Don't worry about the weight, but start swapping naughty for nice food-wise. So instead of a chocolate bar have an apple, jacket spud instead of chips, that sort of thing. If you already active you'll soon shed some weft

Depends what is holding you back currently. If it's poor technique then being lighter won't help.

If you're struggling with power endurance then being lighter will make a huge difference.

I know this. I'm about your height.  climbed hardest at 10st 7.

At 10st 3 i was under powered (and actually injured myself and had to have some surgery). Current 12st but will be 11 6 by end of next month.

Weight loss is pretty well a simple calories in calories out equation. 

Unfortunately cake and chocolate have a high nutritional value. But you knew that.

Would ultimately go with this. Ultimately, in climbing, so much seems to come down to supportive partners, feeling good about yourself and feeling light on the day.

Mick

Weight is a poor indicator.  If you put on muscle and lose fat you might actually put on weight.

I lost about 5kg over the summer (75kg down to 70kg) due to lots of hiking and no climbing.  When I got back my climbing was much worse than previously.  This was obviously partly due to the lack of climbing but I also felt that the weight loss had affected my power and climbing overall.  Now I have put some weight back on I am climbing much better again.

I think this is pretty common in lots of sports where people lose weight and actually lose performance as a result.

Anecdotally I also see plenty of really good climbers who are clearly fit but are not super lean and I see super lean climbers who are not necessarily technically that good.

So, no harm in experimenting with losing a bit of weight but don't over do it and monitor how it is affecting your climbing.  Also focus on technique that will probably give more gains.

Finally, life is too short to give up cakes and chocolate.  Eat a balanced diet, have fun and live long.

sugary foods are excellent for improving your climbing on slopers, they give you sticky fingers.

After the age of 35 you're doomed; diminishing testosterone means you will be less vigorous so will lose muscle and accumulate fat plus the reduction in testosterone means female hormone will predominate and you'll grow boobies. Any muscle you do build will fade more quickly if you don't use it. 

Not addressing the weight issue directly but one of my regular climbing partners completely eliminated refined sugar from his diet about a year ago and is now climbing harder than ever and is feeling far healthier.

The improvement seems tangible and it has certainly got me seriously thinking about whether a similar sacrifice would be worth it.

Good luck with whatever you decide. 

I've been in the same boat, age 33 and weighing up to 68-69kg at 173cm. I've cut it down recently and am about 65-66 at the moment, just through running. I set a new year resolution to run 1000k, I've got 230k left. I'd say around 30% of my diet is 'healthy' the rest is still generally either crap or portion size too big.. I like eating. It's only the last few months though that I've noticed my ever present small podge is shifting from my stomach and it really has made the difference in how strong I feel. However, I've done routes more confidently and in better style than 'young guns' who quite frankly just haven't been able to climb them as well, if at all.. yes they've better power/weight ratio but it just goes to show that technique is king and can often more than make up for any lacking in power/weight ratios. 

How you feel when you're climbing, i.e. if you feel like you're climbing with a whacking great rucksack on your back when you're not?

Utter tosh

Just turn gravity down a bit 

If you are referring to optimal as an ideal, I remember reading an interview with Tom Randall where he referred to data from elite climbers, although I may be misquoting the general gist seemed to be ‘healthy BMI, but at the lower end’. I think BMI of 20-21 was the rough average of these elites. That is healthy but still very lean, so not sure how achievable for you (or indeed me) as part of a lifestyle which may not be totally focused to training and climbing. I am around a BMI of 23 and feel fine to climb fairly well, don’t think it’s my weight necessarily dragging me down. 

Maybe you need a lighter chalk bag then.

''Muscle weighs more than fat.''

no it doesn't muscle takes up less space

Probably better to take off these lead boots first. 
edit to add:

slightly off topic, but I remember the same interview concluding that being a shorter climber was disadvantageous in almost every regard (power and endurance required to climb the same grade)  - just added as I know this is a bugbear of yours and seems to conclusively prove shorties have a right to moan!

