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The Scarpa Vapors are amazing for wide feet, best fitting shoes I've ever had.
pidan fucked around with this message at 09:37 on Apr 8, 2014 |
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Feb 20, 2014 13:14
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If you love the vapors but don't quite like the heel as much, the boostics are absolutely amazing and far and away my favorite shoe. They've got the front of the vapor V but the back of the Booster and they fit like a dream. Along the same lines as the future, though, I wouldn't recommend them until v4/5.
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Feb 21, 2014 19:56
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So I haven't really climbed outside my gym since I started, and assumed the grade differences wouldn't be very big between gyms. A few friends dropped by once and mentioned how much more difficult the bouldering grades were at my gym, but I didn't think much of it. Last week I visited LA Boulders and was able to climb up to V5... while I'm a solid V2 at my gym. The disparity was big enough that I'm a bit confused now, either LA Boulders is softballing or Sender One (my gym) is grading exceptionally harder. Is there anyone that goes to either of these gyms that can give me an idea? I don't really care about the numbers, but it's hard to talk with people now when I'm getting advice, and they mention I should be a so and so grade before this and that, like the post above.
tynam fucked around with this message at 22:05 on Feb 21, 2014 |
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Feb 21, 2014 21:58
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tynam posted:So I haven't really climbed outside my gym since I started, and assumed the grade differences wouldn't be very big between gyms. A few friends dropped by once and mentioned how much more difficult the bouldering grades were at my gym, but I didn't think much of it. Last week I visited LA Boulders and was able to climb up to V5... while I'm a solid V2 at my gym. The disparity was big enough that I'm a bit confused now, either LA Boulders is softballing or Sender One (my gym) is grading exceptionally harder. Is there anyone that goes to either of these gyms that can give me an idea? I don't really care about the numbers, but it's hard to talk with people now when I'm getting advice, and they mention I should be a so and so grade before this and that, like the post below. That's a really big disparity, but grading is often different from gym to gym and crag to crag. My guess is that Sender One is consciously grading hard.
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Feb 21, 2014 22:02
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Grades are stupid in gyms, stop looking at them. Climb outside at well graded areas to figure that stuff out. In the gym just climb and have fun.
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Feb 21, 2014 22:25
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armorer posted:That's a really big disparity, but grading is often different from gym to gym and crag to crag. My guess is that Sender One is consciously grading hard. Yeah, some gyms will do that on purpose. My gym is known to set a little hard and when I asked the setters about it they said it was to help make things safer as people transition to outdoor bouldering. If you send V4 in a gym then you're likely to attempt it when you go outdoors but if the set in the gym is easy then you aren't likely to be ready for it and are more likely to get hurt. In other news the ABS Championships are today and tomorrow and are being broadcast live on YouTube. I watched the women's qualifier round this afternoon and it was pretty awesome. Women's Qualifiers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CrbR8hvakY Men's Qualifiers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7QyxX2lHgo Open Semis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LB3j39Djzc Open Finals: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l51KxaPHsEw
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Feb 21, 2014 22:35
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pokchu posted:If you love the vapors but don't quite like the heel as much, the boostics are absolutely amazing and far and away my favorite shoe. They've got the front of the vapor V but the back of the Booster and they fit like a dream. Along the same lines as the future, though, I wouldn't recommend them until v4/5. Well I know what I'm gonna look at the next time I think about upgrading.
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Feb 21, 2014 23:38
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tynam posted:So I haven't really climbed outside my gym since I started, and assumed the grade differences wouldn't be very big between gyms. A few friends dropped by once and mentioned how much more difficult the bouldering grades were at my gym, but I didn't think much of it. Last week I visited LA Boulders and was able to climb up to V5... while I'm a solid V2 at my gym. The disparity was big enough that I'm a bit confused now, either LA Boulders is softballing or Sender One (my gym) is grading exceptionally harder. Is there anyone that goes to either of these gyms that can give me an idea? I don't really care about the numbers, but it's hard to talk with people now when I'm getting advice, and they mention I should be a so and so grade before this and that, like the post above. This seems weird to me. My impression of Sender One is they grade a little soft, meaning LA Boulders is just flattering people. Although I mostly climb ropes, so I don't know if that translates over to their bouldering grades. Not that it matters to me; I took a month off, including getting sick for a week, and when I went back on Wednesday it was like I'd never climbed before in my life. Also hi fellow Orange County climber.
