I like all the points you emphasised but I found one missing: Not to enjoy the climb. In every gym the grading is different and often fluctuates over time but the point is to enjoy the movement. No matter how it's graded (either outside or in a gym) the point is to have fun, enjoy every move and improve. Is it graded two grades lower than you onsight and you struggle? Who cares! The route setter may have a different body type or whatsoever, if it is an enjoyable boulder problem, enjoy it. I have seen too many people in gyms and outside at crags showing nothing but frustration from their inability to reach their goals. And they are not professionals. If climbing is just your hobby sport (like mine for the past 20 years), focus on enjoying no matter the grade is!
Yes good point Pavel, totally agree! To bring this to a training perspective and away from grades, its important to enjoy the training methods you are doing. As a coach we will try to programme exercises and sessions that the athlete wants to do. The best laid plans won't work if the climber avoids them or even struggles to engage mentally.
The absolute easiest way to fix #2 and rest properly between climbs is simply to climb with other people. With 3-4 people you can hit a good natural rhythm of 1-2 people climbing at a time while the rest watch and/or chat. It's also a great way to learn technique and think about route choice by critiquing (not necessarily aloud!) others' route choices and you can help each other out with pointing out holds and brushing. The obvious downside to this is the difficulty trying to get people available at the same time or trying to meet new people.
The social aspect of bouldering is a really big part of why I enjoy it so much! Giving each other tips, encouraging each other to send a problem, and maybe also having a liiiitle bit of healthy competition between similar level climbers, all these things really motivate me to go to the gym and improve my climbing.
@@slg9307Since I started climbing, this has to be the biggest point I noticed: People at bouldering gyms are so nice and open! I've only been to two different gyms really but so many good climbers are willing to help, explain a technique or just climb the route, so you can get a general idea for yourself. It's not just the better climbers though, struggling and practising a route with others that equally struggle also makes forming bonds really easy. I definitely have to say that one of the most positive things about bouldering/climbing is their community!
Points 6-8 are something this video made me realise I've been missing. Not just from climbing but education too. I feel like those apply to everything really, I've been very bad at managing those things and my grades have suffered as I always try to change things up, especially when the semester grades come back. Similarly, in climbing or other sports I've practiced over the years I've never kept consistent and always tried to overanalyze everything and thinking I must make changes all the time. These tips were very insightful, and to anyone with consistency issues it hopefully helps realise them better! Keep persevering!
Bad habit 4 is so undervalued! It has a lot to do about how you are able to manage reward, uncertainty and failure. You might see some pro climbers that self-identify as perfectionists (like Janja Garnbret or Anna Hazelnut) that would want to make each and every climb perfect. You don't need to reach that level of perfectionism (it has its own drawbacks) to improve, but it can show you how much you can develop as a climber if you are willing to risk lowering your beliefs of what you are able to do. It's hard! We like to believe that we managed the climb because of our abilities and not because it was a one-try fluke of luck. But it's one of the best tools that we have to really get outside of the plateau!
#4 and #7 (the freaking out and anxiety part) are definitely my thing lol! Great video guys especially for including gloves for dish washing! It's an often overlooked performance metric haha
One from me is not trying routes that are above your current level. I'm often quite surprised at the number of higher graded ones I manage to send and if doing it with people, I get tips that I can apply to routes at my current level that make the difference.
Yeah, I've been trying to perfect my climbs. Especially with dynos or strange movements/cruxes. But I will say only fell into that habit when I'm climbing at or near my limit. It's a little bit of an easier habit with slabs, though. Slabs are more technical, than strength based so I tend to be able to send higher grades on slab now.
1:10 my best way to avoid trying again to quickly is to go take a sip of water after every attempt, chalking up again, give a good reading of the problem and THEN trying again
I copy the answers given a few hours ago to another comment by : Climbing psychology : " It removes the natural skin oils that protect it. Makes it more prone to damages and when it gets super wrinkled because of osmosis (wated gets inside the tissue) you lose more skin. Not to talk about the damage the soap can do. " and Lattice Training : " Especially in the hours before climbing, soaking your hands in warm water can soften your skin. Soft skin breaks up quickly climbing on high friction or sharp holds. Dry skin tends to be more resilient, more grippy and leads to a better training session. Skin condition changes a lot between people but if you have generally quite soft skin I would recommend it if you are trying to toughen up your hands. "
i dont have any of these habits but the worst habit there is its overtraining because youre addicted to climbing , hello tendonitis my old friend and youre not getting stronger because youre never fresh
Brush your holds when you've finished your attempt! Such a headache for those followup climbers that find the holds suddenly slippery because the chalk wasn't cleaned off by the last climber!
I'm not gonna clean every boulder that I climb, especially indoors. My warmup where I don't need super clean holds might be someone's project, and vice versa, so if I plan to climb at my peak level it's on me to clean the holds if I deem it necessary.
Maybe if there are people you are climbing with, but not at random, sometimes people won't be climbing it, and if they do, they should be brushing themselves anyways. Never expect holds to be clean.
#10: Never Downclimbing Before Coming Off a Route I see a lot of climbers skip downclimbing and trusting their ability to fall properly every time. Good falling technique is important, and downclimbing supports imperfect falling technique. In some places, gyms only set downclimb holds for beginner routes. This practice encourages climbers to think of downclimbing as "beginners only" rather than a good safety practice. Downclimbing might not be possible on every problem, but taking the more controlled falls with a bit of downclimbing helps prevent injuries that will take you out of climbing for a long time.
To be honest, I downclimb each warmup problem that I do, using only the holds on said problem. The effects are very noticeable. It trains your body to be so much more in control of different holds and thus also allows you to climb harder. Highly recommend it.
