[shark]

http://steve-mcclure.com/articles/154-how-to-improve-by-doing-no-training

Kickback against excessive focus on physical strength training

[tomtom]

http://steve-mcclure.com/articles/154-how-to-improve-by-doing-no-training

Kickback against excessive focus on physical strength training (for old people)

Funny - I read it as "as you get older strength training has more limited returns - hence spend more time working on technique and other 'tricks'".

Personally, my second block of board and one arm training (Jan > April) has led to another jump in my climbing. The board in particular is continually improving my body position, footwork, dynamic movement and accuracy.

[Fiend]

Conclusion: if you've already got to where you are by relying very much on cunning / knacks / tactics / technique / faff / etc etc to compensate for a lack of strength, as you get older you're probably fucked 

[kelvin]

Two years back, I spent three months in a normal gym rather than the climbing centre before heading to Switzerland as normal for a month in the summer. Came back having ticked my hardest grade second go and feeling much more confident on things far above my pay grade.
52 and still silly weak. I had previously put in 1000s and 1000s of metres on Swiss granite tho.

Studies like that always seem dependant on too many different factors to be useful.

*fiend is right

[User deactivated.]

n=1 but for me, bouldering performance has correlated almost precisely with max hangs over the last couple of years, such that from f7A+ to f7C+, a 10% increase in bodyweight hung has equalled 1 grade.

[T_B]

My view after 35 years of doing this and very recently climbing at a similar level to my best in the past, is the most important performance factor is confidence. You cannot train confidence, though you can help build it by being stronger. But the problem arises when performance then doesn’t match the increase in strength, and confidence is undermined. To build genuine confidence, you need to build a pyramid of success and that requires time on rock, getting up things. More true on trad than sport/bouldering, but still more important on the latter than absolute strength/power/endurance.

[yetix]

All I've done is climb outside in the last 7 months and do rehab for longstanding issues, gotta say I think time on rock trumps all. The amount you can learn is so much more important than anything else for meand if you pick right you can keep getting stronger.

Note I probably did trained too much for a long time before this long block outside, but I don't feel I've got weaker only stronger from outdoors, the only thing I feel I'm losing really is a little explosive power maybe

[Bradders]

My view after 35 years of doing this and very recently climbing at a similar level to my best in the past, is the most important performance factor is confidence. You cannot train confidence, though you can help build it by being stronger. But the problem arises when performance then doesn’t match the increase in strength, and confidence is undermined. To build genuine confidence, you need to build a pyramid of success and that requires time on rock, getting up things. More true on trad than sport/bouldering, but still more important on the latter than absolute strength/power/endurance.

100% this.

All I've done is climb outside in the last 7 months and do rehab for longstanding issues, gotta say I think time on rock trumps all. The amount you can learn is so much more important than anything else for meand if you pick right you can keep getting stronger.

I agree with this too, but it relies a lot on a few factors;

- having the time to get out at least 4 times a week
- picking your battles well (you seem to have done this really well lately Dan); pick badly and my experience is that, as TB says, your well of confidence can quickly run dry
- being able to climb on rock types that support strength and power improvements (spend all your time on grit and you will get better, but weaker for sure)

[tomtom]

Bear in mind that DMacs blog is about "the older climber"

[remus]

My view after 35 years of doing this and very recently climbing at a similar level to my best in the past, is the most important performance factor is confidence. You cannot train confidence, though you can help build it by being stronger. But the problem arises when performance then doesn’t match the increase in strength, and confidence is undermined. To build genuine confidence, you need to build a pyramid of success and that requires time on rock, getting up things. More true on trad than sport/bouldering, but still more important on the latter than absolute strength/power/endurance.

While I agree that confidence is certainly very important I do think you can train it in a sense, or at least make conscious choices to do stuff that'll improve your confidence. For example, at the start of a trip I'll often spend the first day or two getting a couple of quick ticks in at a grade or two below my max just to get in that mindset of getting stuff done, remembering what it's like to move well over rock etc. That then helps fend off that redpointing trap of falling off the same move over and over again because you get used to falling off.

I guess it's just semantics about whether you call that training or not.

[kelvin]

Bear in mind that DMacs blog is about "the older climber"

The youth always like to have an opinion 😉

[Stu Littlefair]

Am I the only person reading that article and thinking that Steve did a big block of fingerboard training, went out a did a route that he had previously failed on, and then came home to write a blog trashing fingerboard training?

[yetix]

@bradders

I do have the luxary of alot more disposable time than most I still think this could be done with x3 sessions outside quite readily (appreciate not everyone has the time for this but the point of this post/article is training outside so let's assume people have that time?) just do longer sessions, Ive mostly been doing 2.5h sessions including warm ups really and 3-4 a week, if I knew I could only do 3 sessions I'd probabaly do longer sessions.

I think there's a few factors though really:
- most people go super hard on the days they go outside and fuck their skin rather than backing off or preemptively taping or pick sharp venues when they have bad skin
- I've picked choss mostly as its good training physically
- Ive definitely had as many bad sessions if not more than good ones this year, but I've tried to not go back to something more than once a week unless forced by the weather even when close as I want to make sure when going only on rock that I get a decent variety of moves in rather than just those of 1 problem
- when I do have a bad few sessions I try to go to something new and on my list that I think will suit me as many of my open projects are open because they're hard for me at the end of the day so bashing my head against them when my form drops doesn't seem ideal.

