UKC

A new thread is posted each week on Sunday for anyone to jot down their previous week's activity. UKC fit club is a rich community with posters sharing their goals, noting successes and failures and offering support to those struggling to maintain motivation. Anyone interested in starting is very welcome to join, but to get the most of UKC fit club you should aim to post each week, every week, however little or much you have done. By making such a regular public record of your activities and by restating your goals every week this new habit will hopefully improve your training habits and drive you towards achieving your goals whatever the level of your chosen activity.

The following training article by Alex Barrows gives an excellent breakdown on training the four main "energy systems" specific to climbing:- http://alexbarrowsclimbing.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/training-for-sport-climbi...

For those wanting to find out more about training for climbing a number of physical training articles are linked here:- http://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/t.php?t=274502

Last weeks post - https://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/walls+training/ukc_fit_club_week_678-7169...

Psyche video - youtube.com/watch?v=IfeePvVGjQs& - thanks ian!

jackob - All part of the process with Neds, you'll get there, I'm sure.

Si dH - It's surprisingly easy to over do yoga.  So yeah, take the mobility stuff easy.  Good week.  Glad you enjoyed Trowbarrow.

Powderpuff - No worries, you're forgiven   Lots of good wall sessions.

AlanLittle - Hope you're all ok.  I suspect that Kaly in May 2020 will be a big no no sadly.  Guess it's good you got two good ski days in.

Tom Green - Fil a Plomb looks nice.  Supercouloir!  I'm well jealous.  What a mega tick.  Very nice!!!

AJM - Some nice home exercise there.  I guess you can fix the shoulder now?

Ally Smith - You always make the cave sound nice.  V11?  Very nifty.  Good job on the DIY club.  Sounds mega.

the sheep - Good steady milage as always.

Bones - Seems sensible to rest up and workout at home.

annak - Now would be the time to work on core and stability stuff?  Also just take care of yourself in general.

planetmarshall - If that's the Katherine I think it is, she's a great coach isn't she.  3 good sessions ready for the lockdown.

cyan - Yeah, might be the last time down the wall for a bit.

SteveJones - Lots of solid sessions.  Nice week.  I like the STGs.

Obviously things are going to be a bit odd for everyone for a little while.  I can only urge everyone to be sensible with their exercise and not to get injured.  Now would be a great time to rest up, fix your diet.  Work on your head game.  Improve stability issues if they exist.  Improve flexibility.  Fix long term niggles.

Also generally just take care of yourself and those closest to you.  Give your self a break while things are all a little weird.  It's a good time to just chill out and take stock for a few weeks.  I hope everyone is well.  AJM has put up a post here for training ideas:

https://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/walls+training/ukc_fit_club_the_self-isol...

Well done for still having the psyche to keep it going Matt

Lockdown Week One.

STG: Survive the pandemic; still be on speaking terms with my family at the end of two weeks(*) voluntary self-quarantine. 
MTG: Re-plan Kalymnos trip to the Autumn - but of what year?
LTG: Be a confident, well rounded low to mid 7's sport climber by 2021, assuming I get to go climbing at some point in 2020. For measurable definition see Fit Club 658

M: "Rest" day after skiing (a bit!) and then doing max hangs yesterday. Mostly spent my time stressing out over Bavaria's State of Emergency declaration, the state of our household provisions etc, so not actually very restful. Plenty of further fingerboarding opportunity in the foreseeable future anyway, no need to rush.

T: Since we're all on the Rock Prodigy linear periodisation plan now, I thought it made sense to start with a max hang benchmark session. The result: skiing makes your fingers (marginally) stronger! A slightly surprising two kilos up on when I last benchmarked in November. 
    Celebrated with half an hour kettlebells & core.

W: Quarantine TFNA: one hour zone 2 box step-ups. Did 1200 steps on the ~30cm box I'm using; let's see what gainz I can make here in the however many weeks or months it turns out to be.

T: More max hangs. Went quite well, but I'm not convinced every other day is going to be viable for very long. Let's see.
    Another hour of step-ups. 
F: ... and another. Those panic-bought, comfort-eaten calories aren't going to burn themselves.
S: 
S: Max hangs; kettlebells. Full-on max hangs three times a week definitely not sustainable; will need to throw in a day of something more endurance focused. I hate repeaters.