100% agree on this, I've seen more than a few people close to get injured because of a mentality of "oh, I'm going to just jump off at the end". Really dangerous practice over time.
Not to mention that for some (like me), putting stress on the spine is not really an option. Downclimbing is one of the many reasons why I can still climb at my age when many stop after reaching their 40s or 50s.
Another potential point, at least for me, is: Be careful when you compare your own progress with someone elses progress. Also, be careful when you compare yourself as you are now with someone who is stronger than you. Both of these points risk demoralizing you, demotivating training and slippering the slope down to slower progression due to something like low motivation or bad "catching up" training. If you get hyped or engaged when doing these things, then it's not a problem obviously.
For me comparing myself with others makes me climb stronger. For the last year I had a training partner who had better endurance and technique than me and when she was able to do a route I wanted to do it as well. Now she is gone and something is missing.
0:16 Bad habit 1: Not warming up your lower body. 1:15 Bad habit 2: Not resting between attempts. 2:04 Bad habit 3: Only using one grip type. 3:27 Bad habit 4: Not perfecting climbs. 4:30 Bad habit 5: Not working rest positions. 5:09 Bad habit 6: Changing your training too often. 5:56 Bad habit 7: Not persevering with one method. 6:29 Bad habit 8: Over analysing your performance. 7:19 Bad habit 9: Not brushing holds 7:42 Bad habit 10: Not wearing wash up gloves
@@Fred-oz3tw I'm guessing it's because of how you can lose skin or make it heal slower if you don't wear the gloves while under warm water, detergents and scrubbing. Might be something else
I completely agree with point #4! Doing a route properly can be a valuable learning experience. However, it's important to recognize that sometimes you may not have the necessary strength or technique to execute it perfectly, and that's okay too.
I would say that if you manage to top it in a way that takes less strength. That is the optimal way for you. Working on the technique is the whole point and finding a way that takes less strength. It does not have to be beautiful. But if you can do it once you can probably do it again just a little more efficiently
"Not perfecting climbs" really good one. Started working this because an injury's been forcing me to do easy climbs for a while. Really honing the beta for easy problems feels a lot more rewarding and valuable than a session full of sloppy flashes.
I think I'm very guilty of habit #4 I still often redo climbs but only the ones I liked doing, there are some climbs I kind of "luckily" do and then I don't redo them.
I agree with this. I feel like some climbs are built in a “spray of holds” on the wall sometimes. The problem will never feel good and doesn’t deserve redo-ing. Time is better spent elsewhere.
@@Jagknorr Although it's true that sometimes it might be a crimpy overhang problem that doesn't suit me and I just can't bring myself to redo it because I hated it so much, I just wanted to do it once. But what you describe is sometimes true as well.
Like Josh I have sweaty skin and intuitively figured out that gloves were needed when washing up dishes to keep my skin dry. But unlike Josh I always bought larger gloves so I didn't struggle taking them off and just dealt with using overly sized gloves while washing up. The beta at the end was mind blowing
For me #3 is the most useful. I think it describes me so well, I do attempts over attempts without resting and it makes you so much more prone to injuries. 2 weeks ago I did a "feet first" move where you throw your feet up dynamically, more than 10 times in a row, and I'm still recovering for the back muscle strain it gave me. I've also had bicep pain + golfer/tennis elbow for months and I cannot get rid of it, it may probably be linked with this no resting thing...
I cured my medial epicondylitis (golfers elbow, where the pain is on the "inside" of your elbow) by doing lots of chin ups! The problem with tendonitis is that rest doesn't heal it, you need to induce inflammation to promote healing which I know sounds counterintuitive but look up mark rippetoes pin firing method. I did 10 sets of 2 to 3 chin ups a few times a week and this healed my tendonitis. It works for lateral epicondylitis too. I hope this helps because golfers/tennis elbow sucks!
@@Josh653 well, at this point I'm taking any advice I can you know. I can't make any progress because of the pain, I have to take anti inflammatories all the time it's so depressing. I'll do some research on what you told me. The thing is that I don't exactly know what I have, I do have some tennis elbow with manageable pain, but the golfer one I'm not sure. The pain is insane and is on the upper part of the arm, not the forearm, on the inside and under the start of the bicep. Did you have something similar? Thanks for the advice :)
@@LePetitBat he's right, I had really bad tennis elbow for several months and tried all kinds of wraps and things that were supposed to help, but using low weight forearm exercises targeting the sore tendons every night had me back to normal in under a month.
#1 mistake I see is younger climbers dropping from the top instead of climbing down. Always makes me wince. If you still want to be climbing when you’re 50+ protect your knees
Agreed but there should be some guidance on how to climb down. I always climbed down until one day I sent an overhang, ended up deadhanging whilst working out the next hold and my subscapularis tore. Taking over a year to heal with physio (and out of climbing for half of it) and it's getting there but have had to resort to dropping as safely as I can in the meantime. That's also why warming up and down properly is so important.
Lol at the "not climbing perfectly". If I was already perfect I wouldn't need tips. I have no idea how most ways are supposed to be climbed, I just mess around and find out.
Yay so pleased! My dad taught it to me. He learned it when he worked as a biologist and blood scientist in the years before they commonly used disposable gloves in laboratories I guess.
Thank you for this video, i've been climbing since awhile now, and most videos about good or bad training habits just keep repeating things we all already know and are really basic common sense. Your advices were really relevant and new to me, so thanks a lot.
Really useful tips. I only disagree slightly with point 7: not persevering with one method. When i get stock on routes, i often explore different betas until i find the one that suits me best and then i try hard with that one. So unless i misunderstood the point, i do think it is good to rethink and explore possibilities when projecting
The point is definitely in the details rather than the title, they emphasize that its bad if you just give up first try, and how he shouldn't have given up so quickly when the method seemed fine and just needed more practice. It's definitely fine to switch things up if it doesn't feel right or you've given it some goes and get the sense there's gotta be a better way.