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Feb 22, 2014 02:46
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tynam posted:So I haven't really climbed outside my gym since I started, and assumed the grade differences wouldn't be very big between gyms. A few friends dropped by once and mentioned how much more difficult the bouldering grades were at my gym, but I didn't think much of it. Last week I visited LA Boulders and was able to climb up to V5... while I'm a solid V2 at my gym. The disparity was big enough that I'm a bit confused now, either LA Boulders is softballing or Sender One (my gym) is grading exceptionally harder. Is there anyone that goes to either of these gyms that can give me an idea? I don't really care about the numbers, but it's hard to talk with people now when I'm getting advice, and they mention I should be a so and so grade before this and that, like the post above. I've heard people from another gym say that my gym is way way waaaay harder with grades, but when I went to that very gym I felt like it was actually harder. I've also heard people say Sender One is very hard all around. I think there is a huge disparity between gyms, but also a setting-style difference that makes an even bigger impact in the end. My gym has the setter name next to the V-grade, and the style difference between setters can make a V2 feel like a V4, or a V5 feel like a V3. That's within a single gym. Sad part is it only seems to get worse in the V6+ range. I've spent hours on a V6 only to have a guy who is solid V9 tell me even he can't send it. Then tack on the fact that outdoors is a totally different ballgame, and you have a general clusterfuck when it comes to standard grading. I think it all stems from the fact that bouldering routes are generally graded by their 1 or 2 hardest moves rather than the sum average of the whole route. So height, weight, and climbing style can make the same route very different for different people, because it's all about if you can or can't do that crux.
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Feb 22, 2014 03:20
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My gym has three locations in the area, all with different setters, and you can tell. The location near me is generally agreed to be grading harder, and I sometimes climb at one of the other ones and I agree. Try not to worry so much about the difference between gyms and just use it as a relative guide to track your own progress at your gym. In unrelated news, I sent my first 5.10a! Been trying to make that jump for a while now, and was set back briefly by injury. Big confidence boost, I'm looking forward to trying more of them.
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Feb 23, 2014 13:12
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Sooo which climbing mag should I subscribe to? I'm mostly into sport climbing but want a magazine for all aspects of the sport. They must ship to Sweden and the magazine must be in Swedish or English. Climbed for my third day in a row today, tired and slightly hungover and it felt awful. I got pumped to death during the very soft warmup. Despite this I kept climbing and somehow I climbed as well as ever. Mono pockets, dynos, gymnastic heelhooks - everything clicked. Wierd. Sigmund Fraud fucked around with this message at 23:02 on Feb 23, 2014 |
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Feb 23, 2014 22:58
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Man I climbed on real stone rather than in a gym for the first time in months the other day. I forgot how rough it is on your hands when you're not used to it, especially since it was kinda cold. The tower is also like 25 meters tall and cold so by the end of a route my hands were more numb than in pain!
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Feb 24, 2014 22:16
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I've always found that plastic is more rough on my hands than real stone, but that could be either anecdotal, or simply because of the stone itself (beautiful southern sandstone.)
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Feb 24, 2014 23:36
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pokchu posted:I've always found that plastic is more rough on my hands than real stone, but that could be either anecdotal, or simply because of the stone itself (beautiful southern sandstone.) When I climb outdoors it's mostly on southern sandstone at Bowles, which I find comparable to indoors. But when I go to Dartmoor and climb on granite, it tears me up! But it's so much more satisfying to climb...
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Feb 24, 2014 23:44
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Manstrocity posted:This seems weird to me. My impression of Sender One is they grade a little soft, meaning LA Boulders is just flattering people. Although I mostly climb ropes, so I don't know if that translates over to their bouldering grades. Yeah, I haven't climbed Sender One for a while, so maybe things have changed, but my impression is that the grades were really soft (for lead and top roping, I didn't do any bouldering). They also seemed to set bolts every frigging foot, I've never had such a short ten clip climb before...
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Feb 25, 2014 00:45
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Thanks to this thread, and an extremely enthusiastic guy at the local rock wall, I've gotten into rock climbing and gone from "How do I put this harness on?" to being asked to route for people in the last two weeks. In short, thank you thread for convincing me to become Fiesta, slayer of 5.8s everywhere (in my gym).
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Mar 1, 2014 17:09
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What's some good exercises for training grip strength in relation to climbing?
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Mar 3, 2014 03:33
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climbing
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Mar 3, 2014 03:34
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henne posted:climbing Well yeah, but cause it's a bit of a trip to get to the climbing gym, I'm only going in the weekends for the time being at least. So I'd like to add something into my normal gym routine that'd help my climbing as well.
