[Luke Owens]

I did do a search and found the odd bit of info on this type of PE training but could only find one thread specifically to do with it which had little info.

I've read people have had good PE gains from doing this and I was wondering what peoples workout's are like? The ones I've found are quite different such as:

1. 30 Moves then 2 minutes rest x 5
2. 3 Minutes on 3 Minutes off x 10
3. 1 Minute on 1 Minute rest repeat until failure

What are your opinions on going until failure as opposed to getting pumped stupid and stopping for a rest just before completely burn out?

I know it's all relative to what you want to gain out of it. In my case I'm looking to incorporate this 3 times a week at home. I have a 20mm campus rung under my BM2000. Starting matched on the rung then moving up to the 25's then to the 30mm outside BM slots then back down to the rung, repeat etc.

I've climbed plenty of F7a's, a F7a+ and a F7b. I've only managed these because they've suited me well (not steep) and most have very good rest spots with short hard sections. I know I'd have no chance at a pumpy 6c!

I'm bouldering at 7A now and I know I'm strong enough for the moves up to F7b/+'s it's just the harrowing pump and powering out stopping me progressing.

Interestingly, yesterday my girlfriend and I challenged each other to see who could stay on the longest using the above feet on campus rung fingerboard combo. She managed 1 Minute 50 secs only having to dig deep in the last 10 secs. I managed 1 Minute 10 secs and I was gurning like crazy within the first 40 secs... and she "only" climbs F6a...!

I've chose this method of training due to being able to do it at home and having limited time. Any time I get to go outdoors i'll take rather than doing circuits in a gym for example.

It's an obvious weakness of mine so any advice would be great.

Cheers

[Wood FT]

5 x 40 moves, 2 minutes rest between. 5 sets with 10 minutes rest between, doing this twice a week. Really helped on my last trip and something i'll be continuing to do, I don't find it too boring really. . .

I'm bouldering at 7A now and I know I'm strong enough for the moves up to F7b/+'s it's just the harrowing pump and powering out stopping me progressing.

Apologies if this isn't you but sorting your head might help? I found that teaching myself to climb effectively when pumped was really important, to be able to breathe and not panic becuase the lactic was coming on. I've always been jealous of my mates who 'ride the pump' and love the fight so I'm trying to embrace it. I don't know how you'd go about this on your fingerboard set-up though.

[Luke Owens]

5 x 40 moves, 2 minutes rest between. 5 sets with 10 minutes rest between, doing this twice a week. Really helped on my last trip and something I'll be continuing to do, I don't find it too boring really. . .

Thanks for the reply, that workout sounds good, as I tried the 3mins on 3 mins off and I could only manage 1 minute 10. Think I'd manage the 40 moves. Sounds good, surprisingly I don't find it boring either, feels quite addictive actually...

Do you complete the whole workout (feeling boxed I imagine) or go until failure?

Apologies if this isn't you but sorting your head might help? I found that teaching myself to climb effectively when pumped was really important, to be able to breathe and not panic because the lactic was coming on. I've always been jealous of my mates who 'ride the pump' and love the fight so I'm trying to embrace it. I don't know how you'd go about this on your fingerboard setup though.

I did wonder this and put it to the test when I went out on Sunday, I deliberately got on a pumpy 7a, which starts on steep moves to get the pump going straight away, I was making it to the last bolt and concentrating on fighting the pump to the point where I litrally came off because I couldn't hold on. I think the feet on stuff will be good for mentally fighting the pump too.

I'll focus on climbing efficiently when the lactic is burning too, as I have a tendency to go a bit scrappy with the feet when I'm on the edge!

[standard]

I've used the system that ste mac suggests, which is 1,1,4,6,6,4,2,1,1, switch leading arm.
http://rockclimbinguk.co.uk/steve-mcclure-on-training-power-endurance/

It seems to work well for me.

However, this has wrecked my skin, particularly my pinky, as when super pumped towards the end, I start slapping and dragging heavily.
I've had to tape my pinky to avoid this.

[Wood FT]

5 x 40 moves, 2 minutes rest between. 5 sets with 10 minutes rest between, doing this twice a week. Really helped on my last trip and something I'll be continuing to do, I don't find it too boring really. . .

Thanks for the reply, that workout sounds good, as I tried the 3mins on 3 mins off and I could only manage 1 minute 10. Think I'd manage the 40 moves. Sounds good, surprisingly I don't find it boring either, feels quite addictive actually...

Do you complete the whole workout (feeling boxed I imagine) or go until failure?

