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

move your hands closer together to increase training resistance. Conversely, beginners should do the push-ups with their knees on the floor until they are able to progress to the normal feet-on-floor position.
DIPS
     
    Dips are an excellent exercise for strengthening the many muscles of the upper arms, shoulders, chest, and back. What’s more, the dip motion is quite similar to the mantle move in climbing and thus provides a very sport-specific benefit! Some health clubs and gyms possess a parallel-bar setup ideal for performing dips. Alternatively, you can use the incut ninety-degree corner of a kitchen counter, or set two heavy chairs in a parallel position. A set of free-floating Pump Rocks or gymnastics rings are my personal favorite, as they provide a more dynamic (and difficult) workout.
    Position yourself between the parallel bars, Pump Rocks, or other apparatus. Jump up into the straight-arm starting position with your hands drawn in near your hips. Slowly lower until your arm is bent ninety degrees—do not lower beyond this point! Immediately press back up to the starting position. Continue this up-and-down motion, with each repetition taking about two seconds. Strive to complete ten to twenty (hard) repetitions. Perform two or three sets with a three-minute rest between each. Don’t rush or bounce through this exercise, and never lower beyond a ninety-degree arm bend.
    If you are unable to do at least ten dips, enlist a spotter to reduce the resistance as needed so that you can reach this goal. The spotter should stand behind you and lift around your waist or, more easily, pull up on your ankles (bend your legs and cross them at the ankles to facilitate this).
    Antagonist-Muscle Training Tips
     
    1. Regular training of the antagonist muscles will make you a more biomechanically sound climber and vastly reduce your risk of elbow and shoulder injuries.
    2. Perform all of the antagonist exercises described in this section at least twice per week. Use relatively light weights that enable you to perform fifteen to thirty (better) reps with each exercise.
    3. Dips are most beneficial, but for many people they are difficult to perform at full body weight. If needed, engage a training partner to help you perform at least fifteen dips per set.
    4. Most important, perform Reverse Wrist Curls and Forearm Pronators before and after every climbing workout. These exercises provide a valuable dynamic warm-up before climbing, and may help you avoid the elbow tendinosis that can result from muscular imbalance.
     
     
    Bench Press

     
    1. Press straight up.
     

     
    2. Slow, controlled movement.
     

    Dip

     
    1. Straight-arm start.
     

     
    2. Bend to 90 degrees, then press to starting position!
     

An Overview of Stamina Training for Climbing
     
    Stamina is the ability to resist fatigue while engaging in sustained or intermittent physical activity for an extended period of time. Some people refer to this attribute as endurance, since it is largely a function of one’s aerobic and anaerobic endurance. Depending on your preferred type of climbing, the importance of stamina can range from minor to paramount. In bouldering, for example, the need for strength and power far exceeds that for stamina. Conversely, stamina supersedes strength and power for alpine and big-wall climbing. In the middle of this continuum are multipitch climbing and all-day sport climbing, which require strength and power, as well as significant stamina.
    As in other types of conditioning, there are sport-specific and general ways of stamina training. The most specific—and therefore effective—approach would be to train as you perform. That is, to develop stamina for long days of cragging, you would train by logging many long days at the crags. Obviously, this approach is not an option for many recreational climbers with commitments to job, school, and family. A more practical training alternative, then, is to engage in general stamina training such as running and biking coupled as often as possible with high volumes of climbing at the gym or crags.

Stamina Training for Boulder, Sport, and Multipitch Climbers
     
    Excellence at bouldering and sport climbing requires abundant strength and power, precise technique and efficient movement, and a killer instinct, but very little in the way of stamina. The exception are long boulder problems and sport and multipitch routes that do test anaerobic endurance (local to your forearm and upper-body