My training blog

A short piece on Training for Rock climbing

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 11:20:24 +0100

A friend of mine recently brought this article to my attention and it’s a good solid simple overview. It’s not training for alpine climbing, but even us alpinists need/like to clip a few bolts now and then, and many of the principles are the same.

Subtractions

Tue, 15 Nov 2011 21:26:41 +0100

I have some rules I’ve adopted for myself to help me attain my best emotional state for climbing. I call them the subtractions. These rules helps me create a bubble for optimal internal conditions. Of course I’ve allowed these to change over time, so don’t think me too much of a zealot as you read these:

1) No movies, no television. A hard and fast rule for me. Movies easily burn themselves into my consciousness. I first subtracted movies when in college because I was addicted to Start Trek: The Next Generation and the clips replayed in my head while I was trying to climb. Now that I’m older I find I can watch an occasional film without affecting my ability to concentrate.

1) Music: I limit this as well. I never was that aurally-inclined, so this isn’t difficult for me. Many successfully music to positively modify their emotional state. I find it distracting, again because I hear the tune or the lyrics while trying to focus on the climbing. I enjoy music in a social-setting, but when working, training, and climbing I prefer silence.

1) Internet and email: This became a problem when I got a smartphone. If you want to disrupt your flow, check your email at the crag. I schedule my access to internet and email according to my day so I get on-line, do what I need to do, and get off.

1) Routine: I’ve experimented a lot with this as my life is very anti-routine. Ideally I read in the morning before breakfast, then do my work, eat again, then work another hour while digesting and then climb or train for the rest of the day. Evenings are for friends and family or a good book. If I’m going to have a few full-days of climbing or guiding I put in a few full days in the home-office. Another routine that works well is to climb every day the weather allows, as on an expedition or a road-trip.

1) Avoid drama and dramatic people. They may be entertaining, but they are ultimately detrimental when I’m trying to climb my best.

There is a long American tradition of giving things up to foster self reliance and creativity. Think: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Emily Dickenson, or Henry David Throeau. Within climbing we have the same tradition: think expeditions, roadtrips, bivouacs. Building up a tolerance for solitude, or at least being in very small groups, not only opens up channels of concentration, but it is also a form of ritual in that you’re sacrificing, and what is ritual if not a sacrifice. You are searching to discover and consistently create the environment that works best for you. To find what works, you will have to experiment.

Overtraining: Indicators

Sat, 27 Aug 2011 10:22:12 +0200

One of the best books I have on training is Dr. Tim Noakes’ The Lore of Running. If you are not intimidated by the books 900+ pages, you’re not normal. And if you don’t think this book is not relevant to climbing because it’s targeted at running, you’re wrong. While the book is impossible to digest all at once, any athlete that is self-coaching will find it to be an invaluable reference.

In his section on overtraining Dr. Noakes suggests that if you answer yes to any three of these questions, then it is time to reduce training. You can extrapolate from running to climbing:

1) Does your normally comfortable pace leave you breathless?
2) Do your legs feel heavy for far longer than usual after a hard workout or a race?
3) Do you find it especially hard to climb steps?
4) Do you dread the thought of training?
5) Do you find it hard to get out of bed in the morning?
6) Do you have a persistent lack of appetite?
7) Are you more susceptible to colds, flu, headache, or infections?
8) Is your resting hear rate 5-10 beats higher than usual?
9) Is your heart rate during exercise higher than usual?

I have found that several of these are especially true for me, my indicators. For me they are numbers 7,8, and 9. When you are on the edge of overtraining you may find that one thing that can easily tip you over into one of these symptoms. For me, this is alcohol. If I’m on the edge, and I have one beer, I wake up feeling sick the next day. I’ve learned that I have to abstain from drinking completely when pushing my training hard. With some time and observation you should find your own indicators.

Overtraining, Part I

Fri, 22 Jul 2011 19:16:07 +0200

This will be the first in a series of (long-overdue) posts about over-training. I want to start by revisiting some periodization concepts as they pertain to rest and “easy” weeks since, at it’s most basic, over-training is a symptom of too little rest.

When you start a structured training program for climbing you’ve gone from a purely recreational climber, to one who is setting and working towards new goals. As I covered in an earlier post, a typical plan is based on training volume measured in hours of training. An easy week in an annual training-cycle may be eight hours of training. The next week ten, the hard week twelve. The week following one or two hard weeks will always be an easy week. This is a very important time in your training. And after 2-3 easy days, many people, especially you type-A’ers out there, want to go hard again.

First off: Respect your plan. If your plan says eight hours don’t exceed that. And do not make the mistake of believing that because you’re training less this is the week you can go out and party, or spend all weekend helping your friend move into that fourth floor apartment, or spend a day skiing at the resort. Type-A’s often will feel anxious during their easy week, like they’re not doing enough, and they will fill it up with other activities besides rest.

Here are some suggestions:

Sleep. This is absolutely the single most important thing you can do this week. If you talk to true professional athletes who train at very high volumes, nordic ski racers or triathletes, many of them will report sleeping 11 hours per night!

Get off your feet. Read. Work. Balance your checkbook. Rest means rest. If you must do something, consider taking care of something that is adding to your general stress-level. If you have been meaning to call grandma, or you need to get ahead on a project at work, get that done.

Spend the time working on the mental-side. Meditation is a powerful tool and a possible subject for a future post.
 Make sure you’re eating well. Take time to stock the pantry with good training foods for the coming days and weeks.

Stay hydrated. Pee a lot, your body is doing a lot of repair work this week, and the cleaner the plumbing the better you’ll recover, and the stronger you’ll be.

Get ahead. Prepare for the coming weeks.

Take care of your body. Most of us cannot afford regular massage therapy. If you can afford to do this once per month, this is a good opportunity.

Remember that the training effect is a cycle: you stress your body, it tires, and with rest it overcompensates by getting stronger. So remember, when you’re resting is when you are getting stronger. Not when you’re training.

Next post: Common indicators of overtraining.

Settling back into some training volume

Wed, 19 Jan 2011 01:30:26 +0100

Colorado has been good to me. Home, hearth, friends, climbing partners, skiing, guiding, climbing. Lots and lots of climbing. I lost count of my ice/mixed days this season somewhere after twenty-five.

With my injuries from the March accident still healing I’m doing my best to take care of my body with plenty of climbing and ski touring, good nutrition, massage work, and yoga classes. Rehab isn’t so different from climbing; same process, different goal.

At ten months post-accident I still feel daily soreness in the rib fractures and continue to experience (ever-diminishing) weakness and loss of sensation in my right glute max. But my progress has been huge. As a guy that couldn’t walk nine months ago I’m aware of just how lucky I was, and how happy to be climbing and skiing as much as I am.

Since I’ve been functional for a couple months I’ve been working to get my sport-specific fitness back and there is no better way to lay a big foundation for climbing than climbing. And that is exactly where S.W. Colorado has delivered. In spades.

So going back to the numbers, and the training thread, I’ve been working on three week cycles of increasingly more climbing-volume with some ski-tours thrown in for added cardio and low-impact volume. This has meant that my last big week just topped twenty hours, and I’m looking to cycle down to an easy 13 hour week this week before cranking back up to a 24 hour week in early February.

There is still a long ways to go before I get back to the strength and fitness I had last March when I broke a foothold and ripped some gear in my big fall on Mount Temple, but I’m getting there. One log entry at a time.