(*) Ha. Ha.
 

Hey Matt,

Tuesday: over two hour session! Repeated two v4 , two v5 , one v6 problem. Then worked on the v8 I'd tried last week, made good progress climbing many of the moves. Finished by doing all my usual exercises and theraband.

In the week was busy with work and slight distracted by the virus situation so no climbing until....

Saturday: 4 max hangs on beastmaker.

Sunday: usual set of conditioning exercises and theraband.

The virus period plan is to get outside if work allows and:
• head torch monday night (need to get new batteries for head torch)
• Or get up early and climb Tuesday
• Finger board once in week.
• Wake up super early Saturday and go outside first thing before work.

If weather takes a turn for the worst then I'll be doing tones of fingerboarding, may have to try some non max hangs fingerboarding when I dont have the power in the fingers, we'll see how we get on....there is a slight plan of building a climbing wall in the garden!

All the best to everyone in these crazy days of no bog roll, and no hand shaking!

I haven't done anything this week really. 

I've found the week at work very stressful, trying and entirely failing to get certainty over what we are supposed to be doing. I'm usually fairly good at letting things wash over me but I definitely had proper stress headaches at points. Zero appetite to do stuff during the week.

This weekend has actually been fairly nice. I haven't done any climbing related things, but we've obviously got to start a new regime with miniAJM no longer being in nursery for some indeterminate period and I think we made a positive start on that and generally got a bunch of admin/etc done (we've been trying to tidy everything up a bit since we're not the tidiest of people and  having a higher average house occupancy meant we thought we should try to step change and get on top of things). 

I also sorted out my pinch block, ordered a mono trainer (why not?), bought miniAJM some climbing shoes and made him ten functional if unexciting more holds for his climbing wall from some bits of scrap wood.

Once I get work clarity I plan to put together a plan to train some stuff. Not sure what or when to aim for mind you. My month of shared parental leave in June looks optimistic, Font in September maybe - who knows...

Yep thanks and well done for keeping this going Matt. 

I've done several hours of easy walking every day, nothing else. 

Same this coming week I think, I'm in work and it's likely to be long hours. Working from home alternate weeks after that so should have more time and space. 

This week's goal is to make a plan for how to keep active and maintain some strength.

Let us know what you think of the mono trainer? Presumably the same product AB is using?

Yeah, that's right. Will do.

I could have used a sling, but I figured I didn't have much else to spend money on over the next few months and I've not been told yet that they'll stop paying me!

All about the variety. I want to try to train some things I don't normally train, in the hope that I'll spend more time working weaknesses and in the steep part of the diminishing returns curve...

Thanks Matt.

Made a decent start on home training this week,  without feeling any tweaks on the fingerboard. Since Tuesday I've been working from home and since Wednesday Sol has been off nursery. I'm lucky that I can work from home fairly easily, my actual objectives at work remain unchanged and my wife can take most of the strain with Sol so whilst it has been a weird week,  I think I'm less stressed than most. Mainly worried about my mum who is high risk and lives alone. 

M: rest

T: did a bit of core stuff - unstructured planks and leg raises

W: Max hang session in the morning. Back up to body weight -11kg on the lattice edge,  which at the moment is approx 69kg. A little off my best but happy to be able to hang that without injury. 

T: similar to Tuesday 

F: Max hang session as per Wednesday morning. Also did some TRX stuff - IYWs and reverse flies. 

S: ordered all the bits for my new woodie! Covid has finally kicked me into gear on this before deliveries (maybe?)  stop. Also listened to the latest Trainingbeta podcast and briefly learnt some new TRX exercises (mountain climbers and bodysaws,  not very convinced yet). 

S: Cleared space for my wall and collected a bunch of tools and fixings in the day. More max hangs and TRX in the evening (the new stuff plus some reverse flies.) 

I think I've done a bit better with my diet this week. For over a year I've had a bit of a mild disorder where I just can't stop snacking in the evening and however well I eat through the day,  I end up eating too much overall. However the realisation that we might not get another shop for a fortnight or more has given me a stronger motivation not to eat everything from the weekly shop by mid-week as has happened for a while now. Hopefully this can become the norm again. 

