[Kingy]

I have just started training on a beastmaker and following the 7sec hang 3sec rest (X6) programme set out on this link www.climbingworks.com/files/public/Training_Articles/beastmaker_fingerboard_article.pdf

I was doing the full locks for 7secs as it says but it feels a bit risky on your elbows tbh and I have spotted that it is not recommended to do a full lock for more than 2 or 3 secs on the Hangboard Guru site.

Anybody have any thoughts on this? Not keen to get knackered elbows if I'm gonna be doing these reps a lot.

[36chambers]

I don't have much experience with this myself, but I remember it being discussed earlier this year. 

Oh, by the way...
The Italian doctor who made the campusboarding and fingerboarding mistakes videos, has a very good advice: do not do pull ups on a fingerboard. The high stress imposed to tendons and joints, teamed with the pronated prehension and the elbow flexion, build a very dangerous ensemble.
I haven't done pull ups on a fingerboard in ages and never noticed the lack of them.

from http://ukbouldering.com/board/index.php/topic,25340.msg474111.html#msg474111

Hopefully Nibile won't mind me quoting him, I'm sure he'll be along to offer a better reply. Anyway, I think the video he is referring to is this one (at 5:28), which was posted in the "training for climbing videos" thread around the same time.




Furthermore, it's been argued that when training lock off strength and finger strength together, you can undermine the amount you can push each of them individually and therefore may compromise the quality of the workout. 

[Nutty]

I avoid doing full locks as part of fingerboard workouts, because it can feel tweaky on the elbows. I think it feels more or less tweaky depending on the spacing of the holds and your form (keeping elbows in close to the body feels less tweaky).

It's only really the beastmaker articles that I've seen that recommend doing hangs at varying elbow angles - most other finger board protocols recommend hanging with slightly-bent elbows - so if the full locks feel tweaky maybe avoid them on the beastmaker.

[standard]

On Neil's (NG is the climber behind hangboard guru) facebook (I can't find it now), someone pressed him for evidence to support his "2-3 seconds" lock off theory, and Neil didn't really come up with any as far as i can remember, it was just his opinion. Happy to have my memory proven wrong if someone can find the conversation.

[dave]

....someone pressed him for evidence to support his "2-3 seconds" lock off theory, and Neil didn't really come up with any as far as i can remember, it was just his opinion.

As far as I can tell this one sentence seems to sum up most of the perceived wisdom on climbing training pretty well, including most of the stuff coming from self-professed experts!

[Nibile]

I don't have much to add to be honest, except this: lock off repeaters are Evil. Avoid them like the Plague. Climb happily for the rest of your life.

[abarro81]

To a large extent, with elbows where you're unlikely to blow something suddenly and much more likely to cause issues over the course of a few sessions I don't think it really matters what anyone else says about whether they're dangerous - if they feel tweaky and dangerous then avoid them. They'd break me for sure, especially on narrow grips

[thekettle]

Regarding evidence to support lock-off training protocols, the only thorough research I've ever come across is in these 5 blog posts from Eva Lopez:
http://en-eva-lopez.blogspot.com.es/search/label/Lock-off%20Strength%20Training

[Kingy]

Thanks all so there seem to be widely varying opinions on this mainly based on peoples experiences. I  will read the Eva Lopez stuff tonight. Nibs I will take your warning seriously. I was just curious that beastmaker themselves could be advocating full lock off repeaters in promotional literature. I know a lot of folk do this 7 sec 3 sec programme so I guess if there had been a massive influx of elbow problems then we would have heard about it. I will proceed with caution! In the past I have done pull ups on my old fingerboard to good effect and indeed I recall Jon Cardwell saying in his training beta podcast that he felt this kind of training got him up The Game

[T_B]

If I'm doing 6 x 7 sec 'encores' as BM call them, I tend to do full lock once or at the most, twice. An 'issue' that I can see is with 3 second rests between hangs, you tend to release the full lock as quickly as possible so as to enjoy as much rest as you can. Once you get more tired, the danger is shock loading your elbows as you lower your feet back to the floor. I would argue that if you're working to your max doing repeaters/encores, especially half-crimped or on less good holds, you'd struggle to hold full lock anyway and would be diverting your energies away from pushing your fingers to the max. That said, it's a good way to train your locking strength as well as finger strength in a short session.

[filz]

7"/3" is IMHO a good exercise for PE training, but it's also quite dangerous for the elbow.
I've done 7 secs hang 3 secs rest with locks in the past and they reawakened my golfer's elbow.
Now i go with the "better safe than sorry" motto and I avoid both locks and pull ups on the fingerboard.

I use my the beastmaker mainly for strength training with max hangs. I still do some 7"/3" hangs with straight arms (engaging shoulders and elbow) on my PE days, but only if I don't have time to climb on the board. Training PE on the board is for me less boring and maybe more effective.

[Three Nine]

I've been doing 7/3 repeaters twice a week for the last 5 weeks, and I do all my hangs at 90degree bend and its fine on my elbows. Deep lock might be different.

[Kingy]

Some good thoughts folks. I did 2 sets of repeaters last night and did full locks every third one ie. Ten full locks per set and 20 in total. My elbows are still intact but this will be closely monitored!

Begs the question if u are goin to skip the deep locks the what are u goin to do in their place? A set consists of 6 seven sec hangs so if ur only doing 90 degree and 140 degree locks then u have to do 3 of them each per set, alternating I guess, which kind of defeats the BM vision of varied arm positions throughout, variety is the spice!

[slackline]

Why not go...

140
115
90
65
90
115
[140 if you want to keep it symetrical]

...or any variation thereof?

[Ged]

More anecdotal evidence only in afraid, but I'm fairly convinced doing full lock repeaters is what buggered my elbows up. After lengthy rehab I've gone back to doing only a slight bend in the arm and so far has been fine

[Kingy]

sorry to hear that Ged, good that ur back on it now. il take it session by session. Interesting training plan Slackers! I may adapt it if I quit/ reduce the number of full locks.

For me full locks are the most difficult of the 3 BM hang angles, the 6th and final rep at full lock being desparate in comparison to the first easy 140 hang, I guess that's the appeal. full locks are deployed in real climbing on hard moves at your limit so I can see the rationale for their inclusion. how often do you lock off to 90 degrees for any hard moves outside? so with the risk of full locks (elbow issues) comes the reward

[gcarmichael]

I've found if my elbows are going to hurt it is more likely to be around the 65 angle as opposed to full locks but think this is just reflection of type of climbing i do. doing repeaters with slightly bent arm for all reps and sets followed by some one arm negatives on a jug (with assistance if needed) can be quite a nice combination

[r-man]

how often do you lock off to 90 degrees for any hard moves outside?

Fairly often? I found the ability to do 90 degree locks helped me a lot on certain problems. Haven't done these of course, but obvious examples are moves like the pull through to get rh hold on the ace, or bringing the trailing hand out of the roof after the crux slap on keen roof. Just used those examples as most people will have seen vids, but the 90 degree lock is everywhere...

On the elbow injury note, I have dodgy elbows and I know from experience that launching into lock off training (which I do on a bar, not on a fingerboard) will cause problems. However with gradual build up (using assistance and only doing one rep on each angle for the first couple of weeks) it has been great for getting the elbows strong and allowing me to do those moves outdoors without tendon problems flaring up.