[FlorianD]

Hello !

I'm a french climber who had started to climb the 15th september, when a bouldering gym opened really close to my house. I've always had, in my mind, the will to do some climbing, so I went for it ! I usually manage to go 3 to 4 times a week, for at least 2h, and I've seen progress from a rough 4 Fontainebleau (V0, I think) to recently some 6b (V4). After many fails on "finger" boulder (tiny holds, slopers), I decided that it could be a good idea to train a bit more specificaly.
I looked around french shops and websites in order to buy a training board, and I saw some beautiful wooden boards made by crusherholds and beastmaker. As I'm about to spend few days in London this month, I could came back with one in my luggage ! But I'm wondering wich fingerboard will be the more adapted to me. That's why I created this post on an english board, because none of the french board I use to read have information.
Please excuse me if my english is in some way bad, and thank you for your answers,

Florian

[SA Chris]

Salut. Nothing wrong with your English at all, considerably better than my French. Going to be an interesting response though, as the makes of both these finger boards use this website.

The truth is both are excellent products and either would be fine.

[tomtom]

If you're going for a BeastMaker, I would go for the 1000 model - I have both and despite climbing more in the range the 2000 should cover (7A and higher) I prefer using the 1000 - the big holds are better for warming up and the smaller ones are pretty much as small as on the 2000...

[Drew]

I would suggest not to buy either. In fact don't buy one at all. Someone else will be able to explain better, but essentially if you strengthen the muscles making your fingers stronger, you will probably damage the tendons (?) keeping the ligaments (?) in place.

You should spend more time improving technique, and footwork. Strength gains should be slow initially. Don't rush in or you'll break yourself quickly.

[ghisino]

Someone else will be able to explain better...

a) tendons and pulleys are said to get stronger at a slower pace than muscles.

b) if a finger flexor muscle is too weak for a given hold, you simply won't hold it (forearm muscular injuries are extremely rare!)

c)If a finger flexor tendon or a pulley are too weak for a given hold, they will get injuried.


the combination of a,b and c makes that fingerboarding is relatively more risky in the early years than later on climbing career, unless you are very gentle and stay away from maximal efforts.


a relatively safe way to get stronger fingers is getting lighter, assuming you're not too skinny to start with...

[Moo]

I had a session on a crusher fingerboard once and afterwards I had HIV. Then I went and trained on a beastmaker and my latest swab test came up clean, say no more

[peewee]

I had a session on a crusher fingerboard once and afterwards I had HIV. Then I went and trained on a beastmaker and my latest swab test came up clean, say no more

That's what you get from Hanging About. 

[duncan]

I have a beastmaker 2000.  I'm barely strong enough to use the larger holds and probably should swap it for a 1000 but I was an early adopter (get me) and 1000s didn't exist when I wanted to get a fingerboard.  In any case, I like the slim elegant lines of the 2000 better than the slightly chubby 1000, and this is important.  I feel inspired to use it and, intermittently, I do.  And lets face it, by far the most important thing about any fingerboard is that you use the thing.   

It seems to me that fingerboards are useful if you can't go bouldering as often as you would like (like me) or your climbing wall favours large blobby holds over than anything resembling rock (like mine, alas) or you are operating at a high standard and have a specific finger weakness (emphatically not like me).

Regarding tendon (and other non-contractile soft-tissues like pulleys) versus muscle development.  Serpico posted a link sometime back which challenged the view that tendons strengthen more slowly than muscles.  I wish I could find it and have a proper read but I remember being reasonably convinced.  It would be a poor piece of evolutionary design if muscles got a lot stronger than tendons a lot more quickly. 

[mrjonathanr]

https://www.gymnasticbodies.com/forum/topic/3323-steady-state-training-cycle/
Krank pointed out this site to me. Some of the guys posting are top level gymnastics coaches eg coach Sommer. As a sport we are decades behind. You might want to read their ideas on steady state strength training.

[ghisino]

Regarding tendon (and other non-contractile soft-tissues like pulleys) versus muscle development.  Serpico posted a link sometime back which challenged the view that tendons strengthen more slowly than muscles.

would be great if someone could resurrect it...

my very anedoctical experience points to something vaguely similar to that concept, even though it can be totally dependent on the wrong reasons...

[Schnell]

This maybe: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17596783

Taken from this slightly inconclusive thread: http://www.rockclimbing.com/forum/Climbing_Information_C2/Technique_%26_Training_F36/Exactly_how_does_climbing_strengthen_tendons_P2261817/

[John Gillott]

While it might be true in general that tendons etc can and do adapt at the same speed as muscle strength develops, I'd always presumed (or read it somewhere and have now forgotten where and when) that there is a specific issue / problem to do with finger pulleys and ligaments. Clearly, we evolved to have some finger strength, but isn't the extreme loading caused by the dynamic use of very small holds in modern climbing somewhat outside of humans' evolutionary history? If it is, is this relevant?

[Probes]

  go to https://www.facebook.com/pages/Crusher-Holds/254271731253995 and 'like' you've got the chance to win one and you'll be half way to answering your question 

[Monolith]

https://www.gymnasticbodies.com/forum/topic/3323-steady-state-training-cycle/
Krank pointed out this site to me. Some of the guys posting are top level gymnastics coaches eg coach Sommer. As a sport we are decades behind. You might want to read their ideas on steady state strength training.

That's a very enlightening read thanks for that. I've certainly been injured of trying to go too big too fast after layoffs. I shall take heed.

[mrjonathanr]

Thanks. I thought this #39 on this page was interesting:
https://www.gymnasticbodies.com/forum/topic/3323-steady-state-training-cycle/page-2

[FlorianD]

Thanks a lot for all your answer, which gave me lots of reading ! I decided not to buy any hangboard, and wait for few more months. I had already heard about the pulley/ligaments/tendons vs. forearm muscles, but I wanted to ask anyway... My gym have a very good "opening" (don't know the exact word - ah, I think of route setting, is that ok ?), with one international route setters, few french national setters and many very good Bleau climbers who use to set route, so it's vary from dyno and big holds to compression movements and tiny holds with precise footwork. I guess I will continue to progress anyway, so I'll be back in 9 months, asking the same question again.

Anyway, thanks again for the answering !