[jwi]

OK, so I am trying a route that has two moves on crimpers, my weakest grip type, both on right hand, my weaker hand. The first move is on a small, very incut edge, that absolutely must be taken in the full crimp position to make the move possible. The second move is on a flat pretty ok edge (about 10 mm deep) that I can take open handed: in fact I have only succeeded to do the move off it when holding it drag, but this cut the skin in two-three tries unless the conditions are amazing.

Thus, I would like to get better at crimping, both on small incut edges and on flat medium edges (on which I am at least 25% stronger in open). My regular bouldering gym currently set sufficiently hard boulders on crimps regularly and failing that there is another nearby gym that has a big spraywall with plenty of small edges, so I think I am set for the majority of the training.

However, I have never trained crimp on the hangboard. I have access to a flat slippery wooden edge with adjustable depth and to one smallish incut plastic hold at home. I find it very uncomfortable to do one arm work in the full crimp position. I could possibly take holds one handed with hyperextended joints, without wrapping the thumb over the index finger, but this feels very unstable.

I was thinking that asking how you people train the full crimp on a hangboard could spare me a few sessions of experimentation.

[User deactivated.]

Full crimp is by far my strongest and most natural grip. I say that because it could mean that what I have to say won't be relevant to you.

I've experimented with full crimping on finger boards before and it just doesn't feel the same as doing it on the wall. Having said that it feels a bit more natural to me on really small edges - I don't mind full crimping the micros, but hate full crimping a big 20mm edge with added weight. One thing to be wary of is splitting at the joint between your skin and the sides of your fingernail due to the thumb pulling the skin away. I've had this happen a few times from full crimping on a fingerboard. Generally, board climbing on small positive edges feels better for full crimp development.

Also, having strong rear deltoids and external rotation of the shoulder feels beneficial to me for full crimping. It allows for more outwards pull on the holds. Face pulls closely resemble what my shoulder does when locking off on a crimp to the side. I seem to recall you're generally not a fan of non climbing exercises to get better at climbing, but have you considered this?

[jwi]

Thanks! I will implement some training for the rear delts — it is highly likely that I am weak in the typical positions where I pull in using a crimp as I rarely crimp holds.

I am pretty willing to do auxiliary strength work like pullups, hangboard and different form of holds for the lower trunk. I do however prefer to do any auxiliary exercise agains fixed implements at approximately the same speed as climbing moves, because of the specificity principle.

[yetix]

Maybe you could try the in vogue 4 finger half crimp on an edge, I know alot are trying this ATM.
I can just about hang bodyweight on a 14mm edge doing it now, have noticed when I full crimp my pinky is adding alot more support going into that half crimped position, where as before my pinky would drag even in full crimp in most cases. Seems like it would have alot of carry over for full crimp, which I believe is the desired effect

I've mostly been doing it whilst warming up at the crag, (after doing a decent number of normal half crimp hangs) doing a bodyweight 4 finger half crimp pull on my portable fingerboard feels alot harder than doing a weighted max hangs session in half crimp for me...

Just to note I used to basically only open hand stuff when climbing (which is maybe true for you?) and deploy full and half crimp (unless I can find a pinch) almost never on rock, but am looking to have more grips available which it looks like you're looking to do to? 

Something I remember hearing a while ago from someone with more experience than me was the phrase full crimp brings stability but not strength, when compared to half crimp... Maybe someone with more knowledge could expand, but I guess on a fb that would be true for anyone?

[Bradders]

Maybe you could try the in vogue 4 finger half crimp on an edge, I know alot are trying this ATM.
I can just about hang bodyweight on a 14mm edge doing it now, have noticed when I full crimp my pinky is adding alot more support going into that half crimped position, where as before my pinky would drag even in full crimp in most cases. Seems like it would have alot of carry over for full crimp, which I believe is the desired effect

I've mostly been doing it whilst warming up at the crag, (after doing a decent number of normal half crimp hangs) doing a bodyweight 4 finger half crimp pull on my portable fingerboard feels alot harder than doing a weighted max hangs session in half crimp for me...