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Mar 3, 2014 03:37
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Puseklepp posted:Well yeah, but cause it's a bit of a trip to get to the climbing gym, I'm only going in the weekends for the time being at least. So I'd like to add something into my normal gym routine that'd help my climbing as well. Does your gym have a pullup bar? Try doing pullups but not locking your thumb around the bar, so you're just hanging from your fingers instead. You can also try doing it with fewer fingers, but be very very careful about popping tendon pulleys. But really, there is no substitute for climbing more.
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Mar 3, 2014 03:47
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Puseklepp posted:What's some good exercises for training grip strength in relation to climbing? I don't know what the consensus is on them, but my gym sells these: http://www.amazon.com/Metolius-METOLIUS-Gripsaver-Plus-Medium/dp/B00A6EO9Y8
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Mar 3, 2014 04:03
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guppy posted:I don't know what the consensus is on them, but my gym sells these: http://www.amazon.com/Metolius-METOLIUS-Gripsaver-Plus-Medium/dp/B00A6EO9Y8 Huh, interesting. Have you tried them? Are they any effective?
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Mar 3, 2014 04:10
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I own one but I rarely remember to use it so I will defer to the opinions of others. Note that it is basically just a grip ball (they make them in different resistances) combined with one of those Hand Xpand things or whatever -- you grip, and then pull your fingers back against the resistance of the rubber bands.
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Mar 3, 2014 04:13
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Puseklepp posted:Well yeah, but cause it's a bit of a trip to get to the climbing gym, I'm only going in the weekends for the time being at least. So I'd like to add something into my normal gym routine that'd help my climbing as well. Sorry, I should have elaborated more. Climbing can be very hard on the tendons in your hand, and almost all of the new climbers I know who tried to train grip strength outside of climbing more have injured themselves in a way that can take months to fully heal, with a high chance of catastrophic re injury during rehab exercises. By only training your fingers during your infrequent climbing sessions you increase recovery time and decrease the potential for increasing load on your tendons before you are ready for it. Tendons do not strengthen like muscles, they do not respond well to overloading and when they are tired it is very easy to hurt them with little to no warning. Take it easy as you start climbing, use the lack of perceived finger strength to work on your footwork and body position techniques. Instead of falling off a route and saying "arg if only my fingers were stronger I'd be able to hold on", instead think of it as "how can i position myself to reduce how hard I have to pull on that hold". Focus on finding the best way to position your body to reduce the strength with which you must pull on each hold on a route, then attempt to string together moves that move you from one position of rest to another. Not only will this make you feel less limited by your current strength, the technique you build through doing this will help you later on. Do not get a hangboard. Do not get rock rings. Do not use campus boards. Learn the difference between an open and closed crip, and focus on using open crimps only. This will both increase your hand strength gains while reducing your potential for injury. If it feels like you have muscular soreness in your fingers, stop climbing until it goes away. There are no muscles in your hands, these are your tendons hurting. They do not respond to overload and then hyper recovery or whatever it is. It is okay to have surface tenderness from the holds on your skin, but if it hurts inside your fingers please stop until it doesn't. Please be careful, tendon injuries are terrible and take a long time to heal. I am sorry if it sounds like I am going off on you, but as I have seen climbing get more and more popular recently I have seen huge numbers of new climbers with the beginning of tendon injures, either in their fingers or in their elbows. If something feels off, please take a few days until it feels ALL THE WAY BETTER, not just less painful. This can be hard as a new climber, but 3 days off can prevent an injury keeping you from climbing for 3+ months.
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Mar 3, 2014 04:24
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The best thing I did when I had a 45 min one way drive to the gym is setup a little 8x8' rock wall in the garage. Wood, t-nuts, and holds ran about $125. Then just setup 3 or 4 short problems that work the hands/fingers while allowing you to take the weight on your feet as well.
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Mar 3, 2014 04:39
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henne posted:Sorry, I should have elaborated more. Climbing can be very hard on the tendons in your hand, and almost all of the new climbers I know who tried to train grip strength outside of climbing more have injured themselves in a way that can take months to fully heal, with a high chance of catastrophic re injury during rehab exercises. By only training your fingers during your infrequent climbing sessions you increase recovery time and decrease the potential for increasing load on your tendons before you are ready for it. Tendons do not strengthen like muscles, they do not respond well to overloading and when they are tired it is very easy to hurt them with little to no warning. Thanks, this is all very useful info. I really don't wanna injure myself, and I guess improving my technique should be the priority. After my first few climbing sessions my fingers have been a little stiff for a few hours, though not painful or sore (like DOMS), I guess this is normal?