Stay well and good luck everyone working out new arrangements. Try to stay positive,  it won't last forever. 

Si

Thanks Matt. Good call on working on weaknesses and niggles. I've a few things that I've neglected but never fully resolved. Not quite in lockdown here just yet; my wife is a cancer research doctor who's been recalled to NHS service, so our virus exposure will happen very soon...

(probably about the same time legislation is passed to keep us all locked up)

Week 12

M – In the face of perceived imminent shutdown and like a junky who can’t acknowledge their addiction; I went to the cave of justice. Worked Ferrino sans both, but sacked it off as the 2nd hold was seeping persistently and meant you went into the rest of it with smeggy fingers. Cold wind drove me deeper into the cave instead of attempting another TC link-up. Decided to get well out of my comfort zone and work Louis Armstrong (V13)(!?!). Managed a good chunk of the moves. Core was wibble after this, but smashed 2x 7B+ back-2-back as a “warm-down”.

T – Still facing down uncertainty, I went out on the bike: Got carried away and bonked so hard I had tunnel vision. Even put milk and sugar in my coffee to recuperate! Type II fun. 55km including Swiss hill and other cobbled sectors. Warm-up, then 3sets bench@56kg. 8,7,7 reps.

W – Lunchtime Crimpd finger strength test. Worked up to BW+64kg for 7s hang. Attempted some compression on my home campus board, but holds I’d bolted up were too optimistic. After work, dodged some gardening because of rain so did following:

3x10s 1-arm shoulder engagement holds on Lattice jug. Just starting to rotate out at the end of each hang, so taking it easy and adding duration before extra reps or additional weight.

5x5 on-the-minute pull-ups @BW+20kg

Lattice edge repeaters @70% (+20kg; hard, but just completed the lot)

Reverse flys & prone T’s

45kg squats for groin rehab.

T – Unsurprisingly, I had DOMS today. Rest.

F – Splendid isolation on Breck Road. Cleaned, then led FA of a previously bolted project. 7c/+ ish. Social Distance (7c+)

S – 6 hours hedge cutting; the ultimate shoulder workout with an unwieldly 6kg hedge trimmer!

S – 15km local walk.

Cheers Matt, as predicted its been a very strange week. Swam Monday and Tuesday, however the uni decided to shut the gyms down so thats that for the foreseeable future. Popped out for a short scamper with the kids Wednesday evening which was nice. Spent the majority of the week preparing to put our department into shutdown mode which we expected to be about a week away. However things took a turn for the unexpected when the uni announced a total shutdown from Friday on wards for an indeterminate amount of time!

Luckily I can work from home which is a big relief with the schools closing too.

Saturday, went for a nice run over the fields with the wife. Barely saw a soul which was great.

Sunday, totally unheard of in our house, we sat down for a Sunday roast in the evening. Normally all 3 girls swim train so this was a rather lovely novelty, especially on mothers day 

Plan is now to isolate as much as possible, take the kids out running over the quiet trails and see how this pans out.  

Stay safe everyone

Week 2 of corona-limited activities. We're still able to go out to the woods for exercise, so I've been doing that a LOT, more for my mental wellbeing than anything.

M: cycle 16km, core, fingerboard repeaters

Tu: cycle 10km, run 12km

W: cycle 15km

Th: cycle 16km

F: yoga, core

Sa: rest

Su: Lattice home training assessment test! Maybe I will have more motivation if I'm following a proper plan while I'm so limited. Max hangs: 34kg, max endurance: 115s, max pullups 1 min: 13, max pushups 1 min: 29.

STG: try to stay mentally and physically healthy during these weird times.

MTG: all climbing trips are on hold if not actually cancelled. Not sure whether to find some local objectives for future motivation, or if it's too annoying to look at routes I can't even go try yet.

Hi All. Thanks for keeping the stat-ball rolling Matt.

Week 12:

No exercise at all. Battling against my post-alps cold (hopefully just a cold).

Week 13:

Hopefully recover from lurgy and get back in to training. 