As a climber who eschews lower body training, my warming circuits consist of glute bridges (two legged, progressive split and range of lift, pull with the heels and with the toes) first circuit, kossack squats (progressive range of depth and lateral movement) second circuit, assisted pistol squats (add assistance and velocity over each repetition) third second, and then simple force absorption (increase the height of the jump, including off of boxes). Of course, a good warmup procedure is strength training, and I am only fooling myself to say I don’t strength train the lower body, but I do this utterly minimal dose after a more recent issue behind my knee and with my ankle. Warm the lower body, takes no time because you cannot do enough finger and shoulder work to generate the bloodflow you want at the intensity without a brief break… and that is for the legs.
Point 4 is something I've been trying to get my climbing partner to understand for a year now. But, she'd rather bruteforce her way through a route. That includes bouldering and top-rope.
I think I tend to overuse the open-handed crimp, which leads to chronic inflammation of the DIP joint on my middle finger, right hand. I am trying to switch it up with half and full crimps more.
Eat right, Sleep right, Train right, Stay consistent, Trust in the process, Climb less, lift more, Short cuts don't exist, Train with intensity as the gains only begin when it gets hard, 30 year old, no climbing experience, opiate addict that couldn't do a push-up. Now 3 years clean, 33 year old, bouldering 7c consistently. If I can do it from that foundation, imagine what you can accomplish.
Wow. That’s amazing and inspiring. I am just two months into climbing and still get discouraged when seeing other people climbing so good and having so mich strength. Do you have some advice how to train to improve my skills or technique?
Can someone explain to me how he’s seemingly levitating in mid-air at 4:30? 😅 Looks awesome, and definitely someone I’d wanna practice…. if I just knew what was going on :p
Josh is doing what's called a kneebar, which is basically jamming your leg between 2 holds in a way where you can lean back. Particularly good ones like that can let the climber remove both hands and rest quite well, especially on sport climbs. It's less common inside but you might be able to find one or two using holds from different climbs, even if your setters didn't specifically set it
I feel like brush etiquette has declined massively in climbing centres. Some places you go to, you never see anyone using a brush (Rainbow Rocket, in Cambridge, I’m looking at you!)
I can't comment for the the change in etiquette too much (been climbing 10 years) but I would love to see brushing more widely encouraged. For example it would be good if this was encouraged in gym inductions and good stick brushes are always provided. I personally love brushing holds haha.
@@LatticeTraining Yes, brushing is a good opportunity to look over the problem, gives a bit of thinking time doesn't it, and it's nice to brush off all that chalk!
Bad habit #4 can be avoided by climbing something way over your current level: I’ll spend weeks projecting a super hard boulder (couple hours every other day) and by the end of it I can do the boulder ultra smooth. I spent somewhere in the ballpark of 20 hours on one boulder once and now any hold that vaguely resembles the ones on the route are super easy to use for me
Clickbaited. I disagree with the thumbnail. It very much looks like you should let your pinky go in crimp. For target audience this is dangerous as it often leads to tendon injury. And it's not explained in the video, it just is there in the thumbnail.
The thumbnail is crimping slopers and not using an open hand grip. In this video we cover this topic. We talk about not always using the same grip type, even when others might be more appropriate but are avoided because you feel stronger in others. This is a missed opportunity to learn different grip types. I don't understand why this is dangerous though?
@@LatticeTraining For the target audience it is dangerous to open grip without pinky, as people tend to flatten the back of the hand putting huge force on tendon of the ring finger. Because they don't use muscles in the hand, only the finger muscles I assume. But when pinky is engaged in the grip, the back of the hand cannot be flat (the pinky is too short), so the hand muscles naturally activate and the tendon of the ring finger is no longer of danger of PLOPing.
I guess you chose a very hard holds to convey your message. And/Or the hands are too small in the shot. You actually switch the hold, which is not immediately apparent. All in all, as a climber, all I see is: "Don't use pinky, it hampers your strength." Unfortunately, the thumbnail and video title naturally come together to that message.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on that one. In our experience an open grip with 3 fingers i.e. drag, is not dangerous. But we are not talking about injury risk in this video, we are suggesting climbers should use all grip types and avoiding certain grips as a beginner, or at any level, doesn't make much sense to us. We'll take on board the TN feedback 👍.
Skin condition varies a lot. My skin gets trashed very quickly if I don't keep it dry before climbing. There would be very little to recover from if my skin was soft before climbing 😅
On the rubber glove front Lakeland sell ones with a moisturising layer inside. Other than that having bottles of handcream (ideally pump bottles for convenience - you can bulkbuy large 5l refills from hotel supply sites) at every sink and at your bedside is a gamechanger for skin care.
Sweating is controlled by two mechanisms that are the nervous system and the humoral system, in which the mechanism that causes sweating is mainly nervous (sympathetic), so wearing gloves with powder is not the best solution…
When my biggest take home from a climbing video is how to wash my dishes... xD Lol but actually a super neat trick! The rest of the tips were good to keep in mind too
Is he wearing the la sportiva solution? I'm thinking of buying it myself. It would be my first climbing shoe (I'd only use it indoors (boulder)). Is it a good choice guys?:)
These are the Unparallel TN Pro. Fit my feet perfectly! One of the best indoor shoes I've ever had. I've had a few pairs of solutions and the TN Pro is more comfortable IMO. Fit comes first, so I would try on a few different pairs at least. Even withing a single brand you'll find a whole range of different fits.