I've been doing this a bit, during warm ups etc. It's utterly nails! So much harder than a half crimp hang for me, and I do feel like it's made a difference in conditioning my fingers to be prepared for full crimping smaller holds.

I've also been doing pick ups like this as well, which is probably a good way of easing into it if you can't hang bodyweight (seriously...I could add 40kg on my half crimp but really struggled to finally get to a 10s bodyweight hang with pinky bent). Just have to make sure your fingers are at a sufficiently high angle bend at the PIP joint.

[mr chaz]

Sorry If I've missed it, what's the difference between 4 finger half crimp and half crimp?

edit. I presume this is just making sure pinky is half crimped as opposed to dragging?

[yetix]

Pretty much, it feels for me like alot more weight is going through the back two and the wrist is working much much harder

[Bradders]

Yeah, pinky bent at roughly 90' at the PIP joint, which for me means my other fingers have a more acute angle than normal half crimp.

Interestingly thinking about the Tyler Nelson thread, it feels much more active for me, much more like I'm having to pull as opposed to just passively hanging. Could just be because I'm so shit at it though.

[Wellsy]

I literally can't get my pinky bent 90 degrees at the PIP joint and on the same edge as my other fingers. Huh.

[yetix]

I couldn't for a while at 1 point either

[Moo]

It took me ages of steady build up and being very disciplined with hand posture to get comfortable with the pinky bent up thing.

It felt quite painful at first but you’ll definitely see benefits in the long run if you’re at a stage where it’s worth doing.

I’d probably advise against people who are just getting into the swing of fingerboarding and board climbing bothering with it, I reckon there’s bigger fish to fry when you’re just starting out.

[teestub]

I literally can't get my pinky bent 90 degrees at the PIP joint and on the same edge as my other fingers. Huh.

You have to cock your wrist quite a bit compared to the half crimp position, feels quite unnatural to me in comparison.

[YorkshireTea]

Another person who can't get their pinky to crimp here

What point were people starting at that have managed to get it to work for them?
I have to push my DIP joint down with my other hand and it wants to pop back to bent and often will, its less likely to under more load but feels uncomfortable

[Wellsy]

I pissed around on a fingerboard for a while trying to find any position where my pinkie bent like that and no chance. I think it might be due to the size and shape of my hands.

[teestub]

I pissed around on a fingerboard for a while trying to find any position where my pinkie bent like that and no chance. I think it might be due to the size and shape of my hands.

What position is your little finger in when full crimping? This grip should essentially be the same position for the fingers as that just without the thumb over!

[Bradders]

It's certainly an unnatural feeling when you get started, and even now whilst warming into it tbh. But it gets so much better.

My hypothesis for why this is a helpful thing to train is that when full crimping, whilst mechanically it is an extremely strong / locked grip type your thumb is doing a lot of work, taking the strain off the rest of your fingers. This means your other fingers, and especially your pinky, aren't being stressed as much as they could be and therefore strength gains are limited. Removing the thumb from the equation forces a greater degree of adaptation potential in the fingers, as well as ensuring that you train the pinky in the position it's going to be used in when actually climbing.

[MischaHY]

I've spent the last 9 months training exactly this for exactly the same reasons and can confirm it's very trainable and the gains are quite impressive.

Firstly I spent around 8 weeks doing twice a week sessions of long hangs in full crimp (with thumb) at bodyweight on the BM2K small crimps. I was doing 4-6 20s hangs. These felt very intense at the time and took a lot of recovering from.

Once I started to notice it was feeling a lot more casual I started consciously employing full crimp on the board and whilst bouldering as much as possible even on bigger edges. This is where the real gainz started because suddenly I realised as mentioned by several above how fecking hard it is to keep the pinky engaged and also how intensely full crimp loads the knuckle of the index finger.