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Mar 3, 2014 04:53
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Yeah that's pretty normal, I like to massage my fingers or fully open and close my hands after climbing to maintain blood flow and help prevent this. I would worry if you felt DOMS or had pain on finger opening and closing, stiffness is fine.
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Mar 3, 2014 04:58
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Mar 3, 2014 06:53
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Are those a new line of evolvs? They look pretty sexy. I will go out on a limb and say that if a beginning climber wants to start hand exercises, there's nothing wrong with doing so as long as you're "doing the right thing." There's some terrible idea going around that you need to pinch or grip harder and while I can see the as an issue later on, say at V4, I doubt anyone is falling off a VB because of pinch strength. On the other hand, I would definitely recommend very light resistance exercises for opening your hand to work and train your tendons for opening your hand. They're just as important and many injuries can be mitigated if your hand is "well-rounded" instead of being burly in just one lop-sided fashion. I wouldn't recommend going out and starting the beastmaker routine right away, but every climber of every level can benefit from keeping your hand a balanced machine. If you're still climbing and are topping out at V3/4, then go ahead and fire up something like the beastmaker.
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Mar 3, 2014 15:05
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The problem is new climbers generally don't understand that finger strength and grip strength are two different things that are trained in different ways. As far as climbing is considered, finger strength is the ability to put your fingers in a position and keep them stable even when applying weight. Grip strength is how hard you can squeeze, or how long you can squeeze before fatigue sets in. V0-V2, you can get away with brute force upper body/grip strength. V3, is when you start to find holds that require finger strength. Technique helps you apply the minimum amount of weight on your fingers. So every new climber faces their first plateau and goes, "Help, I need more grip strength!". Not only do they not know what they need (technique), but they are calling what they think they need (finger strength) something else (grip strength). That's why every page a bunch of us go TECHNIQUE, ITS TECHNIQUE Don't use fingerboards or any other bullshit.
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Mar 3, 2014 15:54
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Baldbeard posted:Don't use fingerboards or any other bullshit. I don't know if I'd go so far as to say fingerboards are bullshit. I've gotten a lot of gains out the beastmaker, but I suppose I'm not technically a "beginner." I sometimes think I climb like one though. 
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Mar 3, 2014 18:20
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gamera009 posted:I've gotten a lot of gains out the beastmaker,
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Mar 3, 2014 18:56
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gamera009 posted:Are those a new line of evolvs? They look pretty sexy. Well that's Sidney Trinidad at the Bouldering nationals two weeks ago, and she climbs for evolv, so probably. Look like they could be a new Optimus? Guy in the background is what makes that photo though. Also if you didn't watch nationals you should (it's on youtube). There were some excellent moments and the setters really were on their game.
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Mar 3, 2014 19:30
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Manstrocity posted:Well that's Sidney Trinidad at the Bouldering nationals two weeks ago, and she climbs for evolv, so probably. Look like they could be a new Optimus? Guy in the background is what makes that photo though. I feel bad that when people are climbing, I really only notice the shoes first, beta second.  I am a giant shoe whore. 
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Mar 3, 2014 19:43
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Baldbeard posted:That's why every page a bunch of us go TECHNIQUE, ITS TECHNIQUE I've taken a lot of beginners climbing and one of the most interesting things to me is how people who can brute force it through the low levels just hit a WALL when they get into the high 5.10 or V2 range. The people I've taken climbing who have great upper body strength (men and women, though generally guys tend to have this "problem" more, the only girl I've taken climbing who's had the issue was a kayak guide for years) can muscle up routes and just don't progress on technique nearly as fast as you'd expect. The people who progress the fastest tend to be the ones who are weak as hell in upper body and flail like crazy on the 5.8s when they start, but once they figure out technique they shoot right up in levels. Everyone is different, blah blah blah, but in general I feel like you don't really benefit from specific training for climbing (aside from climbing more) until you're climbing solidly in the 5.11 range for sport and in the V3-V4 range for bouldering. That's around the range where even if you've got perfect technique, more strength and such will really benefit you.
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Mar 3, 2014 19:54
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It really depends on your level of fitness. Personally, when I started climbing, I would only ever go hiking for exercise, and my upper body strength was non-existent. Simply being able to do a pull up makes an immense difference in your ability to climb. If you can't muscle up anything at all, you're going to have problems with anything overhung. If you're overweight, or have weak grip strength, you're going to have problems period. Do you need to do hangboard training in order to get past this? No. But using an assistive pull-up machine and strengthening your core through yoga (or climbing or whatever) will make a big difference over time, and less weight makes everything easier. I found the Metolius rubber donut thing to provide a major boost to grip and forearm strength as well as stamina when used regularly, and I would strongly suggest them for anyone with a commute where they have a hand free - it was great on BART.