Well that seems to go against what Dave Macleod says in "9 out of 10 climbers" and against simply observing the heights of good climbers; I see as many, if not more, shorter climbers as taller climbers. Do you have a link?

https://www.trainingbeta.com/media/tom-ollie/

"Tom Randall: Ah okay yeah, that’s a really interesting point actually. If we rank all the different performance markers that we look at in the profiling, the taller climber has an advantage in every single area.

[laughter]

Neely Quinn: I knew it!

Tom Randall: Except for one, and that is core strength. So the tallest climbers need to have the best core strength for the grade. That’s the one area they cannot neglect."

I think the take-away is that short climbers can still, of course, be really good, but in pure physical terms they have be fitter and stronger to climb the same grade as an average height climber based on their normative data. I would be interested in MacLeod's research - from my own anecdotal experience I know loads of good climbers who are average height and one or two exceptional ones who are shorter rather than shorter being the norm - which you would expect from their relative representation in the climbing cohort. Cannot see how being short can be an advantage in all honesty. 

Edit to apologise for thread hijacking. First weight, then height - anyone want to throw grading into the mix for ultimate climber's pub conversation...

My perfect weight is current weight - 5kg always. 

This is too true.

Thanks. Interesting.

However, further down from the bit you quote, he seems to admit that there are probably other factors they have not tested which level the playing field:

Neely Quinn: So if you’re saying that taller climbers have so many advantages, then why do you think there are so many shorter climbers who are really, really good?

Ollie Torr: So the taller climbers are seeing significant advantages as far as our testing procedures. One thing that might not occur is the fact that it might take taller climbers much more effort to improve their technical efficiency or economy of movement. The size of holds might make a slight difference, depending on the size of shoe and fingers. Also being able to create good coordination and movement economy might be a bit harder for a taller climber than a shorter counterpart.

Neely Quinn: Because of the lever arms?

Ollie Torr: Exactly. Stuff like dynamic and plyometric strength will also change depending on the lever length as well. What we are looking at is in specific areas to do with our data. But what we are looking into now, the really interesting part is understanding the mechanisms behind these results.

Sure, there may be, and it may well depend on specific route intricacies and morphology. Interestingly the study seems to suggest that female climbers generally have a lower finger strength required, perhaps due to hip mobility. 

While obviously there is no rule of thumb to HOW much weight one should carry as it's all relative to ones physiology, in my personal experience optimal weight does matter a great deal.

Of course it does - as testament put on a mere 2/3kg weight vest and lug yourself up a wall - it makes a whole world of difference. That said, feeling strong is more important to me and they have not always correlated in the past, though when I have found the balance between the two that has been key for me completing my hardest climbs and feeling strongest.

I don't think you have to be utterly ripped - I am not and I like my cake - but when I prepare to project a hard climb I like to restrict my sugar intake which helps me lose 2-3kg of pudge within a month. I think my point is if you are carrying weight from fat it is redundant (to a certain point!) and if you are able to lose weight from just cutting out cake (and other sugary foods) it's relatively easy to lose and an important component to climbing harder.

I have experimented and found that after a certain point of lowering my weight, other factors such as injuries, losing power (and possibly muscle), compromise to quality of life etc. creeps in and affects my climbing negatively. 

I think the key is to not be in too much (or at all) of a calorie deficit where you are drastically losing weight and potentially losing muscle mass and depriving yourself of nutrients. This has almost always lead to some sort of injury and/or loss of performance for me.

I also like to cycle my 'sugar' diet where I cut out sugars and generally eat healthy in order to lose weight, timing it so I'm at a good weight in prime outdoor season so the rest of the year I can eat whatever I want.

Of course this is all from the perspective of someone who has only climbed f7b+ and according to your profile you've climbed 8a - you probably don't need my advice!

I did a quick google to try and find the tom Randall interview you mention but no luck, I could only find this from Randall

https://latticetraining.com/2017/10/04/bmi-and-climbing/   this seems to suggest bmi is not highly correlated to climbing grade, however i don't really trust it as it also claims that there are a few climbers with bmi above 30 climbing in the high 7s which i find very hard to believe, ive personally never seen that.