STG/MTG/LTG:

I had come up with a list of summer climbing and running goals but hard to know whether they will be possible now?

STG:

Mount lattice rail.

Get/stay healthy.

Form habit of core and max strength sessions.

Work out a socially responsible/acceptable solution to run/climb.

So, finally got a work plan in place. Working from home for the foreseeable. Starting to think about home training and would appreciate any thoughts/feedback. It’s definitely easier for me to do short sessions in gaps around childminding, working and all that. So I’ve had a look at my apparatus and started to pull together a list of sessions. My aim is to set a goal of x sessions per week from that list, ideally with at least one of each session every 2 or 3 weeks. That should give me some flex to do things that fit the circumstances.

Apparatus:

- fingerboard

- bar

- rings

- trx

- pinch block

- mono trainer

- dumbbells and bar

- foot on campus

- floor exercises

- therabands

- finger extensors

Sessions:

- rings push and pull - archer rows and dips - my son likes the rings

- bar/weights push and pull - weighted pull-ups and shoulder/bench press

- core on trx or floor

- stretching session - I want to try to maybe build to a position where I’m doing this or core daily?

- fingerboard - open hand

- fingerboard - slopers and edges

- pinch blocks and one arm shoulder engagement - because they shouldn’t interfere with each other too much

- foot on campus stamina - low intensity - 5-3-5-3-5 session

- foot on campus stamina - high intensity - probably 1-on-1-off or maybe 2 on/off.

- rehab - rotator cuffs and wrist curls

- bicep curls and front lever progressions - again because they shouldn’t interfere with each other too much

Mon. Rest. 

Tues. Raven Tor, did bens from 4 moves in to the end. Felt about as hard as doing the whole thing with the knee bar. Hopefully this will go within a few sessions now although they might not be for months! 

Wed. 6km run

Thurs. Warmed up to climb but felt tired so sacked it off. 

Fri. Max hangs (+25kg),weighted pull ups (+10kg) bar core and pressups. 

Sat. 5km run, static core, press ups. 

Sun. Rest. Elbows a bit sore so need a few days where I avoid working fingers and arms. 

How did I forget the crack deadhang bar?!

Now redrilled, just need to start adding some more plates to work on the wide...

youtube.com/watch?v=6EoglUzcGWI&

Psyche vid?

Nice! Still keen to see the crack machine in action!

Made myself a hobo TRX today and after my first session I’m quietly confident that I’m going to be ruined with DOMS over the next day or two. Great stuff... should have started TRXing years ago!

Although training is a poor substitute for climbing on a day like today. 

Going to try to drill a few more bits of wood over the next day or so - at the minute if I wear the jamming gloves (which definitely narrow things a bit) it's thin hands for me and solid hands for my wife (to use a more conventional frame of reference, it's a red camalot starting to look a bit tipped out or a gold camalot just a little bit wider than fully overcammed), or narrower if I take some spacers out. But I've definitely got a few more 20mm strips of scrap I can repurpose and there's a fatter (50mm? Haven't measured) block of scrap sitting in the shed so should be able to start to push out to fists and the smaller end of stacks...

Will share some photos on Instagram soon!

Sounds epic! Good inventing!

What we’re really all waiting for is the insta vid of it in knee lock mode ;-p

with the accompanying psyche-vid of Jason Kruk  youtube.com/watch?v=1dJLN43G6KA& 

Mostly ticked off the STG - moved my weights etc into the conservatory. Just nee dto get the turbo trainer on there! Diet has been a bit better, weight is coming off, tho not sure I believe this mornings readings (71kg) as that's quite a drop in a week or so.

M - run round park before work (late shift) 5.8km 28 mins. The through the day I noticed I had a 'new and persistent cough'... Working from home from tomorrow and starting a week quarantine! 

T - rest day, felt a bit fluey, but OK. 1st day off this month.

W - 5k round the park, 25mins or so (after work). feeling the effect of flu/virus

T - WFH lunch run - Latrigg, 5.8k, 330m, 40 mins

F - WFH lunch run - Latrigg, 5.8k, 330m, 40 mins

S - run - 10k, 330, 50 mins or so. PM - 20mins ish testing out weights set up (bench press 5x5 @40kg)

S - long run - 16k, 500m, about 2hrs, but stoped for a good chat (keeping distance) for a while.