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Mar 3, 2014 22:06
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Irving posted:I've taken a lot of beginners climbing and one of the most interesting things to me is how people who can brute force it through the low levels just hit a WALL when they get into the high 5.10 or V2 range. The people I've taken climbing who have great upper body strength (men and women, though generally guys tend to have this "problem" more, the only girl I've taken climbing who's had the issue was a kayak guide for years) can muscle up routes and just don't progress on technique nearly as fast as you'd expect. The people who progress the fastest tend to be the ones who are weak as hell in upper body and flail like crazy on the 5.8s when they start, but once they figure out technique they shoot right up in levels. Yeah exactly, v0-v2ish gives people the false impression that you can get through routes by just -pulling really hard!-. So people who have stronger upper bodies fall into that trap even more, and seem to hit an even more significant plateau when that's over. Meanwhile the skinny guys/gals sometimes pick up good technique sooner because they have to, and have a more consistent progression. Fingerboards and stuff can definitely supplement experienced climbers who know exactly what's going on and exactly where they are lacking, but the act of climbing is the only perfectly balanced exercise that improves climbing, so I'm wary of someone who is not really really good at climbing already wanting to use a fingerboard. I know at ~V6, I still feel like technique is holding me back and I still rely on my strength too much -- a fingerboard would just tax my tendons off the wall and be a waste of time.
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Mar 3, 2014 22:16
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Since we're on finger chat, any thoughts on how to prep your fingers/elbows for returning to harder climbing. I could climb like 12a in the gym pretty reliably, then I haven't climbed for like 2 months and want to ease back in. I'm trying to move up the grades slowly (which is easy at first since I'm tired after a 10a right now, but will get harder), but it wouldn't be crazy to do some other prep.
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Mar 3, 2014 22:57
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AriTheDog posted:It really depends on your level of fitness. Personally, when I started climbing, I would only ever go hiking for exercise, and my upper body strength was non-existent. Sure, I was referring mostly to specific climbing training (fingerboard, etc.) Generally improving your fitness and core strength will help a lot, but that isn't really specifically climbing related. Also, even on overhung routes, technique is so so important.
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Mar 3, 2014 23:10
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modig posted:Since we're on finger chat, any thoughts on how to prep your fingers/elbows for returning to harder climbing. I could climb like 12a in the gym pretty reliably, then I haven't climbed for like 2 months and want to ease back in. I'm trying to move up the grades slowly (which is easy at first since I'm tired after a 10a right now, but will get harder), but it wouldn't be crazy to do some other prep. You are doing the right thing, your tendons need to get stronger just like they did the first time. They are not muscles, you will not have muscle memory gains in your tendons. Take it easy, your tendons aren't any harder to injure because you have climbed in the past. It can be really hard not to try harder routes that you have the muscular strength for, but avoid climbing hard crimpy things, I have multiple friends who have injured themselves while regaining strength by climbing something too hard too soon. Slopers and pinches are a bit safer as they put less load on the pulleys but still be careful. AriTheDog posted:Simply being able to do a pull up makes an immense difference in your ability to climb. If you can't muscle up anything at all, you're going to have problems with anything overhung. If you're overweight, or have weak grip strength, you're going to have problems period. Do you need to do hangboard training in order to get past this? No. But using an assistive pull-up machine and strengthening your core through yoga (or climbing or whatever) will make a big difference over time, and less weight makes everything easier. I would once again recommend against training strength outside of climbing as a new climber. Returning to climbing, go hard on the core and upper body workouts all you want. But as a new climber I think the experience you gain as a weakling will do wonders for learning how to move in a way that requires the least strength possible. Yeah, overhanging stuff will be hard until you get a handle on hip twisting and using floating flags to rotate your torso. I can make larger reaches from an extended arm through proper torso rotation than I can through a one arm lockoff and keeping myself square to the wall. Yes you will get to v2 faster through strength and grip training, but you will just hit that wall so much harder than if you get to v2 through natural progression from climbing. The best climbers I know are the ones who started young, not because of their years of experience, but because they spent their early years unable to build much muscle mass and had to learn how to best use what they had. True on the less weight though. henne fucked around with this message at 23:26 on Mar 3, 2014 |
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Mar 3, 2014 23:18
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