I'd be struggling to finish each set, after the 2nd or 3rd, but do finish them which seemed about right. I used to do 1min30 on with 4/5 minutes rest and do this 4 times but I couldn't really complete this at all, also got told the rest was too long.

as I have a tendency to go a bit scrappy with the feet when I'm on the edge!

everyone loves a good gipppin' finish

[Luke Owens]

I'd be struggling to finish each set, after the 2nd or 3rd, but do finish them which seemed about right. I used to do 1min30 on with 4/5 minutes rest and do this 4 times but I couldn't really complete this at all, also got told the rest was too long.

Does your workout take about 2 hours? Each set about 15 minutes x 5 plus the 10 minutes rest x 5. Sounds killer!

[Wood FT]

it's never felt that long but yeah it should be that time, blimey times flies down t'wall.

[Luke Owens]

OK so I'm attempting to get some structure to my endurance training and at the same time trying my best to understand the energy systems.

I have a plan for working all the systems in different sessions it's just how to order these over an 8 week (to long to short?) period.

Please correct me if these are incorrect:

AeroCap - Low intensity - 20 - 30 minutes moving hangs resting on jugs to keep intensity low.

AnCap - 30 moves 2 mins rest x 3 - Rest 10 minutes complete 5 sets.

AeroPower - 20 moves, 20 sec rest x 3 - rest 20 secs complete 3 sets.

AnPower - 10 moves, 10 sec rest x 4 - 10 sec rest complete 4 sets.

Am I in the right direction with these?

I'm wondering how to fit these into a cycle. I was thinking:

Week 1 - 4 - AeroCap x 2/3, AnCap x 2 (per week)
Week 4 - 8 - AeroCap x 1, AnCap x 1, AeroPower x 1, Anpower x 1 (per week)

All these will be in addition to actual outdoor climbing twice a week. I'm hoping I can figure out something to train the above using the feet on fingerboarding technique in my previous posts.

I've no idea if the above makes sense, but I hope I'm in the right direction. Any advice would be appreciated.

Cheers

[Rocksteady]

I find it quite hard putting this stuff together too.

But what I remember from Binney's paper (on the wiki)

Aerocap needs 2 months for adaptions to take effect
Ancap takes 4 months to take effect
Aeropow takes around 1-2 months and Anpow takes a similar amount.

So Ancap is something to be trained long term, Aerocap is a base on which to build a 2 month programme of aeropow, anpow.

[jstrongman]

Hi Luke

I started doing this about 3 weeks ago leading on from the two month endurance thread. I started pretty much where you are, (sets of about 1.30-1.40 and totally blasted). I changed my target to 2 mins on 3 mins off, after about a week and a half I achieved a full set of 3 x 2 mins, then have been adding 15 seconds as I have got fitter and am now doing sets of 3 x 2.30 on 3 mins rest. The transfer to outside has been the amazing and I have found it has given me the extra bit to finish things off, rather than powerout and fall off the last hard move.

I have found the exercise gets more painful as you get fitter, as you can push further and further into the pump and it also gets more boring as you are on the campus board for longer. I have started to experiment with doing more of a routine to make it a bit more interesting and more like climbing, which has been good but you get pumped quicker again so may save that until I reach 3x3mins

[highrepute]

This look pretty good to me.

You have a fitness period which will help build and base followed by a higher intensity period.

I'm a believer that what you are training needs to be strongly aligned with your goals, otherwise you may loose direction/motivation. I say this because you are trying to train everything at once in the second 4 weeks when perhaps you could be more focused towards a goal?

Your sessions add up to 6 a week. this is a lot.  Rest is important and 1 day a week doesn't seem a lot. Aerocap can be done at the end of a session giving you more rest days.

The adaptation times that racksteady quotes seem very long. I would say 4 weeks of laddering on a campus 3 times a week and you see a significant improvement.

go to it!

[Luke Owens]

Thanks for the responses guys!

Hi Luke

I started doing this about 3 weeks ago leading on from the two month endurance thread. I started pretty much where you are, (sets of about 1.30-1.40 and totally blasted). I changed my target to 2 mins on 3 mins off, after about a week and a half I achieved a full set of 3 x 2 mins, then have been adding 15 seconds as I have got fitter and am now doing sets of 3 x 2.30 on 3 mins rest. The transfer to outside has been the amazing and I have found it has given me the extra bit to finish things off, rather than powerout and fall off the last hard move.

That's great to hear you've made good gains so quickly! It's got me psyched as I've only started with the AeroCap and AnCap this week.

This look pretty good to me.

You have a fitness period which will help build and base followed by a higher intensity period.

I'm a believer that what you are training needs to be strongly aligned with your goals, otherwise you may loose direction/motivation. I say this because you are trying to train everything at once in the second 4 weeks when perhaps you could be more focused towards a goal?