It would be interesting to know who is the fattest person to climb 7a,7c or 8a?

Lose weight by going running or stomping up mountains with a pack on. I think general fitness is way more important than some attempt to realise an ‘optimum’ weight.

Probably John Dunne.

Same link as the one I posted above re: height. I could be wildly misrepresenting the data of course, but the tag line is ‘no correlation between unhealthy BMI and high performance’ I.e. absolutely prioritising weight loss at the expense of health is counter productive. However, the spread seemed to quite narrow in healthy BMI 19-21ish. This was for high level climbers but seems to suggest lean body mass is an asset. I would have to weigh sub 9 stone for that classification, currently weigh around 9 stone 9 and feel healthy, happy so losing 10 pounds would be really hard and not worth it for me at the moment. 

i think the comments above are really valuable on how draining it is to be in calorie deficit: very hard to train and adapt like that. I try to maintain a healthy lifestyle and then will target a bit of weight loss as I’m shaping up for a holiday or trip or whatever. Something I have tried and found works for me is a fast day (sub 400 calories) the day before I go out and want to climb something hard (for me) and eat sparsely on the day itself, stuff like bananas and flapjacks - seems to mean I feel light and sharp but not drained, not sure what the science is there. 

It's more about % body fat than overall weight or BMI.  15% seems to be a healthy balance?

see here you are on this scale

https://www.ketogains.com/2015/09/how-to-estimate-your-body-fat-percentage-...

I've failed to find any real details on the lattice guys analysis of strength vs height for climbers but I'd assume then when they say strength they actual mean strength relative to bodyweight  since there tests involve bodyweight rather than pure total strength tests.  A quick search will show a number of studies showing a negative correlation between strength/relative to bodyweight and height - not greatly surprising and would fit with, for example, gymnasts generally being shorter than average.

Based on that the conclusion could be instead written as short climbers tend to be naturally stronger and tall climbers can use there height to compensate (to some extent)  for their lesser strength.

In the end this has been done to death and if we take hard sport climbing as a proxy for climbing ability there is no evidence at all that being tall is an advantage, with on average top climbers being possibly slightly smaller than population but no strong particularly correlation between height and climbing ability.

BMI is so misleading for sports people.  I have a BMI of just over 25 but my body fat is 11.5% (according to my Garmin Scales) or 13.5% (according to my last caliper measurements).  I'm not sure where my optimum is but I've certainly some spare fat!

Fat % seems a better measure for climbers, although it's not unfallable.  A climber with muscly cycling legs is at a disadvantage compared to a climber with thin, spindly climbers legs - even if their fat % is identical.

I'd also add that power to weight would be more important for sport climbers, where effieciency is often crucial.  Boulderers can often get away with carrying more spare weight.

When I was climbing hard last year (bouldering up to about Font8A) I was 71.5kg at 183cm. (I'm now 73.5'ish and have just started to try and slim down again)

For you to be the same BMI as I was you'd need to be 67kg, however as I boulder and you look to mainly route climb you can probably afford to be down to about 65kg as you won't need as much strength. If you want an idea of the difference it would make, go climb some routes with a 5kg weight belt on.

The key to performance weight loss for climbing though is to lose weight while maintaining strength. If you just stop eating and stop climbing you'll lose weight but you'll be losing muscle as well as fat so you have to keep up the training while running at a slight calorie deficit. 

I used to eat a bit too much in the winter, to build some muscle and then cut down as summer aproaches to get light and ready for the longer climbs outdoors. 

At 177cm,  73-74 kg is the heaviest I have been. 65 is the lightest. I prefer something around 68.

The progression I get in the spring when doing this is wery motivating! It is actually quite amazing how different the climbs feel when you get lighter and lighter !

To loose weight I simply skip breakfast, drink a glass of water and some coffe instead,. intermittent fasting is for me the easyest way to cut weight.

 I think it is wery important that you climb while you are on some form of diet, your body needs to know which muscles to prioritize. If you go running instead then your climbing will not progress the same way.