Rock Climbing

[Izawwlgood]

I went last week, and tweaked the shit out of my shoulder. Nailed the route though.

I've been having a blast getting back into it. My forearms were so blown last time, I couldn't operate a can opener.

[Samik]

Went again today - alone, so I just tried bouldering. This time felt as bad as last time felt good.

Two problems:

1.) My grip strength sucks. Badly. Very much incommensurate with my overall fitness level. I crack my knuckles relentlessly, and haven't had any place to do pullups on a regular basis for quite some time now, so they're weak to begin with, and die very quickly. So, obviously I got a very good finger work out today, because I could hardly open my car door when I got out, but it's hard to justify $15 to go when your fingers call it quits after only a couple routes.

2.) Apparently the skin on my fingers needs some toughening up. I ripped them to shreds. And not in the way that is going to yield calluses. More like in the way that is going to yield big, thick scabs that will prevent me from going again until they heal entirely.


So I've invested in some tennis balls. Hopefully by the time my fingers heal, they'll also be back close to something like normal human non-knuckle-cracker level strength.

[Izawwlgood]

My grip strength sucks.

Actually, I find pullups don't really improve grip. They improve biceps and shoulders. Grip is entirely predicated on forearms, and yeah, just keep at it, it'll come in time. I tend to finish sessions at the gym so beat I can hardly use my hands for anything more dextrous than lifting a cup of water. Turning doorknobs is outta the question.

Apparently the skin on my fingers needs some toughening up

You can always tape over those. Try making slower more deliberate movements; you'll improve your strength and reduce the likelihood of ripping your pads off. (I believe they're called 'flappers')

Although be careful with actual bleeding wounds; walls are beyond filthy.

[Samik]

RE: pullups: As I said, knuckle cracking really destroys your grip strength, so I'm starting out with much weaker grip strength than most would be, compared to my weight and fitness level. When I'm doing pullups regularly, it doesn't necessary make my grip strength awesome, but it does help combat the strength loss from the cracking, so I'm more like a normal human being in that regard. Plus, I make a point of doing finger only pullups (at least, where I'm only using the first two segments), or even door jamb pullups. I'm not planing on using pullups exclusively to improve my grip strength - I was just pointing out why it's so pathetic overall right now.


RE: slower movements: you're right, of course. It's just that with my grip strength as weak as it is, everything is rendered harder than it would otherwise be - a V0 isn't appreciably easier for me right now than a V2 (yeah, I suck), because it's not the technical aspects of the moves that are holding me back - I just flat out can't support my weight (all 155lbs of it) with one hand, even when the hold is large. So every move becomes an explosive move, or I just never get off the ground at all.


And yeah, they started out as flappers. A few routes later, they were more like chicken strips.



A lot of griping by me in these last two posts; I'm not discouraged or anything - just am going to go to town on those tennis balls for a little while before dropping another $15 for 15 minutes of climbing.



EDIT:

You can always tape over those.

I misread this the first time. Not sure how. Yeah, tape is probably the ticket. Maybe I should just do that anyway for the time being. I wonder if that will prevent the skin from toughening up, though? I'd like to not have to keep using it indefinitely.

[Nath]

RE: pullups: As I said, knuckle cracking really destroys your grip strength.

This is likely a myth. The whole connection between knuckle cracking and grip strength goes back to one dubious study from over twenty years ago. It's quite plausible that people with inflamed joints are just more likely to crack them; the study didn't look at what was causing what.

Here it is, if you're curious. That page also points to a commentary criticizing the paper.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/article ... =pmcentrez

Science journalism is a game of telephone.

[Samik]

Hum. I see the ambiguity loud and clear.

Well, regardless of the cause, my grip strength is highly incommensurate with my overall strength level (but only when I haven't been working out - after putting some effort in, it catches back up fairly readily).

I mean, maybe I'm wrong. You tell me: is it normal to be able to do ~15 good quality pullups, but not be able to hang by one hand for more than a second or two? (Again, I'm 155lbs, so it's not like I'm trying to support 240 from one hand.)

I have no other factors to pin it on other than knuckle cracking. Why would my fingers practically freaking atrophy, so much more so than the rest of my body? Maybe too many hours at the keyboard... maybe that causes the inflammation, which leads to weakness and cracking to alleviate subtle discomfort. *Shrug*


With regards to climbing, it's not really a big deal. I was just griping. I know from going through this many times before that I can get my grip back to where it needs to be. Or, at least, to respectability.