@tomtom you're right it is for the older climber, but I am 30 next year so it's approaching but in more seriousness I just thought I'd comment on the outdoor for training generally, I do appreciate in an older climber there will be more variables for sure, I also think there will be many more experienced climbers than I who will probably have less to learn on rock so the gains I'm noticing are perhaps less useful to them, but who knows, learning movement on rock seems king to me now, I wish I'd stopped all the other stuff I was doing sooner really tbh, but who knows maybe I'll be weak as piss in 6 months and pyshced on training again as a result haha

[Fultonius]

Am I the only person reading that article and thinking that Steve did a big block of fingerboard training, went out a did a route that he had previously failed on, and then came home to write a blog trashing fingerboard training?

Train hard, plateau, rest phase, perform?

[Stu Littlefair]

Yeah, weird isn’t it.

[teestub]

Am I the only person reading that article and thinking that Steve did a big block of fingerboard training, went out a did a route that he had previously failed on, and then came home to write a blog trashing fingerboard training?

Definitely! You could take the key events in this post and rearrange them into a post about how a big block of fingerboarding could be a great plateau breaker for someone who generally just climbs outside 😄

[abarro81]

I've alternated in the past between
(a) thinking that people often spend far too much time focused on training and most people should just climb more, and
(b) thinking that a focused approach to training is the only reason I've ever done well on things

My current thinking is that climbing on rock most of the time, possibly with a small amount of focused top-up training, is ideal. However, you need to manipulate what you're climbing on in the same way you would manipulate training (thinking about goals, specificity, individuality etc.). To do that, you need a decent volume of the appropriate rock styles, route lengths, conditions, things-you've-not-done-before etc. Which is to say I strongly agree with this:

- being able to climb on rock types that support strength and power improvements (spend all your time on grit and you will get better, but weaker for sure)

 and variations on it around fitness, style, not only lapping the same routes/problems etc. You also need to adjust for your individual needs/response (do you get weak easily or unfit easily? etc.)

Examples from my own experience:
- If you redpoint 15m routes down Chee Dale all summer then when you go to onsight 45m tufa-fests in Ramirole in September you will suck ass, no matter how dialled in to rock you are. If you're only climbing rock, you still need to do your fitness "training", just at the crag, and still need to approach preparing for goals/trips with the specificity of what you need to be good at in mind.
- Climbing grit will not make you good at steep lime sport. Nor the other way around.
- Going bouldering on rock all the time can make you the strongest you've ever been but you will suck at fitness.
- Going and onsighting 40m routes for 3 weeks will make you(me) weak as fuck. At some point (about 3-4 weeks of only doing stamina routes for me) you will even get worse at onsighting 40m routes because you(I) will be so weak.

So yeah, overall, taking a focused "training"/"improvement" mindset and applying it to the medium of rock rather than plastic/wood, in a situation where you have the time, conditions, available rock and life-flexibility to do this is the ultimate in getting good at climbing. Funny that, who would have thought it. 

Obviously, most people in the UK don't have enough time, flexibility, appropriate rock close to home, quantity of new-to-them climbing close to home, and conditions to make the "perfect" formula work, so it's a question of balancing indoor training with outdoor climbing as best possible. Steve, who's basically saying what Dave Mac said in 9 out of 10 climbers, is - in my opinion - right that most people should climb more, but wrong that people will get better vis this approach irrespective of what it is they're climbing (at least for those who aren't still on the steep upwards part of an improvement curve).

Also worth noting that some people trained a lot due to lockdowns and then went and crushed. This is easier to do after 1 lockdown than 3, because you're stacking some training on a period where you climbed lots rather than a period where you didn't. All a balance.

P.s. anyone who climbs easy routes for a month then improves their hang scores is a freak and so utterly different in their response to stimulus than me that I know I can safely ignore everything they say. Individuality innit...

[Monolith]

I came here looking for the panacea but was left wanting.

My view after 35 years of doing this and very recently climbing at a similar level to my best in the past, is the most important performance factor is confidence. You cannot train confidence, though you can help build it by being stronger. But the problem arises when performance then doesn’t match the increase in strength, and confidence is undermined. To build genuine confidence, you need to build a pyramid of success and that requires time on rock, getting up things. More true on trad than sport/bouldering, but still more important on the latter than absolute strength/power/endurance.

Nice sentiments Tom.

[Nibile]

Should I ever start improving with no training, 90% of the fun would be gone.

[joel182]

Should I ever start improving with no training, 90% of the fun would be gone.

No training seems to involve loads of fingerboarding and then climbing your trad project the next month so I reckon you won't be running out of fun any time soon.

[cheque]

the most important performance factor is confidence... To build genuine confidence, you need to build a pyramid of success and that requires time on rock, getting up things... More true on trad than sport/bouldering

This is exactly my experience. I find it easy to be confident in pretty much everything I do in life apart from climbing and I think that might be why I love climbing so much and also why I love trad so much.

[jwi]

The very last thing that I did before I did the thing was the thing that made me do the thing.

[mrjonathanr]

My view after 35 years of doing this and very recently climbing at a similar level to my best in the past, is the most important performance factor is confidence. You cannot train confidence, though you can help build it by being stronger. But the problem arises when performance then doesn’t match the increase in strength, and confidence is undermined. To build genuine confidence, you need to build a pyramid of success and that requires time on rock, getting up things. More true on trad than sport/bouldering, but still more important on the latter than absolute strength/power/endurance.

What he said, exactly 

[Andy F]

Conclusion: if you've already got to where you are by relying very much on cunning / knacks / tactics / technique / faff / etc etc to compensate for a lack of strength, as you get older you're probably fucked 

Well that's me truly fucked 

[Rob F]

As it happens I just picked up my philosophy of bouldering book last night for a re-read.

In the foreword John Gill writes "Gymnastic judges treasure extreme difficulty so highly they are reluctant to deduct points for lack of form - whereas half a century ago gymnasts were required to do compulsary routines, simple exercises where form and grace were paramount"