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Ancillary excercises: weekly sessions or weekly blocks? (Read 4712 times)

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After a grand total of around seven rock climbing days this year, and riding high on the crest of the recent Dolomites trip, it's time to start training again.
Not that I ever stopped, by the way.
Anyway, aside from the climbing-specific training, I currently use three main tools for ancillary excercise: weights, rings, hill sprints and boxing bag.
The hill sprints aren't much of a problem, in terms of planning. I can fit them in whenever I like.
I was wondering, for the other tools, whether it would be better to train each one once per week, or doing weekly blocks of each single tool.
Weekly sessions could give more continuity but could be harder to plan due to other committments; weekly blocks could give more specific gains but each tool would be used only once in a month, because after three mixed weeks (board climbing + ancillary excercises) I dedicate one week just to board climbing.
Please help.

Sasquatch

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I think it depends on how you're training them.  If you're doing heavy strength based weights work, particularly full body, then I'd say each once a week.  Doing three heavy lifting days in a week would likely result in pretty significant CNS fatigue for me, which would make the climbing work pretty minimal that week.  I'm not sure how your body handles it though. 

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Hey!
Cheers Sasq, that's an interesting perspective.
I've been focusing, and I will be in the future, on speed and explosiveness, with very little volume, so your call sounds about right.
Must reflect over it.
Many thanks.

Rocksteady

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How are you using the heavy bag Nibs? You could use it for warming up for your climbing pretty effectively multiple times a week. But if you're trying to do a proper heavy bag workout to develop punching power the normal rules of power development apply, and you wouldn't want to do more than 2 workouts a week. If you're doing loads of power workouts already it might be too much.

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Hey!
To be honest I hadn't thought about using the bag for warming up. I think that the same kind of recruitment that I would search could be obtained also with mirror boxing, avoiding the hits on the hands and arms.
For a serious pre-session recruitment I've found snatches and jumps absolutely brilliant.

I use the bag mostly (because it's so fucking cool and) to develop speed and therefor power. It's brutal on the shoulders, upper back, traps, all midsection, even glutes. So, a classic power finisher with all its effects: boosting metabolism, testosterone production, muscle mass and power.
So yes, I definitely have to fit it among all the other power routines...
Let's see.

Thanks for the input!

filz

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Cheers Lore, I would consider what are the goals with these exercises and how they help you with your main goals.

If the goal is improve speed and so power IMHO sprints, boxing, some weight training are interchangeable and you can do the ones you prefer or work the muscles who are less tired.
For other exercises (rings, weights) the goal might be to work antagonists so you are less prone to injury. These too become interchangeable.

On the other hand if the goal is, let's say, do the iron cross :) (i.e. becoming very good at performing a specific excercise) then you probably need to train it regularly for some time.

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Hey!
Let's say that the overall goal of these excercises is to keep good physical form, increase speed and power output and keep body fat low with good muscle mass.
Of course, each one of these excercises have a specific goal, so for instance, I want to do an iron cross sooner or later, and also maybe clean my bodyweight and more...
 ;)
I think it's going to be an interesting Winter...

filz

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And you forgot climb stronger than ever  ;D :strongbench:

Gus

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Currently doing quite a lot of muay thai/ kickboxing training mixed in with climbing. Can't imagine trying to climb or do climbing specific training with more than one heavy bag session a week. Absolutely brutal! Took me a month or two do be able to do anything with a decent amount of strength and power for 2-3 days afterwards!

It's better now, and I've got a solid level of fitness but it defo still takes a lot out of me. Personally I'd do any climbing specific shizzle before hitting the bag (I often do a fingerboard sesh before heading down to training or sparring)

Hope this helps!

 :boxing:

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Classic, but not always remembered would be to make sure you do "primary goal" exercises first, and dynamic/complex/intense first followed by secondary/lower intensity/static. 

:)

Doesn't change the weekly aspect, but it matters when you're trying to fit that much stuff into 1 week.

Nibile

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Cheers beast, that's something that is always useful to have well clear!
I'm starting to find my way around these things, for instance I've found out that the boxing bag is quite right after my PE sessions, when my forearms are so tired that lifting heavy is out of question.
I could always do some dumbbell complex or the likes, but the bag is the dog's!

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I used to love working the heavy bag, beast workout. I still can't quite see it's applicability to climbing power though? I used to have decent knockout punching power (or considerably above average in my old MMA club), but my climbing power is relatively poor (below average for a regular boulderer). I guess foot and hip drive are perhaps transferrable, but the upper body movement above the hips is really different?

Are you using it for a general finisher to trash yourself?

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Yes, I'm mainly using the bag as a finisher, but its benefits are highly transferrable to climbing.
The movement pattern is different, but the muscles are more or less the same that you're going to use while climbing.
I am mostly working on speed, fast combinations of various punches, more than punching power, and this translates very well to climbing because all the upper body muscles learn to "fire" quicker and more simultaneously. Being able to contract more fibers at once, and faster, is key for strength.
Also, I particularly like combinations with hook punches, so I work heavily on obliques, hips and glutes due to the rotation.
Every punch puts all the upper back muscles under heavy stress, because they have to bear the shock of the punch itself, and they have to stabilize the arms and shoulders, so these muscles grow quite stronger using different stimuli and movement patterns. So far it's been a killer excercise to stay fit, maintain muscle mass and lose some fat.

Murph

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Being able to contract more fibers at once, and faster, is key for strength.

Hey nibs do you mean power rather than strength?

I'm thinking how this might be helpful for dynos, though also the sorts of training suggested for improving standing vertical jump could help there too - squats, box jumps, that thing where you quickly jump left and right, etc. Does heavy bag get lower body power levels up too?

Not asking totally randomly, I think I need to train power somehow too. But thinking obviously isn't doing...




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Hey Murph, yes I was referring to both strength and power in fact, the term strength was not specific.
In the last years I've been focusing more on full body strength and power rather than concentrating just on climbing specific muscle groups or movement patterns.
Strength, and power, are systemic: full body involvement will give greater gains than isolation. Bear in mind that I mostly climb on my board that is 53 degrees, so full body strength/power is highly required.
I've seen big big gains from this approach, and not necessarily in dynos.
For lower body, as I was saying, the bag isn't so focused - at least not at the punter level at which I'm using it - so, whenever I can I do hill sprints, jumps and sometimes also a variation of the Litvinov: a heavy lift followed by broad jumps.
All these excercises are crucial to boost the effects of the climbing specific training.

For instance, on my board I only use flat, non incut small wooden footholds. It's impossible to stay put unless your full body works at the same time on every move. So all the training I do is aimed at that, and on rock it pays.

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Here's a couple of videos to show what kind of sessions I do with the bag. Jesus I was tired!




 

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