It removes the natural skin oils that protect it. Makes it more prone to damages and when it gets super wrinkled because of osmosis (wated gets inside the tissue) you lose more skin. Not to talk about the damage the soap can do.
Especially in the hours before climbing, soaking your hands in warm water can soften your skin. Soft skin breaks up quickly climbing on high friction or sharp holds. Dry skin tends to be more resilient, more grippy and leads to a better training session. Skin condition changes a lot between people but if you have generally quite soft skin I would recommend it if you are trying to toughen up your hands.
@@LatticeTraining Thanks for the explanation and the video! I was so confused! I have sweaty hands as well, and not even fancy powder chalks stay on my fingertips for long hahaha Sometimes I feel that a good liquid chalk helps to keep my fingers nice and dry, what's your take on that? Thanks in advance!
@@MaxinfamilyYT Liquid chalk is a game changer for me. But I also find it quite aggressive and dries out my skin after climbing if I use too much. So I tend to save it for projecting only.
Done as a training method, there are ways to climb with little rest or at least controlled rests, but simply not resting properly for hard climbs is definitely not getting sport fitness. As a sport climber, I can tell you my current capacity to hammer away at boulders feels extremely different from my using a board for building capacity.
@@zacharylaschober now that I think about it, I think you are right. This shouldnt be done on boulders at your limit. I like to do it on boulders that are like 1-2 grades below my limit.
training question RE: beginner climbers. Ive seen things saying to stay as far away from hangboards/fingerboards for the first year of your climbing as itll just speed up getting an injury, but how hard of a rule is this? ive been climbing for like 5-6 months and am around a v4-v6 climber but im scared of pulley injuries and dont want to not be able to climb lol.
I think that is a myth. In my opinion hangboarding is pretty safe, as you load your fingers slowly in a controlled way. Just don’t do it to failure and never full crimp. On the other hand, stay away from the campus board for a while, as it is the complete opposite - loading the fingers quickly with a lot of weight. @everyone: please correct me, if I’m wrong ✌️
Checking into Dr Tyler Nelsons recent two part series on this with Climbing Magazine. Hangboards are greatly beneficial to newer climbers, even not looking for climbing training yet the habit of using them for warming will be a gain, but if you’re asking then you should start on a board.
I do a lot of fingerboarding with my feet still on the ground. You can control how much force you put on your fingers while building strength. I normally do this as part of my warm-up, but it's a good way to start fingerboarding while avoiding injury.
The risk of pulley injury is probably reduced by hangboard training. Just do what you can and slowly progress. You don’t have to use the smallest edge , or even take your whole body weight to have it be very effective
This should not be a hard rule as it does not take into account indivuidal circumstances. If you are approaching V6 you will soon be catching small grips at speed and loading the connective tissue in the fingers with a lot of force. The hangboard is a way safer method of loading the fingers and will act to build training tolerance and robustness that supports your progression on the wall. The risk comes in when new climbers don't understand the principles of training and get carried away chasing strength on a hangboard. And in turn can overload the whole system. Lots of hangboarding + lots of climbing done too soon is risky. The hangboard itself is not risky. As Zack said in their comment, Tyler Nelson has been trying to break the myth that beginners need to avoid a hangboard. It's far more to do with the education around hangboarding that presents a risk. If you can read up and become informed, it's not risky in our opinion. We are actually working on a collab video with Tyler about this very topic and will be dropping that in April or early May.
I like all the points you emphasised but I found one missing: Not to enjoy the climb. In every gym the grading is different and often fluctuates over time but the point is to enjoy the movement. No matter how it's graded (either outside or in a gym) the point is to have fun, enjoy every move and improve. Is it graded two grades lower than you onsight and you struggle? Who cares! The route setter may have a different body type or whatsoever, if it is an enjoyable boulder problem, enjoy it. I have seen too many people in gyms and outside at crags showing nothing but frustration from their inability to reach their goals. And they are not professionals. If climbing is just your hobby sport (like mine for the past 20 years), focus on enjoying no matter the grade is!
Your comment deserves more likes.
Yes good point Pavel, totally agree! To bring this to a training perspective and away from grades, its important to enjoy the training methods you are doing. As a coach we will try to programme exercises and sessions that the athlete wants to do. The best laid plans won't work if the climber avoids them or even struggles to engage mentally.
Martin Prince ass comment
Great comment
Thank u for this reminder 🥹
The absolute easiest way to fix #2 and rest properly between climbs is simply to climb with other people. With 3-4 people you can hit a good natural rhythm of 1-2 people climbing at a time while the rest watch and/or chat. It's also a great way to learn technique and think about route choice by critiquing (not necessarily aloud!) others' route choices and you can help each other out with pointing out holds and brushing. The obvious downside to this is the difficulty trying to get people available at the same time or trying to meet new people.
No friends :(
@@MonkeyBarsEveryday I met a lot of new friends in the climbing gym!
The social aspect of bouldering is a really big part of why I enjoy it so much! Giving each other tips, encouraging each other to send a problem, and maybe also having a liiiitle bit of healthy competition between similar level climbers, all these things really motivate me to go to the gym and improve my climbing.
@@slg9307Since I started climbing, this has to be the biggest point I noticed: People at bouldering gyms are so nice and open! I've only been to two different gyms really but so many good climbers are willing to help, explain a technique or just climb the route, so you can get a general idea for yourself. It's not just the better climbers though, struggling and practising a route with others that equally struggle also makes forming bonds really easy. I definitely have to say that one of the most positive things about bouldering/climbing is their community!