Your sessions add up to 6 a week. this is a lot.  Rest is important and 1 day a week doesn't seem a lot. Aerocap can be done at the end of a session giving you more rest days.

The adaptation times that racksteady quotes seem very long. I would say 4 weeks of laddering on a campus 3 times a week and you see a significant improvement.

go to it!

That's a good idea I think after the 4 weeks I'll adapt the workouts to mirror a specific route goal.

I've planned to do for the first 4 weeks the AnCap on it's own day and the Aerocap after each outdoor session. So 4 days on a week plenty of time for rest then.

Regarding the adaption times, if what Rocksteady has quoted rings true would that mean you would need to consistently train AnCap for 4 months for it to have significant improvement?

[highrepute]

Regarding the adaption times, if what Rocksteady has quoted rings true would that mean you would need to consistently train AnCap for 4 months for it to have significant improvement?

Everything that i've read says you'll adapt very quickly and plateau in 6-8weeks.

I can't find a reference for this right now.

However, this doesn't mean you reach your max ancap in 8 weeks. it means there's no point training for more than 8 weeks straight. do something else for a bit then come back to it.

Conversley, 4 months route training seems reasonable if you want to improve year-on-year.

[Adam Lincoln]

I do 5 mins on, 5 mins off on the campus board. Usually 5 or 6 sets, find this really helps.

[jimbob]

I am a big fan of foot on campus training.

The repetition of the same movement allows opportunity to study how movement works, and how the same move can be done in many ways.

Try adjusting the amount of force applied from the feet or from the fingers.
Try focusing only on transferring power up from your toes.
Adjust the speed of hand movement and see how this affects your results.

I found that by practising foot on campusing whilst focusing on driving up from my feet, and not pulling harder with my fingers, resulted in better performance.

Always aim to become more efficient and perform each set with less effort.

Maintain awareness of the whole body, and breathe steadily.

[Luke Owens]

Thanks for the further replies guys.

So, last night I tried an AnCap workout. It went like this:

2 x (30 moves 2 mins rest x 3 - Rest 5 minutes)
3 x (40 moves 2 mins rest x 3 - Rest 5 minutes)

Took about an hour in total.

I orginally planned for all sets to be 30 moves but I didn't feel it was pushing me enough.

From my experiance with it I did the first 3 sets feeling fine and not being too pumped then by the end of the 5th set it was getting pretty hard and I completed the whole thing feeling drained in the arms but overall not too tired.

Is the aim with an AnCap workout to progressively get more pumped to the point i'm fighting on the last set as above or should I feel pretty boxed after consistantly and fight to complete every set and need possibly more than 5 minutes between sets?

Just to clarify what the point of AnCap is, am I right in saying it's getting the body used to flushing out lactic acid much like interval training in running and other sports?

Cheers

[Rocksteady]

This look pretty good to me.

You have a fitness period which will help build and base followed by a higher intensity period.
...
The adaptation times that racksteady quotes seem very long. I would say 4 weeks of laddering on a campus 3 times a week and you see a significant improvement.

Regarding the adaption times, if what Rocksteady has quoted rings true would that mean you would need to consistently train AnCap for 4 months for it to have significant improvement?

Sure, but campus laddering is only training 'power endurance' - the last 6 weeks of a periodised plan - so anpow or aeropow? This will improve in the timescales everyone's saying but the ancap and aerocap elements are different.

I'm refering to the timescales quoted on page 6 of this
http://ukbouldering.com/media/pdf/principlestraining.pdf

Ancap looks like it takes a long time to develop. It's close to pure strength I guess which takes a long time to build. Aerocap is quoted at 8 weeks adaptation time.

I'm not an expert, just quoting what I understand to be the foundation of most British climbers' understanding of this stuff.

[iain]

I'm not an expert, just quoting what I understand to be the foundation of most British climbers' understanding of this stuff.

Me too.

Just to clarify what the point of AnCap is, am I right in saying it's getting the body used to flushing out lactic acid much like interval training in running and other sports?

That's how I would describe aerocap.

P9 of the pdf gives an example ancap workout, 10-15 reps of a 5-15 move circuit (depending on intensity) and I just can't hold on any more.
Trouble is P8 is also titled anaerobic capacity and gives a totally different number of moves and rest.

[Luke Owens]

That's how I would describe aerocap.

Surely during an AeroCap exercise you stay below your threshold so not allowing lactic to build up?

I thought (and i'm probably wrong):

AnCap training get's the body used to flushing and tollerating lactic build up. You get pumped and then completely rest allowing the lactic to build up then flush out.

AeroCap training increases capillery size, delaying the time taken to cross your lactic threshold.

My Dad told me about this stuff years ago so i'm not sure if i've got the wrong end of the stick...

