the titanic, round 2

apparently ice can sink more than huge ships of yore, because tomorrow's float the boat comp at boat rock has been postponed. the boulders have frozen over after a spurt of bad weather thursday night. its unfortunate they chose next saturday as the rain date; it overlaps with  a snowboarding/rock climbing/whitewater canoeing trip, so i will not be able to compete.

they should have changed it to a mixed bouldering comp:

fancy mixed (rock/ice) climbing move

anyway, now i'm hauling up to rumbling bald tomorrow with adam, george, and one of george's friends. hopefully we're gonna use the cold temps (high of 31, feels like 22) to send like crazy. we'll see...

intro to training for climbing

i am by no means a training expert. the following is simply my understanding and what i have come across while researching for my own training regimen.

it seems like every strong guy or girl at the gym or local crag/boulders/whatever has a different training plan that got them strong, ranging from "ya bro, i just climb all the time" to "get on a hangboard for x hours a week" to "i just sit on my ass and eat a lot." honestly, all of the above will probably make you a better climber to some extent (well, except the last one), but i am going to simplify it for you, and hopefully explain what it is that helps you.

there are many training techniques used to become a stronger climber. in this context i mean "stronger" in a purely physical sense - not common climber context, which is interchangeable with "good". all these techniques fall into what are essentially 3 and a half different physical attributes: (1) your aerobic endurance, (2) anaerobic endurance, (3) strength/power, (1/2) contact strength.

aerobic endurance - how long you can go without getting a pump. raising your aerobic endurance increases the difficulty at which you can climb before anaerobic energy production begins/lactic acid starts building up/you get pumped

anaerobic endurance - once pumped, this is how long you can tolerate the pain before you pump out and fall. this also plays a large part in stamina, which is your ability to recover from high-intensity work. raising your anaerobic endurance will let you continue to climb longer once you start getting pumped; raising your stamina will increase how many high quality attempts you can make on your project over the course of a day

strength/power - how physically strong you are as a whole/your ability to apply that strength quickly. they are separate but similar, so for our purposes we will talk about them together. an increase in strength will raise your ability to lock off or campus; an increase in power will help with dynos and quick movements off of hand holds.

contact strength - refers to local strength in your forearms and how much force you can exert through your fingers. increasing your contact strength will make it easier to use smaller holds. contact strength is extremely dependent on the situation: you can be really strong on crimps and small edges, while at the same time horrible at slopers or pinches. some people include this with strength/power, but as it is entirely possible to be able to do 100 pull ups and at the same time not climb a v2, i am separating them.

i will elaborate on each of these, one at a time, in the future. the specific posts will be much more in depth and include exercises to train each attribute. i plan to get a training section up on here, with links to notable training websites and other good information. unfortunately, i'm swamped with work, so it may be a while before this is done. bear with me

lastly, i will say that no matter how hard you train, if your technique sucks it will mostly be in vain. unless you've been climbing a long time, it is probably better for you to work on footwork/turning/fluid movement than squeeze off another campus burn at the end of a session

thoughts on the scarpa stix

in august, when my beloved 5.10 galileos kicked the bucket, i decided it was time for me to get some new kicks. while looking for a pair of la sportiva solutions i stumbled across these almost by accident, the scarpa stix. they were on sale and i had a friend who swears by their velcro-clad brethren, so i figured what the hell and went home a proud new owner.

fit/sizing
i have a big, very full foot, and usually wear a size 12 in tennis shoes. sometimes i can squeeze into an 11.5 or have to bump up to a 13, depending on the brand. i was apprehensive about going with slippers, but surprisingly was able to squeeze into a euro size 43.5. they were numbly tight around the middle of my foot, so i decided to go with a 44. although these are slippers, they have a good deal of elastic in the forefoot of the shoe, and as such are very accommodating for those with thick feet. it should also be noted that these shoes have a deep heel pocket.

the rubber

the rubber on these shoes is pretty sweet. it grips well, and covers a large portion of the shoe. there is plenty of rubber on the center of the toe, but on both sides the supple lorica is exposed. while this material scuffs up easily, it seems very durable and i have not had any problems with it wearing thin. i tried to "upgrade" this issue with the 5.10 stealth rubber kit, but i'll save that for another post. the heel is definitely minimalist, with rubber only where you need it most. this is especially obvious to anyone who has climbed in a pair of mad rock hookers (or similar), which have the entire heel cup covered in rubber. it should be stated, though, i have yet to find myself wanting for more back there.

how they climb

these shoes are very aggressive. they downturn like a son of a gun and the rand puts all the power on your big toe. as you could guess, where the scarpa stix really shine is the steep stuff. it seems the closer to horizontal you get, the better these things work. they are by far be best toe hooking shoes i have ever climbed in, and have proven adequate for all but the most demanding heel hooks. being a slip-on, they do not have the heel hooking prowess of a velcro or lace-up, but so far i have only found one time when i hooked my way out of the shoe. while uncomfortable, they do alright edging and on climbs of the vertical persuasion. i've never had an issue with blowing off holds, but thin edges are definitely not where they excel, if for no other reason than the intense pain that goes along with it.