With regards to that study... well, it may been flawed in drawing the conclusions it did based on what it did, but man if I'm not a supporting case. Admitting the study was flawed doesn't quite get me all the way to thinking that the results are "likely a myth".

[Samik]

In any case, there's clearly only one thing to do: undertake one of the most horrific tests of human will possible:


Quit cracking my knuckles.



I guess this should include my wrists, toes, ankles, shoulders, back, hips and neck too? But man are the shoulders ever satisfying...

[EvanED]

I feel like there was an Ig Nobel winner relevant to this discussion... let's see if I can find it.

Edit:, ah, it was about arthritis, not strength.

[Izawwlgood]

And yeah, they started out as flappers. A few routes later, they were more like chicken strips.

For future reference, as soon as these happen, tape them. Bad blisters too. I currently lack any skin on two finger pads; it hurts like hell but won't impede your climbing if you tape it good. And it'll callous after. I dunno if you're supposed to, but I cut away the dead skin from flappers. Blisters I try to leave, but end up picking at. Blisters callous quicker if you don't pick them I think.

This is kind of gross, I guess?

I just flat out can't support my weight

That'll come with time. Forearms are pretty hard to work out doing... anything else, so getting into climbing can be a bit of a steep curve for your forearms. Keep doing grip related stuff, and it'll improve your grip! Does your gym have a grip board?

[Samik]

Does your gym have a grip board?

Yeah, but I can't hang from it, even with both hands, for even a fraction of a second at the moment. I'm telling you: to look at me, you wouldn't believe how abnormally bad my grip is. That's what the tennis balls are for

I guess the plus side of that is it's making me have a lot of focus on my feet and weight distribution, which I might not be paying as much attention to if I could just power up everything.

[Nath]

I mean, maybe I'm wrong. You tell me: is it normal to be able to do ~15 good quality pullups, but not be able to hang -by one hand for more than a second or two? (Again, I'm 155lbs, so it's not like I'm trying to support 240 from one hand.)

That is strange. Are you measuring the one-hand hang on a pull-up bar or a climbing wall? The limiting factor is probably different; when doing pull-ups, the bar is in the distal half of your palm. When hanging from a hand-hold, you may be limited by finger strength or endurance (specifically, your ability to maintain flexion in the joint between your proximal and intermediate phalanges, rather than between the metacarpals and the proximal phalanges). I am just thinking out loud, since I've never been a serious climber, but you might benefit from farmer's walks with the dumbbell held in your fingers rather than your palm. Another thing that might help with inflammation is sticking your hand in a bucket of icy water for a few minutes after practice, and moving all the finger joints through their full ranges of motion. I've never tried it with fingers, but it did wonders the last time I had inflammation in my ankle.

With regards to that study... well, it may been flawed in drawing the conclusions it did based on what it did, but man if I'm not a supporting case. Admitting the study was flawed doesn't quite get me all the way to thinking that the results are "likely a myth".

I have a counter-anecdote. A couple of years ago, I injured my right ring finger. Since then, it's been kind of knobbly, occasionally sore, and I've gotten into the habit of cracking it. I don't crack the same joint on any of my other fingers, and don't remember cracking it before the injury. So it seems fairly likely that the cracking is an instinctive response to the injury. Perhaps it is even beneficial -- maybe it helps keep the joint mobile or something. But that's just speculation.

[Sytri]

Just to add to the anecdotes about knucle cracking. I am a recovering knuckle cracker as I came across the same problem as Samik a few months ago and just from my experience it does help to not crack your knuckles; as after a few weeks of stopping I felt that my grip had improved. This could have also been down to the fact that I had been training quite a bit and improved on my technique but I would say that in part it was down to not knuckle craking.


Gah, after writing all that down and thinking about knuckle cracking as I read this over I absent-mindedly cracked my knuckles!

[Izawwlgood]

I mean, maybe I'm wrong. You tell me: is it normal to be able to do ~15 good quality pullups, but not be able to hang -by one hand for more than a second or two? (Again, I'm 155lbs, so it's not like I'm trying to support 240 from one hand.)

That is strange.

I don't think it's that strange, it sounds, like you alluded to, that he just has very deficient grip strength. I don't think much of climbing is actually predicated on pull-up like motions; it's mostly grip strength.

[Nath]

I don't think it's that strange, it sounds, like you alluded to, that he just has very deficient grip strength. I don't think much of climbing is actually predicated on pull-up like motions; it's mostly grip strength.

Right, but if he can hold on to a pull-up bar with two hands long enough to do 15 pull-ups, he should be able to hold on with one hand for more than a few seconds. That doesn't necessarily mean he can hang from a climbing hand-hold, for reasons I described above. That's why I asked how he was measuring the one-hand hang: pull-up bar or climbing wall.