[iain]

I thought (and i'm probably wrong):

It's me, ignore me, I'm rushing and not thinking clearly.

[Sasquatch]

2 x (30 moves 2 mins rest x 3 - Rest 5 minutes)
3 x (40 moves 2 mins rest x 3 - Rest 5 minutes)

Took about an hour in total.

So doing the backwards math to figure out rest/work ratio, this comes out to about 45 minutes of resting and 15 minutes of work over the course of an hour?  And the 15 minutes of work is broken into 15 different segments, meaning you're doing 30-40 moves in a minute followed by 2 minutes rest? Was this on a hangboard or campus rungs?  If so, go to timed instead of moves as the moves are very fast due to no or very little foot movement.  If not, then my math/understanding must be off, because 30-40 moves a minute is wicked fast climbing.

From a generic standpoint, anaerobic capacity should be long work at hard intensity followed by long rest.  I would say generally a 1:1 to a 1.5:1 work to rest ratio, with the work being between 2-5 minutes depending on fitness, and the rest being 2-3 minutes depending on fitness.  As you get fitter, you can decrease the rest to increase the workload or increase the work. 

[Luke Owens]

2 x (30 moves 2 mins rest x 3 - Rest 5 minutes)
3 x (40 moves 2 mins rest x 3 - Rest 5 minutes)

Took about an hour in total.

So doing the backwards math to figure out rest/work ratio, this comes out to about 45 minutes of resting and 15 minutes of work over the course of an hour?  And the 15 minutes of work is broken into 15 different segments, meaning you're doing 30-40 moves in a minute followed by 2 minutes rest? Was this on a hangboard or campus rungs?  If so, go to timed instead of moves as the moves are very fast due to no or very little foot movement.  If not, then my math/understanding must be off, because 30-40 moves a minute is wicked fast climbing.

From a generic standpoint, anaerobic capacity should be long work at hard intensity followed by long rest.  I would say generally a 1:1 to a 1.5:1 work to rest ratio, with the work being between 2-5 minutes depending on fitness, and the rest being 2-3 minutes depending on fitness.  As you get fitter, you can decrease the rest to increase the workload or increase the work.

Thanks Sasquatch, I was wondering this regarding 40 moves only taking a minute on a hangboard. Didn't seem like enough.

Last night I did:

5 x (40 moves 2 mins rest x 4 - Rest 6 minutes)

Took an hour and a half to complete. 20 minutes actually hanging and 70 minutes resting!

When you put it like that it seems like I'm doing hardly anything but it definitely was hard work and I really had to fight at the end. I stayed pumped from the 3rd set onwards so surely this must be doing something beneficial?

I guess I'm not using the training time as efficiently as I can. What would you recommend from a time point of view? Something like the guys above have mentioned like:

2 minutes on 2 minutes rest x 3

This results in 6 minutes hanging and 6 minutes rest. Would this be more beneficial than what I've been doing as it seems a lot less work?

Cheers

[highrepute]

My bit...

With feet-on campusing (FEC) I'll pause breifly before taking the hold, slow down the movements, better simulate climbing.

With AnCap I always thought long rests were best. so if you on wall for 5mins then rest for 5-10mins (this is also what binney says). This is obvious when you think about it, you are simulating a RP (sort of) so you want the intensity to be high. The longer the rest the higher you can keep the intensity. It's a trade off between getting in lots of high intensity stuff and how much time you've got. If you have the time to take really long rests then you can keep the intensity high and possibly repeat the exercise more times.

If the rest becomes too short then you might start crossing over into AeroPow or Cap.

How fit you are will also affect the length of rest required.

[Sasquatch]

I wsn't really trying to say you had it right or wrong, or that you could be more effecient with your time.  Just to be careful using moves as a barometer if you're on a hangboard.  Go to timed instead as you really can't cheat it. 

As Highrepute says, if you look at Binney's work he indicates a work rest ratio between 1:1 and 1:2.  I generally aim for a 1:1. 

The #1 thing I would probably change would be the time on the wall.  I would go for 1:30 to 2:00 minutes as the shortest duration, so maybe more like:

5 x (1:30 on, 2 mins rest x 3 - Rest 6 minutes or longer if needed to depump)

or

5 x (2:00 on, 3 mins rest x 3 - Rest 6 minutes or longer if needed to depump)

Anyway, I do think what you're doing will help.  As you improve aim to increase the hang time.

[highrepute]

5 x (1:30 on, 2 mins rest x 3 - Rest 6 minutes or longer if needed to depump)

or

5 x (2:00 on, 3 mins rest x 3 - Rest 6 minutes or longer if needed to depump)

Sounds good. I think I will try this