STG - weights training every day, alt between bench/pullups and Squat/something - with core stuff added every day.

MTG - not to have gone crazy in isolation!

Slacking last week on the reporting, whoops... can be summarised with a damp trip to the peak, an okay CWIF performance and nothing else particularly of note.

Last Week:

Mon: Yoga; Bike 9km, Stabiliser conditioning, aborted hang board session (skin was terrible)

Tues: Yoga; final dash to the wall - whipped round the weekends comp circuit (which I missed due to the CWIF) and didn't do particularly well at. Bike 8km.

Weds: Yoga, had a go at a session from the Neil Gresham app - 30 mins arms/core. Lots of pull ups/lock off work which I need. 10 min TRX core session.

Thurs: Yoga, went down to Wales whilst travel was still a bit of a grey area

Fri: Killer Weed (f7A) pretty fast. 6C surely? Some goes at King of Drunks (V6) but kept messing up the top, despite having already done the stand.

Sat: attempts at Harvey Oswald (V7), still a bit hard for me this one. Back to the barrel to continue war with Bulling 747 (V6), and got about as close as possible without doing it - pretty fed up of this problem now and just want to have done it.

Sun: No match for climb id:74256 and the 6C RH variation. Then King of Drunks (V6) went down - pretty chuffed. Ran back home prior to what we all suspected was coming...

This week

More on this in the relevant post; but I'm pretty well set up for home training. 2 hang boards, small edges, weights, TRX, and a small (very recently built) board. 

Thanks for guarding the psych flame Matt. Not sure what's going on and which week is which, but essentially in the last three weeks:

• Nice day at Tunhill before the world started ending.
• Couple of sessions at the Unit the next weekend.
• Locked up my 89 y.o. grandma with a cupboard full of sardines and tinned pears.
• Bought some trail shoes (inov-8 roclite G 290) and a Garmin (instinct) so running won't be so boring. It turns out I can run 4 miles without getting bored so will stick with that as a standard jaunt while allowed. Luckily there's a good option from my front door so after zombie-dodging through the village (churchyard crux), we can get to slightly less populated country lanes, loop the hill and back. 

Rest! Pah! Although, I have been doing a lot of that recently. I suppose I should re-evaluate my goals, what with this virus and all. I did three fingerboard sessions and struggled with some, others are totally fine. Have written this on Saturday evening with a lot of thoughts for the week but will leave them for tomorrow's post.

Week 700 goal: 50 fingerboard sessions - 13/50 completed

Mon: 20 mins at the basketball court

Tues: lattice fingerboard 20mm - struggled with this. Came off early on each rep.

Weds: 20 mins at the basketball court

Thurs: lattice fingerboard 20mm - 100% success today and did legs in between sets. Lunges, squats, some other things I don't have a name for.

Fri: lattice fingerboard 20mm - same as Tues, managed around 8/10 seconds on each hang. Again doing leg work in between but was quite out of breath today (not ill!)

Sat: 20 mins at the basketball court

Sun: rest

Weekly goals:

1. fingerboarding: 3 x week - 3 completed

2. running: 3 x week - went a bit out of the window with Covid-19, been thinking about whether I should go out or not. Just get to run around a bit on the basketball court.

3. No climbing or bouldering, need to really think about the plan.

STG - 14st / 30 minute 5k

MTG - Goblin Girl (6b) 6c at Navigation, then WFD

LTG - ???

Weight - 14st 6lbs

M - S - Rest

Mostly just ill and transitioning to home working again.  I've done it a lot in the past, so it feels pretty normal to me.  Still isolating, but we've managed to get a few food deliveries, which has made things much nicer.  Out of isolation on Friday, but we'll hole up for as long as possible I think.

March - 34%
YTD - 41%

That must have been rough. I'm honestly quite relieved that my last elderly relative passed away in January.

She's relatively cheery at the moment. Her short-term memory isn't the best so perhaps she will get through the Groundhog Day feeling better than most of us!?