“Hey Siri, set a timer for 5 minutes”
Points 6-8 are something this video made me realise I've been missing. Not just from climbing but education too. I feel like those apply to everything really, I've been very bad at managing those things and my grades have suffered as I always try to change things up, especially when the semester grades come back. Similarly, in climbing or other sports I've practiced over the years I've never kept consistent and always tried to overanalyze everything and thinking I must make changes all the time.
These tips were very insightful, and to anyone with consistency issues it hopefully helps realise them better! Keep persevering!
Josh giving tips on washing up is the video we never knew we needed. Will be turning on notifications waiting for it.
Coming up next week.... vacuuming.
Bad habit 4 is so undervalued! It has a lot to do about how you are able to manage reward, uncertainty and failure. You might see some pro climbers that self-identify as perfectionists (like Janja Garnbret or Anna Hazelnut) that would want to make each and every climb perfect. You don't need to reach that level of perfectionism (it has its own drawbacks) to improve, but it can show you how much you can develop as a climber if you are willing to risk lowering your beliefs of what you are able to do. It's hard! We like to believe that we managed the climb because of our abilities and not because it was a one-try fluke of luck. But it's one of the best tools that we have to really get outside of the plateau!
#4 and #7 (the freaking out and anxiety part) are definitely my thing lol! Great video guys especially for including gloves for dish washing! It's an often overlooked performance metric haha
At 52yrs old - I have no choice but to warm up properly 🤣definitely great advice 💪
One from me is not trying routes that are above your current level. I'm often quite surprised at the number of higher graded ones I manage to send and if doing it with people, I get tips that I can apply to routes at my current level that make the difference.
Yeah, I've been trying to perfect my climbs. Especially with dynos or strange movements/cruxes.
But I will say only fell into that habit when I'm climbing at or near my limit.
It's a little bit of an easier habit with slabs, though. Slabs are more technical, than strength based so I tend to be able to send higher grades on slab now.
1:10 my best way to avoid trying again to quickly is to go take a sip of water after every attempt, chalking up again, give a good reading of the problem and THEN trying again
Sick soundtrack! Great episode.
Thanks :)
1:35 brushing the holds is always good to make a rest.
I didn't understand the last tips with the gloves
If you wash your dishes without gloves, it can affect your skin negatively
@@heraclitus4884 that's what I understood from it ..
I copy the answers given a few hours ago to another comment by :
Climbing psychology : " It removes the natural skin oils that protect it. Makes it more prone to damages and when it gets super wrinkled because of osmosis (wated gets inside the tissue) you lose more skin. Not to talk about the damage the soap can do. "
and Lattice Training : " Especially in the hours before climbing, soaking your hands in warm water can soften your skin. Soft skin breaks up quickly climbing on high friction or sharp holds. Dry skin tends to be more resilient, more grippy and leads to a better training session. Skin condition changes a lot between people but if you have generally quite soft skin I would recommend it if you are trying to toughen up your hands. "
I love the soundtrack, who's the artist?
i dont have any of these habits but the worst habit there is its overtraining because youre addicted to climbing , hello tendonitis my old friend and youre not getting stronger because youre never fresh
Brush your holds when you've finished your attempt! Such a headache for those followup climbers that find the holds suddenly slippery because the chalk wasn't cleaned off by the last climber!
I'm not gonna clean every boulder that I climb, especially indoors. My warmup where I don't need super clean holds might be someone's project, and vice versa, so if I plan to climb at my peak level it's on me to clean the holds if I deem it necessary.
Maybe if there are people you are climbing with, but not at random, sometimes people won't be climbing it, and if they do, they should be brushing themselves anyways. Never expect holds to be clean.
Full crimp the world.
for the love of God, stop wearing beanies indoor.
Bouldering.....rest positions?
#10: Never Downclimbing Before Coming Off a Route
I see a lot of climbers skip downclimbing and trusting their ability to fall properly every time. Good falling technique is important, and downclimbing supports imperfect falling technique. In some places, gyms only set downclimb holds for beginner routes. This practice encourages climbers to think of downclimbing as "beginners only" rather than a good safety practice. Downclimbing might not be possible on every problem, but taking the more controlled falls with a bit of downclimbing helps prevent injuries that will take you out of climbing for a long time.
Downclimbing also makes you stronger!
To be honest, I downclimb each warmup problem that I do, using only the holds on said problem. The effects are very noticeable. It trains your body to be so much more in control of different holds and thus also allows you to climb harder. Highly recommend it.
I fell into this pit, and now have a bulging L5 thanks to it. It makes climbing really painful and my sessions are always cut short. ALWAYS downclimb!
100% agree on this, I've seen more than a few people close to get injured because of a mentality of "oh, I'm going to just jump off at the end". Really dangerous practice over time.
Not to mention that for some (like me), putting stress on the spine is not really an option. Downclimbing is one of the many reasons why I can still climb at my age when many stop after reaching their 40s or 50s.
Another potential point, at least for me, is: Be careful when you compare your own progress with someone elses progress. Also, be careful when you compare yourself as you are now with someone who is stronger than you. Both of these points risk demoralizing you, demotivating training and slippering the slope down to slower progression due to something like low motivation or bad "catching up" training. If you get hyped or engaged when doing these things, then it's not a problem obviously.
so true
For me comparing myself with others makes me climb stronger. For the last year I had a training partner who had better endurance and technique than me and when she was able to do a route I wanted to do it as well. Now she is gone and something is missing.
I have gained so much useful information from lattice videos over the years, but I think that glove video from Josh takes the cake🤣
Glad you liked it Robin 😉
That one blew my mind! 🤯
I slapped the shit out of the gloves for years now. My mind was blown by this video. And totally unexpected too 😂
I do not understand why not using gloves is a mistake...
0:16 Bad habit 1: Not warming up your lower body.
1:15 Bad habit 2: Not resting between attempts.