Basically over the course of about 4-5 months I went from barely being able to hang a decent full crimp with bodyweight and never using it on the wall, to being able to comfortably one arm the BM2K middle slot in full crimp for a few seconds and got much stronger on small edges that I'd always struggled with. I can't recommend it enough.

[Wellsy]

I pissed around on a fingerboard for a while trying to find any position where my pinkie bent like that and no chance. I think it might be due to the size and shape of my hands.

What position is your little finger in when full crimping? This grip should essentially be the same position for the fingers as that just without the thumb over!

When full crimping both the joints in my little finger are at around 45 degrees

[teestub]

If both your joints were at 45 then your fingernail would be digging into your hand 😂

[SA Chris]

someone needs a trig lesson.

[Eddies]

There’s no harm in finger-boarding full crimp if you’re used to crimping.

Fifteen years of finger-boarding and training on a board had ‘trained’ me to prefer half-crimp over full crimp; and I found that outside on limestone I was subconsciously half crimping everything instead of utilising the full power of the full crimp that I used a lot before I stared finger-boarding.
So in recent years I always perform a few hangs at full crimp at the end of my warmup during every f-board session, to remind myself how to full crimp!

[SA Chris]

I full crimp reluctantly too, but working on a problem at the moment where you have to full crump a hold to hang it, so have included some full crimping in training for the first time in a while.

[Aussiegav]

There’s truth in the saying: don’t use it, you lose it.
I know Buster did a few posts about training full crimp on his Instagram some time back.
Ned’s book, beastmaking also covers full crimp training too.


I’ve never been competent at full crimping. But started using full crimp on easier boulder problems  once warmed up (Especially on the Moonboard) help my confidence and competence with the full crimp.
Over time, I increased to intensity of problems using the full crimp. A simple principle of increasing intensity to create gains.

IMO: The mental aspect of full crimping with confidence shouldn’t be over looked.

[Wellsy]

If both your joints were at 45 then your fingernail would be digging into your hand 😂

Lol yeah sorry they are both 135 degrees

[User deactivated.]

It's quite funny to see that most people don't like crimping. When I'm climbing something fairly hard, I will look to crimp everything, to utilize my best grip. In this video I take a second on moves 2 and 3 to find the correct part of the hold - they are slopers, but I'm searching for a slight ripple on each hold to full crimp. As soon as I learnt to grip the holds this way, I was locked in and the problem was dispatched shortly afterwards (great Bonjoy boulder by the way!).

There are downsides to crimping everything. Achy fingers aside, I find it can sometimes limit the mobility of my shoulders in certain positions, and it tends to reduce how hard I can pull with the biceps in comparison with an open grip.  Clearly, being well rounded is the best approach. It seems most of you have to consciously add crimping into board sessions, whereas I generally ban myself from crimping on the board!

[Duma]

OT - as another "crimp everything" climber, I wonder if it's affected my wrist stability on slopers - engaging the thumb with the wrist in flexion naturally stabilises it, whereas on large slopers with the wrist in extension my wrist feels very unstable to the point of subluxing (don't know if this is the right word) and stopping me doing certain moves. I find it very hard to train open without my wrist(s) feeling like I'm damaging them somehow.

[User deactivated.]

OT - as another "crimp everything" climber, I wonder if it's affected my wrist stability on slopers - engaging the thumb with the wrist in flexion naturally stabilises it, whereas on large slopers with the wrist in extension my wrist feels very unstable to the point of subluxing (don't know if this is the right word) and stopping me doing certain moves. I find it very hard to train open without my wrist(s) feeling like I'm damaging them somehow.

Make a large diameter wrist wrench?

[Duma]

?

[User deactivated.]

It's a training device to build wrist strength. It's fairly easily to make one with PVC pipe, griptape and straps. A large diameter pipe would make it so that the position of the fingers somewhat replicates a large sloper.

Random youtube video showing how they work, note which side the straps are on causing it to rotate:

[jwi]

It's quite funny to see that most people don't like crimping. When I'm climbing something fairly hard, I will look to crimp everything,...