[Samik]

Are you measuring the one-hand hang on a pull-up bar or a climbing wall?

Pull-up bar. One hand on a pull-up bar, things stay together for a few seconds, maybe. One hand on a climbing wall, using fingers only, and there are effectively 0 seconds of hang time - I just flat out can't do it at the moment. (Which is why I said that, when bouldering, every move becomes an explosive move. I have to get that second hand back on the wall in a split second, before my upward momentum dissipates.)

Ok, a key point I might need to clarify better: When I've been working out/climbing/pullups/deadlifting/etc., my grip isn't, as far as I can tell, really out of sync with the rest of my body - a month or two from now, if I keep things up (and past history repeats itself), I'll be able to swing around by the fingers of one hand with the best of them. It's only when I've been lazy for a long time and everything has gotten all soft and pathetic that my grip strength really falls out of line with the rest of me. This is the primary reason that I don't think it's my natural state - it seems to me that some outside factor must be... factoring in. I've always assumed knuckle cracking was the culprit, but that's pretty much entirely based on the fact that I don't remember always having grip issues, and I haven't always been a knuckle cracker. I suppose I'm operating under the "where there's smoke, there's fire" principle, which may or may not be justified.

I've always been pretty solid at pull-ups. It comes with the territory of being smallish - no matter how out of shape you are, your strength/weight ratio never goes completely into the crapper. I can not work out for a year, and then go and throw down 10 good pull-ups first time out, and be up to 15 after a few days. When I'm really working on them, I can hit 30 good quality ones pretty... well, not "easily", but "consistently".

All of that said, for the first few days/weeks, each set involves doing the first few easily, then having to constantly pause at the bottom (hanging, of course) and re-adjust my grip before each of the remaining pull-ups. My ability to keep my hands in a good position, rotated over the bar as much as possible, is much worse than my ability to actually physically pull myself up.



This is a lot of analytical effort being put into something that's not really a big deal though. My grip strength is just fine after I've been working out for a while. In fact, even when I'm in the neighborhood of doing 25-30, I never use my palms - I'm much more comfortable doing pull-ups with just fingers.

Personally, I was just interested in the knuckle-cracking debate; my grip will be fine, with a little time and effort. I know because I've been through this a half dozen times.


@Syrti - my resolution to quit cracking my knuckles lasted, as I knew it would, about 3.5 minutes. It's impossible to stop doing something that you don't even realize you're doing until you've already been doing it for 5-10 seconds :/

[Izawwlgood]

Oh, that is odd. Your forearms must be crazy weak.

Pull up bar hang time isn't a great metric of grip strength, but yeah, start doing those grip exercises.

[Sytri]

@Samik - I'm the same, I scold myself everytime I catch myself cracking my kunckles. What I've done though is change from bending my fingers back to crack them to pushing them into the palm of my hand. I read somewhere (can't find where, have spent days looking for it) that the reason that your grip deteriorates is that if you crack the kuckles by bending the fingers back it stretches the tendons and decreases their strength. So my thinking is that just pushing them in the direction I need them to always go will avoid deterioration and means I can keep cracking to my hearts content

obviously IANA doctor/ physio/ someone with any medical qualifications and it's purely anecdotal; but it works for me.

As an aside, does anyone know of a good way to toughen up your hands? I'm finding that my fingers are starting to really burn after climbing for a while and it's the pain of that rather than my lack of strength thats stopping me.

[Samik]

Erm. Just wanted to weigh in on the tennis ball thing.

Today was the first day my forearms felt good enough from the last time I climbed to feel like I wanted to do anything with them, and, while I'm sure that eventually (read: when one actually has strength in any significant measure) it will come to function more as an endurance exercise than a strengthening one (a la pushups vs bench) and need to be replaced with something more immediately impactful, I found that I was able to get a pretty fair amount of work out of this particular 50 cent implement.

Nice thing is, much like manual resistance bicep curls, you can pretty much just squeeze at 100% for as long as you can bear; doesn't matter if you weaken as time goes on and compress the ball less and less - 100% is 100%.


Anyway, early opinion is: recommended for people like me with crap grip strength.

Just don't go accidentally slicing off the top of one of your knuckles (pretty much entirely) so you can only squeeze with three fingers on that hand.*



*I'm considering splinting it with popsicle sticks**, taping it up, then going to the climbing gym that way, just to look hyper committed.