2:04 Bad habit 3: Only using one grip type.
3:27 Bad habit 4: Not perfecting climbs.
4:30 Bad habit 5: Not working rest positions.
5:09 Bad habit 6: Changing your training too often.
5:56 Bad habit 7: Not persevering with one method.
6:29 Bad habit 8: Over analysing your performance.
7:19 Bad habit 9: Not brushing holds
7:42 Bad habit 10: Not wearing wash up gloves
Thanks 😄
@@LatticeTraining Great video!
what is with wash up gloves?? i dont understand the point.
i thought this is a climbing video
@@Fred-oz3tw I'm guessing it's because of how you can lose skin or make it heal slower if you don't wear the gloves while under warm water, detergents and scrubbing. Might be something else
I completely agree with point #4! Doing a route properly can be a valuable learning experience. However, it's important to recognize that sometimes you may not have the necessary strength or technique to execute it perfectly, and that's okay too.
I would say that if you manage to top it in a way that takes less strength. That is the optimal way for you.
Working on the technique is the whole point and finding a way that takes less strength.
It does not have to be beautiful. But if you can do it once you can probably do it again just a little more efficiently
"Not perfecting climbs" really good one. Started working this because an injury's been forcing me to do easy climbs for a while. Really honing the beta for easy problems feels a lot more rewarding and valuable than a session full of sloppy flashes.
I think I'm very guilty of habit #4
I still often redo climbs but only the ones I liked doing, there are some climbs I kind of "luckily" do and then I don't redo them.
I think most of us are guilty of this one 😅
I agree with this. I feel like some climbs are built in a “spray of holds” on the wall sometimes. The problem will never feel good and doesn’t deserve redo-ing. Time is better spent elsewhere.
@@Jagknorr Although it's true that sometimes it might be a crimpy overhang problem that doesn't suit me and I just can't bring myself to redo it because I hated it so much, I just wanted to do it once. But what you describe is sometimes true as well.
@@BunnyAce im that way with slabs 😜
Thanks for the glove tips Josh! I will never again have to deal with individually getting each finger back to being the right way around :D
You're very welcome! :D
Like Josh I have sweaty skin and intuitively figured out that gloves were needed when washing up dishes to keep my skin dry. But unlike Josh I always bought larger gloves so I didn't struggle taking them off and just dealt with using overly sized gloves while washing up. The beta at the end was mind blowing
I can never find large gloves haha. Innovation through necessity.
Glue bridges, powered by Pritt ;)
Still looking for that sponsorship deal with Pritt 🙃
For me #3 is the most useful. I think it describes me so well, I do attempts over attempts without resting and it makes you so much more prone to injuries. 2 weeks ago I did a "feet first" move where you throw your feet up dynamically, more than 10 times in a row, and I'm still recovering for the back muscle strain it gave me. I've also had bicep pain + golfer/tennis elbow for months and I cannot get rid of it, it may probably be linked with this no resting thing...
Resting is hard! But 'quality over quantity' is a good motto to take to the gym :)
I cured my medial epicondylitis (golfers elbow, where the pain is on the "inside" of your elbow) by doing lots of chin ups! The problem with tendonitis is that rest doesn't heal it, you need to induce inflammation to promote healing which I know sounds counterintuitive but look up mark rippetoes pin firing method. I did 10 sets of 2 to 3 chin ups a few times a week and this healed my tendonitis. It works for lateral epicondylitis too. I hope this helps because golfers/tennis elbow sucks!
@@Josh653 well, at this point I'm taking any advice I can you know. I can't make any progress because of the pain, I have to take anti inflammatories all the time it's so depressing. I'll do some research on what you told me. The thing is that I don't exactly know what I have, I do have some tennis elbow with manageable pain, but the golfer one I'm not sure. The pain is insane and is on the upper part of the arm, not the forearm, on the inside and under the start of the bicep. Did you have something similar?
Thanks for the advice :)
@@LePetitBat he's right, I had really bad tennis elbow for several months and tried all kinds of wraps and things that were supposed to help, but using low weight forearm exercises targeting the sore tendons every night had me back to normal in under a month.
#1 mistake I see is younger climbers dropping from the top instead of climbing down. Always makes me wince. If you still want to be climbing when you’re 50+ protect your knees
Agreed but there should be some guidance on how to climb down. I always climbed down until one day I sent an overhang, ended up deadhanging whilst working out the next hold and my subscapularis tore. Taking over a year to heal with physio (and out of climbing for half of it) and it's getting there but have had to resort to dropping as safely as I can in the meantime. That's also why warming up and down properly is so important.
Lol at the "not climbing perfectly".
If I was already perfect I wouldn't need tips. I have no idea how most ways are supposed to be climbed, I just mess around and find out.
1:35 Do you take off your shoes after every attempt? I hadn't realize this was the norm - apparently my shoes aren't tight and uncomfortable enough!
Do you score points if you probably do all of them? Surely, being that bad is good... Right? 🤪
The glove trick is going to change my life.
Yay so pleased! My dad taught it to me. He learned it when he worked as a biologist and blood scientist in the years before they commonly used disposable gloves in laboratories I guess.
Absolutely LOVED this video, thanks!!!! ❤
Thank you for this video, i've been climbing since awhile now, and most videos about good or bad training habits just keep repeating things we all already know and are really basic common sense. Your advices were really relevant and new to me, so thanks a lot.
Really useful tips. I only disagree slightly with point 7: not persevering with one method. When i get stock on routes, i often explore different betas until i find the one that suits me best and then i try hard with that one. So unless i misunderstood the point, i do think it is good to rethink and explore possibilities when projecting
The point is definitely in the details rather than the title, they emphasize that its bad if you just give up first try, and how he shouldn't have given up so quickly when the method seemed fine and just needed more practice. It's definitely fine to switch things up if it doesn't feel right or you've given it some goes and get the sense there's gotta be a better way.