On steep routes absolutely every hold is a jug until you hit mid/high eights

[YorkshireTea]

I've no doubt crimping on a hangboard is a good idea and the pinky can be trained in a crimp position but can you train getting into that position?

Has anyone gone from being unable to get their pinky into that position without use of their other hand (therefore totally useless when climbing) to being able to crimp with their pinky?

My hand when crimping:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/MPPrLEHhZXFAtnjm9

[yetix]

I did pinky monos with a mono pick up device and super low load to begin with (as Dan V detailed arouns the start of covid on the fingerboarding thread?), had to force my pinkies into the position to begin with, then recruitment pulls when warming up at the crag, and now I can do hangs on a fingerboard at bodyweight as described above. Hope that helps.

[MischaHY]

I've no doubt crimping on a hangboard is a good idea and the pinky can be trained in a crimp position but can you train getting into that position?

Has anyone gone from being unable to get their pinky into that position without use of their other hand (therefore totally useless when climbing) to being able to crimp with their pinky?

My hand when crimping:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/MPPrLEHhZXFAtnjm9

Hanging back two crimp at sub bodyweight loads will likely be helpful in this regard. You'll be able to get the position right and then load it carefully as much as feels reasonable.

[Bradders]

My hand when crimping:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/MPPrLEHhZXFAtnjm9

That's bizarre! Sorry but is that really the position your pinky sits in when under tension?

Just doesnt make sense to me, I don't understand how you could be resisting tension with the joints at that angle.

[YorkshireTea]

My hand when crimping:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/MPPrLEHhZXFAtnjm9

That's bizarre! Sorry but is that really the position your pinky sits in when under tension?

Just doesnt make sense to me, I don't understand how you could be resisting tension with the joints at that angle.

Yeah that's the position with front three in a high angle crimp. Means it feels like I'm getting absolutely nothing from the pinky but I physically can't get it into another position

I'll try monos or back two with very light load and try push the pinky into the right position. I'm also doing some high angle crimp no-hang hangs as I'm willing to accept my pinky won't ever get into the position and I'll always be weaker at angles above half crimp but want to increase front three crimp strength for when I need it 

[knollchri]

Yeah that's the position with front three in a high angle crimp. Means it feels like I'm getting absolutely nothing from the pinky but I physically can't get it into another position

Exactly the same for me. I struggle to change this position to a more 'conventional' crimp, even when using the other hand to fix the joint angles of my pinky.
Always put it down to my anatomy and somehow learned to live with it. Curious if it can actually be fixed.

On a side note, I've always wondered if this difference between the fingers is in part responsible for developing notable Dupuytren lumps between ring-fingers and pinkies...

[SA Chris]

you mean as a result of DC, or responsible for DC?

[knollchri]

you mean as a result of DC, or responsible for DC?

Responsible for DC, as the movement of the tendons will vastly differ between ring finger and pinky when latching a hold open and rolling into a crimp position (or when the fingers open up). I imagine that this could lead to some notable shear forces in the palm. I don't know; maybe it is just utter nonsense...

[SA Chris]

I don't know; maybe it is just utter nonsense...

Fear it might be. From DC groups I have followed on FB etc, there seems to be very little / no link at all between any activity and DC, least of all the position you hold a finger in.

[knollchri]

The link to the finger position might be indeed.

...there seems to be very little / no link at all between any activity and DC,...

I feel must disagree with the lack of link between activity and DC though. Anecdotally, I have seen a cohort of very active climbers (education for trainers in Austria) with average age of ~25 years, where around one third had developed DC (which is clearly way higher than normal for this age-group). Some hand-surgeons that work closely together with climbing federations also confirmed the observation that there is a much higher occurrence of DC in climbers than in non-climbers.
I just don't think that there is enough research being done to get a clear picture yet. Anyway, I hope that I did not divert from the actual topic of the thread too much...