Training

I came across quite an interesting topic the other day, whether stretching before a workout (climbing in our case) is actually worth it. I became interested when I read the line "In the last few years, several studies have found static stretching before playing a sport makes you slower and weaker." This seemed to go against the usual idea of stretching sufficiently before a climbing session, static stretching in particular. Stretching was always one of those admin things you "should" do before a workout, but never actually feel like it or get around to doing. As it turns out we're actually doing ourselves a favour by forgetting to stretch. When we stretch, our muscles try to react against over-stretching and contract and become tighter, this in turn results in the muscles becoming weaker and incapable of moving as fast or as freely. Its like we are destabilising our muscles and putting them at greater risk of being pulled. So all this goes against the conventional wisdom of stretching beforehand, but it doesn't diminish the value of stretching in general, as it can be very effective when done on it's own. Yoga makes perfect use of this, and the benefits are widespread. On the other hand, active stretching, which is basically movement incorporating stretches, are still meant to be beneficial before a workout, but I'm not sure who actually stretches like that. Apparently this research on stretching has been around for quite some time, its just that people have never really taken too much interest, and so the usual ideas around stretching remain. All of this doesn't mean that we don't need to warm up before a session at the wall or outdoors, as blood flow to all our muscles and joints is very important for maximising performance as well as minimising injury, with the fingers being vitally important.


Pre-Work Out Stretching by Maria Cheng

Me stretching out on "Spoon" (7C) at Ezemvelo. Photo by Calvin Kemp.

On another note, I've been trying to boost my power in my bouldering, its something that I've wanted to do in order to give me that boost on those harder problems. Sometimes my slightly shorter reach makes moves that much more difficult, but hard dyno problems also feel out of reach. I've managed to get the technique right for dynos, by staying close to the rock, and trying to engage the arms and legs fully, I just lack the raw power to go far enough. So the best option to get there at this point in time is hyper-gravity training, which is basically just training with a weight belt. This isn't a very good idea if you have any finger or muscle tweaks, and is best done when you're feeling in good shape, and now after a season of boulder league I think all the components are in good enough shape to handle the extra weight. I have been training at the UCT wall with a weight belt here and there, trying to repeat boulder league problems with the added weight of 4kgs, which certainly makes everything harder. The belt doesn't sit at your centre of gravity, and so on more dynamic moves you can get thrown off quite a bit. The article I'm talking about here mentions three ways to boost strength through hyper-gravity training, and the one I'm most interested in are the basic weighted pull ups. All it takes is adding sufficient weight to your weight belt so that you can't do over 20 pull ups, and then doing three sets to failure, with your third set probably failing at around 10. If you can't do 20 pull ups its probably best to start doing them without weight, and building up until you can do over 20. So all this sounds like so much fun, and I'd rather go to the wall or even outdoors for a night bouldering session, but end of the day it can be a very quick session at home on a pull up bar that can get you strong quickly. When you lack that time during the week, and have to try fit in everything you want to do after work, it can really help.

Developing Uber Strength by Eric J. Hörst

Luke Gregor hitting the dyno on one the the Boulder League problems at the UCT Wall. 

Photo by Calvin Kemp