The dude with the red nose and a beanie looks like a Disco Elysium character.
As a climber who eschews lower body training, my warming circuits consist of glute bridges (two legged, progressive split and range of lift, pull with the heels and with the toes) first circuit, kossack squats (progressive range of depth and lateral movement) second circuit, assisted pistol squats (add assistance and velocity over each repetition) third second, and then simple force absorption (increase the height of the jump, including off of boxes).
Of course, a good warmup procedure is strength training, and I am only fooling myself to say I don’t strength train the lower body, but I do this utterly minimal dose after a more recent issue behind my knee and with my ankle. Warm the lower body, takes no time because you cannot do enough finger and shoulder work to generate the bloodflow you want at the intensity without a brief break… and that is for the legs.
#4 often I just did not enjoy the boulder, but still made it. Not gonna waste more energy on it and go to find a fun one instead.
Point 4 is something I've been trying to get my climbing partner to understand for a year now. But, she'd rather bruteforce her way through a route. That includes bouldering and top-rope.
Im confused about the last tip about washing dishes? Lol
I think I tend to overuse the open-handed crimp, which leads to chronic inflammation of the DIP joint on my middle finger, right hand. I am trying to switch it up with half and full crimps more.
These are all great but some need a bit more elaboration, like what is a rest hold?
Eat right,
Sleep right,
Train right,
Stay consistent,
Trust in the process,
Climb less, lift more,
Short cuts don't exist,
Train with intensity as the gains only begin when it gets hard,
30 year old, no climbing experience, opiate addict that couldn't do a push-up. Now 3 years clean, 33 year old, bouldering 7c consistently. If I can do it from that foundation, imagine what you can accomplish.
Wow. That’s amazing and inspiring. I am just two months into climbing and still get discouraged when seeing other people climbing so good and having so mich strength. Do you have some advice how to train to improve my skills or technique?
Eat right... sleep right... damn I already messed up.
Though heck yeah for you on it helping with battling your addiction, that's amazing.
@@Nuadin thank you. Take care
Can someone explain to me how he’s seemingly levitating in mid-air at 4:30? 😅
Looks awesome, and definitely someone I’d wanna practice…. if I just knew what was going on :p
Josh is doing what's called a kneebar, which is basically jamming your leg between 2 holds in a way where you can lean back. Particularly good ones like that can let the climber remove both hands and rest quite well, especially on sport climbs. It's less common inside but you might be able to find one or two using holds from different climbs, even if your setters didn't specifically set it
Never climb jugs ❌
climb pockets ✅
Not me pinching everything and just end up not crimping😅
Went to this gym on a trip super good spot
Not working rest positions is a very real problem. Id have to get up a route in 1 push because trying to rest cost me more energy than not resting 😂
Resting is an underrated skill!
my biggest mistake was jumping down from the top of the boulders, this destroyed my knees...
7:14 bros controller disconnected lmao
3:43 Bad habit #10: leaving stuff on the mat below the route, for you and others to trip over and sprain an ankle when they fall...
'Dear Diary...' 😂 I do this! 😅
Washing up tips from Lattice. It's peak youtube.
Haha thanks Dan!
lol, #9 somehow wildly out of line
What pants are Josh wearing?
Okay American here - the final tip is saying to wear rubber gloves when washing your dishes?
I feel like brush etiquette has declined massively in climbing centres. Some places you go to, you never see anyone using a brush (Rainbow Rocket, in Cambridge, I’m looking at you!)
I can't comment for the the change in etiquette too much (been climbing 10 years) but I would love to see brushing more widely encouraged. For example it would be good if this was encouraged in gym inductions and good stick brushes are always provided. I personally love brushing holds haha.
@@LatticeTraining Yes, brushing is a good opportunity to look over the problem, gives a bit of thinking time doesn't it, and it's nice to brush off all that chalk!
I'll also add that sometimes brushing the hold just makes me feel mentally able. Like, it's a ritual.
Dear diary 😂, another great video. Thanks guys.
Michelle
Bad habit #4 can be avoided by climbing something way over your current level: I’ll spend weeks projecting a super hard boulder (couple hours every other day) and by the end of it I can do the boulder ultra smooth.
I spent somewhere in the ballpark of 20 hours on one boulder once and now any hold that vaguely resembles the ones on the route are super easy to use for me
I usually warm up with some easy boulders to engage my whole body, and increase difficulty a bit until I feel ready to go on my projects...
Josh just really wanted to show that glove thing off didn't he
Got me!
#4 is probably the most useful, but it's important to give yourself a little reward from time to time ☺
Can we talk about the ruber glove tip? They have become chinese fingertraps at this point
Clickbaited. I disagree with the thumbnail. It very much looks like you should let your pinky go in crimp. For target audience this is dangerous as it often leads to tendon injury.
And it's not explained in the video, it just is there in the thumbnail.
The thumbnail is crimping slopers and not using an open hand grip. In this video we cover this topic. We talk about not always using the same grip type, even when others might be more appropriate but are avoided because you feel stronger in others. This is a missed opportunity to learn different grip types. I don't understand why this is dangerous though?
@@LatticeTraining For the target audience it is dangerous to open grip without pinky, as people tend to flatten the back of the hand putting huge force on tendon of the ring finger.
Because they don't use muscles in the hand, only the finger muscles I assume.
But when pinky is engaged in the grip, the back of the hand cannot be flat (the pinky is too short), so the hand muscles naturally activate and the tendon of the ring finger is no longer of danger of PLOPing.