**This would require buying popsicles. Which is another incentive.

[Izawwlgood]

Any Bostonians interested, I'll be at the gym in Woburn tomorrow from about 6-8. Come get grippy!

[Sytri]

Have my first lesson on top-roping today! Am like a little child I'm so excited. Been bouldering for a year and have just found the time and money to do the 3 week course they recommend you do before they let you climb/ belay by yourself. Really looking forward to it

[ElCarl]

Recently started rock climbing (nearly two months ago, once a week mostly) mostly bouldering, done a bit of top roping and had one go at a big lead climbing overhang, that was fun. Hard on the grip though!
So much fun. Since the place I go to has some pretty um, strange, gradings (the instructor couldn't do one of the V0s they had set up...) I'm not sure I can say how much I've progressed or anything, but I do know I'm finding it easier, and it's really really fun. Mostly doing V0s and V1s there.
Went to a top-rope focused place on Tuesday (The Reach in London), did a few 5+; 2 slab, 2 vertical. Did a 6a on a slab, couldn't manage the 6a vertical - next time.
Plenty of room to progress

[juststrange]

Leaving Saturday with 5 friends for a week long bouldering tour. 2 days in HorsePens 40 (AL), Rest day, 1 day in Rocktown (GA), Rest day, 1 day in The Stonefort (TN), driving home. Here's hoping my skin holds up, an no ankles are sacrificed. Anyone else travel the dirty south bouldering circuit? Lots of really fun lines down there.

[ElCarl]

Went lead climbing (learning belaying for it, and generally practicing) at Swiss Cottage today; really fun

[Sytri]

Did all my lessons for top rope and am allowed to run free! Yay! Plus it looks like I can safely climb V5s so my challange is to climb V6s woop.

[eaglewings51]

I went rock climbing for the first time since before Christmas break (which started in mid-December). My boyfriend and I went so we bouldered for a little while to get warmed up and then got harnesses and did some top rope. It was pretty fun. We only went for about an hour because we had somewhere else to be. I have definitely gotten worse because I haven't gone in so long. I couldn't make it over this one right angle ledge (coming from underneath). I tried several times and about jerked my arm out of it's socket when I dropped from holding myself up above a hold to falling so I was just hanging from that one arm before letting go.

Oh well. We're planning on getting back into the habit and are going again tomorrow. We really got to know each other when we climbed as friends before we started dating so we want to keep up the tradition of climbing. We joke about our relationship starting out on the rocks so it can only get better from here.

[Jorpho]

Oh, there's a rock climbing thread?

I tried out a nice local indoor facility a while ago. I kind of wanted to do a proper, harnessed climb, but apparently if you want to do that you're actually supposed to bring someone else with you, which I think is kind of a raw deal. So I was stuck with bouldering.

Anyway, while all the floors are cushioned, my first time out I fell a couple of feet and hurt my back quite badly, which was kind of discouraging. I am left at something of a loss as to how to spend my time there, aside from attempt the same walls repeatedly until sufficiently exhausted and/or bored.

[Sytri]

Oh, there's a rock climbing thread?

I tried out a nice local indoor facility a while ago. I kind of wanted to do a proper, harnessed climb, but apparently if you want to do that you're actually supposed to bring someone else with you, which I think is kind of a raw deal. So I was stuck with bouldering.

Anyway, while all the floors are cushioned, my first time out I fell a couple of feet and hurt my back quite badly, which was kind of discouraging. I am left at something of a loss as to how to spend my time there, aside from attempt the same walls repeatedly until sufficiently exhausted and/or bored.

If you want to do a harnessed climb, top rope I'm guessing over lead climbing, then there may be a board at your climbing centre where other single climbers who require partners put up a card. I know my climbing centre has a board full of people looking for partners with similar skill levels.

With bouldering, you have to remember that just because the floor is padded that you still have to bend you knees and absorb the fall.

As for attempting walls repeatedly until exhausted/bored, that's pretty much all climbing is. You climb a wall, drop down and try a harder one. If you do that, drop down and try a hardeer one still; if you don't make it, try to figure out why and correct you technique.

If that doesn't sound like fun to you then maybe you just don't like climbing.

[EvanED]

With bouldering, you have to remember that just because the floor is padded that you still have to bend you knees and absorb the fall.

You'll also figure out (you already intuitively know to some extent) what positions on the wall are secure and so you can push yourself, and what positions are sort of tenuous and you need to watch yourself, so that if you fall you're less likely to take a nastier fall where you don't land on your feet.

