Training for Climbing, 2nd: The Definitive Guide to Improving Your Performance (How To Climb Series)

This two-step process begins with high-intensity strength training that excites the muscle to near-maximum motor unit recruitment. The second step takes the already excited muscle and challenges it to function at higher speed. In this way complex training stimulates the muscle fibers in conjunction with the nervous system in such a way that slow-twitch fibers are taught to behave like fast-twitch fibers (Chu 1996). Consequently, complex training could be viewed as the magic-bullet exercise for the average climber born with an average percentage of fast-twitch fibers (approximately 50 percent).
    Incorporating the complex training method into your program could be done in several ways. Remember, the key is a back-to-back coupling of a maximum-strength exercise and a power exercise with no rest (only as long as it takes to chalk up) in between the two exercises. Intermediate climbers might couple Hypergravity Pull-Ups with One-Arm Lunging. Or they could perform a maximum boulder problem that is really fingery followed by a set of Campus Touches. Rest for three to five minutes between coupled sets.
    A more advanced protocol would couple a set of heavy Hypergravity Isolation Training (HIT) with a set of Double Dynos on a campus board. This latter strategy of combining HIT and drop-and-catch reactive training should be a staple technique of elite climbers: It may represent the single best training protocol for fulfilling genetic potential in finger strength and upper-body power.
    Obviously, complex training is an advanced technique that produces both high passive and active stresses—it should be used only by well-conditioned, intermediate to elite climbers with no recent history of injury. Furthermore, its use should be limited to once or twice per week, and it should be cycled on and off about every two weeks. Finally, complete recovery from a complex workout could take as long as three to five days. Any other strenuous training or climbing during the supercompensation period would tend to negate its benefits.
    Summary of Complex Training
     
    1. Complex training is the most advanced method for developing maximum strength and power.
    2. Only well-conditioned, injury-free advanced intermediate and elite climbers should engage in complex training.
    3. Couple a maximum-strength exercise and a power-training exercise back-to-back with no rest in between.
    4. Rest for at least five minutes between sets so that each training couplet is a high-quality effort. Do only three to ten coupled strength-power sets. Never more.
    5. Engage in complex training once or twice (elite climbers only) per week. Use complex training as part of the maximum-strength and power phase of a training mesocycle.
     
     

 
    Rachel Melville on Table of Colors (5.13a), Red River Gorge, Kentucky. DAN BRAYACK
     

    CHAPTER SIX
     
    General Conditioning Exercises
     
    What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.
    —Oliver Wendell Holmes
     
     
    The previous chapter provided an overview of the principles and methods of strength and fitness training for climbing. With this understanding, we can now take a more purposeful look at the dozens of conditioning exercises that are of value to climbers. In this chapter you’ll learn a variety of basic, yet important, warm-up and general conditioning exercises; chapter 7 will then provide a detailed look at the many climbing-specific exercises for the pull muscles of the upper torso and arms.
    Since failure while climbing often seems to center on lack of arm and finger strength, you may be tempted to skip this chapter in favor of total immersion into the climbing-specific exercises. Please don’t! No matter if you are a beginner or elite climber, the content of this chapter is essential for building a balanced body that can best learn climbing skills, maintain coordinated movement despite growing fatigue, and tolerate high amounts of climbing with minimal injury risk. By regularly using the general conditioning exercise described herein, you will develop and maintain a solid physical foundation from which you can train and climb hard for many years to come.
    Divided into five parts, this chapter will delve into optimizing body composition, improving flexibility, core conditioning, antagonist-muscle training, and aerobic training to improve stamina. The first section on optimizing body condition is especially important since strength-to-weight ratio correlates well