how they age

the one thing i was afraid of with these shoes is their unlined leather nature. luckily, the toebox is a synthetic material called lorica that is both comfortable and does not stretch. after 4 months of use, the toebox feels exactly the same as it did when i first bought them. the upper seems to have stretched some, because they are much easier to put on now, but do not feel looser on my feet when climbing. the fit seems to come from the toe box and heel cup, so as of now it is a non-issue.

in summary

9 times out of 10 these are my go-to shoe, with slab and crack climbs being the only time i reach for something else. they surprised me with how good they are, and if you get a chance to pick up a pair of these or their velcro (booster) and lace-up (mago) brothers for a good price, go for it.

     booster

 

     mago

in fact, i think i may pick up a pair of the scarpa magos to use as my next pair of outdoor route shoes...

new years resolutions

happy new years everybody!

i know, i'm a few days late. sue me.

with this new year ahead of us, i figured it was time to make some resolutions for a kick ass year. they cover several different topics, so for convenience i'm going to break them up into 3 categories: climbing, school, and life.

climbing resolutions
because i'm optimistic, i have several:
1. train more, instead of just climbing whatever tickles my fancy at the gym
2. set some goals and keep track of what i have climbed and what i want to climb in the future
3. become a more well rounded climber, aka take something besides bouldering seriously from a performace viewpoint
4. work on my head game

school resolutions
due to a slight priority mix up, i have fewer of these:
1. get my scholarships back
2. find out exactly what kind of engineer i want to become
3. talk to my professors outside of lecture

life resolutions
for stuff that doesn't fall into the other two categories:
1. remember people's names the first time they tell them to me.
2. be less condescending
3. keep in touch with people

i'll be back with a more detailed plan to carry these out later

ok, we're live

i figure i'll start this thing off with a recap of how my climbing year has gone this far.

i apologize in advance about the spray, feel free to skip this paragraph if that's not your thing. this time last year, i was a v2/3-ish gym climber with almost no experience climbing outdoors but a deep yearning to figure it all out. now i have successfully sent a handful of v5's and can at least work a few v6's and v7's, as well as redpointed a couple of 5.8-5.10's and miraculously onsighted a 5.10c. i have lead exactly one route in the traditional ethic, scaring myself senseless in the process, and know a good deal about building safe and equalized anchors. finally, i managed to get a job at the clemson climbing wall and next semester will be a climbing guide for c.o.r.e. (clemson outdoor recreation and education).

talk about a the difference a year can make, huh?

there are three main things that made all this possible.

1) getting a job at the climbing wall - this was awesome. i was getting paid to do what i would rather be doing anyway. in learning how to set anything worth climbing, i spent tons of time thinking about climbing movement and understanding how ones body wants to move over rock (or plastic, in this case). i felt this, as well as the exorbitant amount of climbing i was squeezing in per week, led to a huge improvement in my climbing ability. probably the greatest perk of working at a gym was getting to know almost everybody that comes through the place on a regular basis, which leads to...

2) ...awesome people to climb with. a lot of my improvement as a climber can be chalked up to friends pushing me to get on stuff that i would have scoffed at as being too hard, or finish something that i would have otherwise punted off of. positive encouragement is a huge part a successful climbing session, and if there is anything the three of you (or so) that are still reading can take away from this, here it is: dump all your climbing buddies that are super negative or tell you that you can't do it when you think of pushing your personal envelope. besides climbing with positive people, climbing with people much stronger than me also helped a good deal. i found out that sometimes linking 2 or 3 moves on something three grades harder than my current best can seem almost as satisfying as sending an easier problem. plus, it gives you something to work towards.

it is also fun to have friends that prefer another type of climbing than just bouldering. without the constant "when are you going to get on a rope/lead climb/learn to place gear?" i would have never gotten seriously interested in those things. that's actually a lie, but it probably would not have happened this year without their nagging/encouragement/invitations to go.

3) shoulder surgery. now i know it seems like going under the knife to have my labrum repaired, and not being able to climb all summer may not seem like something that made me stronger, but hear me out. before i dislocated my shoulder playing rugby, i was starting to plateau around the v3/v4 barrier. realizing that i only had a month or so of climbing before 3 months of no climbing motivated me like nothing else. i started taking each and every session, indoors or out, much more seriously; this lead to my bursting through my plateau right before (2 days, in fact) i went under the knife.

there was a bad part of surgery too: then end of my rugby career. i love the sport and loved playing even more. i miss it greatly, but finally found a positive way to look at it. without rugby practice everyday from 5-7, i am able to climb without being worn out beforehand. it also freed up my weekends for climbing trips; used to, after a match on saturday, i would sometimes be so beat up that i could not physically climb come sunday. not playing rugby also caused me to approach climbing differently. for the first time in my life i am not playing a competitive sport, so i figure i might as well be the best climber as i physically can; especially considering how much time i put into it.

i'll get something new up soon