[eaglewings51]

I went climbing last week. I've been pushing myself on climbing over a ledge parallel to the floor. It's difficult because it's so wide, I can barely reach with my feet the wall underneath the ledge that's perpendicular to the floor. So it's more difficult to climb.

About partners, see if any of your friends want to climb. That's how I really got to know the guy who became my boyfriend a few weeks later. We both rock climbed and he invited me to go so we'd have each other to belay instead of just bouldering. You don't even really need someone who's exactly your level. They can belay you on a more difficult route and then you belay them on an easier route.

I slipped on some ice coming out of the gym last time and I scraped up my hand pretty good and tweaked my wrist a little. My wrist is feeling better but my hand hasn't quite healed. I'm debating going back to the gym and either taping my palm or just ignoring it and if I get chalk in it, I get chalk in it.

[juststrange]

Made it back, no major injuries!
Drove out Saturday AM, 12 hours on the road at 4 hours between stops, with delicious Waffle House. 2 days in HP40 (AL), 1 day in Rocktown (GA), 1/2 day in The Stonefort (TN), rain came in so we bolted home and hit Coopers Rock (WV) on the way back. 6 days, 1600 miles, 1 bobcat encounter, 1 crushed mailbox, 1 tire explosion at 80mph.

47 problems, 27 of which I had never done or had done from the stand and added the sit start to.

[Simius]

Nice! I've heard a lot of good things about HP40.

I'm going to do some trad climbing in Squamish tomorrow, looking forward to it. The outdoor climbing season is finally starting again!

[Dark567]

I just flat out can't support my weight

That'll come with time. Forearms are pretty hard to work out doing... anything else, so getting into climbing can be a bit of a steep curve for your forearms. Keep doing grip related stuff, and it'll improve your grip! Does your gym have a grip board?

Doing assisted one-arm pull-ups(one arm grabbing the bar facing away from you, other arm grabbing the wrist of the hand gripping the bar) is probably the best thing I know to improve grip. Of course you need to switch back and forth, and have enough grip to do the pull up in the first place.

Like this:

Spoiler:

Or if your strong enough, just do one arm pull-ups.

[Izawwlgood]

I don't feel that really trains grip as much as chest and biceps. The best thing for training grip is getting a squeeze doodad, or working up and down a grip board.

[Kain]

Hanging from a hang board also helps a lot, and is good at the end of a practice when you might be too tired to go up or down a grip board.

[jobriath]

Boulders Beach in Simonstown in the Western Cape of South Africa combines some lovely (granite) rocks with a sea, sand, and penguins. I love that place. Now I'm back in England I can't wait to improve on my bouldering, and hit a real wall soon!

[juststrange]

Nice! I've heard a lot of good things about HP40.

I'm going to do some trad climbing in Squamish tomorrow, looking forward to it. The outdoor climbing season is finally starting again!

Totally going for Cobra Crack? Do it do it do it!

I've heard good things about Squamish, and rumor is the local hardman in my hood was dangerously close to sending Dreamcatcher recently, but no luck. Funny you say the season is just starting there, its effectively ending here - Give me 50/60F and low humidity and I'm happy. This weekend was 80F out at the park and while stuff was still getting done, it was not comfortable.

( I will admit that at one point in time I was one of those boulderers with a beanie but no shirt on. I have learned the errors of my ways - maybe )

[emceng]

I've been climbing on and off for 15 years. Typically find someone who wants to go, do 5 or so climbs in a month or two, then stop for x years. Just got back into it after 3 years off. Bought a harness this time, and have someone that should be able to climb with me fairly regularly. The local gym has auto-belays, but I don't like them near as much.

Last time I went, I walked out of the gym and my forearms were absolutely spent. I tried on a harness and it took 5 minutes to do the buckles because I had no strength. Typed an email at home later, and pretty much 1 fingered it because I couldn't move my fingers at any sort of speed.

[Kain]

Okay, so I won a gift certificate for one pair of La Sportiva shoes, and I have no idea which ones to choice as the second or third choice if the first are "out of stock." Other than Testarossa, do any of you have any recommendations for nice and aggressive LS shoes, when price is for once not a concern? (I tend to focus on bouldering, lets say a solid V4 level by the time these shoes would get in)

[Izawwlgood]

By aggressive, do you mean 'meant for overhangs'? I liked my sportivas, but they're wearing thin at this point. My next shoes, the only thing I'll really look for is velcro; lacing up my shoes is getting annoying.

[Kain]

Overhangs would be a plus, given that that seems to be our gym's prime focus...
You could always go with Evolve Defies, if your only concern is velcro