I guess you chose a very hard holds to convey your message. And/Or the hands are too small in the shot.
You actually switch the hold, which is not immediately apparent.
All in all, as a climber, all I see is:
"Don't use pinky, it hampers your strength."
Unfortunately, the thumbnail and video title naturally come together to that message.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on that one. In our experience an open grip with 3 fingers i.e. drag, is not dangerous. But we are not talking about injury risk in this video, we are suggesting climbers should use all grip types and avoiding certain grips as a beginner, or at any level, doesn't make much sense to us. We'll take on board the TN feedback 👍.
Love the accent that makes "sloping holds" sound like "slopey holes."
YOOOO Is that Linus Bouldering Tips???
Linus Bouldering??
@@LatticeTraining You look like Linus Tech Tips lol
I literally needed the rubber glove trick like 10 seconds ago! I'll keep that one in mind.
i like washing up without gloves though, it fills my fingers with blood which is good for recovery
Skin condition varies a lot. My skin gets trashed very quickly if I don't keep it dry before climbing. There would be very little to recover from if my skin was soft before climbing 😅
Depends a lot on the type of skin but also for how long you stay under the water and what kind of soap you use
On the rubber glove front Lakeland sell ones with a moisturising layer inside. Other than that having bottles of handcream (ideally pump bottles for convenience - you can bulkbuy large 5l refills from hotel supply sites) at every sink and at your bedside is a gamechanger for skin care.
I have soft sweaty hands, that gloves trick is golden thanks! Hahaha.
is the last one about wearing gloves while doing the dishes?
Resting is hard because it’s so much darn fun!
A wild Carlos appears!
Haven’t watched yet but sure that I’m gonna get at least a C on this test
My Problems are def habit 1&4
I tried a glue bridge ... but my car got stuck to the tarmac.
Sweating is controlled by two mechanisms that are the nervous system and the humoral system, in which the mechanism that causes sweating is mainly nervous (sympathetic), so wearing gloves with powder is not the best solution…
That's good to know. What would you suggest climbers do to control sweating instead? Always interested to learn.
Carlos spotted
Could be a drinking game.
Wow, this was awesome. Very unique
When my biggest take home from a climbing video is how to wash my dishes... xD
Lol but actually a super neat trick! The rest of the tips were good to keep in mind too
Haha Thanks!
I want a Lattice Training sweater like that 😍
I think it's glute bridges 😅
#1 Sometimes I feel pain in my hips when I do toe hooks. Do you know good exercise for warming up hips?
Yeah we have a few different videos on our channel. This could be a good start - th-cam.com/video/Lfiyx_DNl2w/w-d-xo.html&feature=shares
8:00 this is the best tip😂🤌🏼
So helpful! Thanks!
I really cracked up on 7 lol
why do people do the french blow after chalking up
Remove excess chalk, or to look cool....
Is he wearing the la sportiva solution? I'm thinking of buying it myself. It would be my first climbing shoe (I'd only use it indoors (boulder)). Is it a good choice guys?:)
go to your local climbing store and try different kind of shoes to see which one suits your feet best :)
Nope, you can see at 4:30 that they're Unparallel shoes, perhaps the TN Pro. On both of them actually (perhaps they have a sponsorship going?)
These are the Unparallel TN Pro. Fit my feet perfectly! One of the best indoor shoes I've ever had. I've had a few pairs of solutions and the TN Pro is more comfortable IMO. Fit comes first, so I would try on a few different pairs at least. Even withing a single brand you'll find a whole range of different fits.
Could you explain why no gloves is bad?
It removes the natural skin oils that protect it. Makes it more prone to damages and when it gets super wrinkled because of osmosis (wated gets inside the tissue) you lose more skin. Not to talk about the damage the soap can do.
Especially in the hours before climbing, soaking your hands in warm water can soften your skin. Soft skin breaks up quickly climbing on high friction or sharp holds. Dry skin tends to be more resilient, more grippy and leads to a better training session. Skin condition changes a lot between people but if you have generally quite soft skin I would recommend it if you are trying to toughen up your hands.
@@LatticeTraining Thanks for the explanation and the video! I was so confused! I have sweaty hands as well, and not even fancy powder chalks stay on my fingertips for long hahaha Sometimes I feel that a good liquid chalk helps to keep my fingers nice and dry, what's your take on that? Thanks in advance!
@@MaxinfamilyYT Liquid chalk is a game changer for me. But I also find it quite aggressive and dries out my skin after climbing if I use too much. So I tend to save it for projecting only.
@@LatticeTraining that sounds like a great piece of advice, thanks! I think I will do the same and deal with the gooeyness when not projecting hahaha
1:30 sometimes I purposely do that in order to train for sport climbing.
Done as a training method, there are ways to climb with little rest or at least controlled rests, but simply not resting properly for hard climbs is definitely not getting sport fitness. As a sport climber, I can tell you my current capacity to hammer away at boulders feels extremely different from my using a board for building capacity.
@@zacharylaschober now that I think about it, I think you are right. This shouldnt be done on boulders at your limit. I like to do it on boulders that are like 1-2 grades below my limit.
Buy a dishwasher. Got it.
It's on my Christmas list.
10/10 washing up content
Thanks 😄
training question RE: beginner climbers. Ive seen things saying to stay as far away from hangboards/fingerboards for the first year of your climbing as itll just speed up getting an injury, but how hard of a rule is this? ive been climbing for like 5-6 months and am around a v4-v6 climber but im scared of pulley injuries and dont want to not be able to climb lol.
I think that is a myth. In my opinion hangboarding is pretty safe, as you load your fingers slowly in a controlled way. Just don’t do it to failure and never full crimp. On the other hand, stay away from the campus board for a while, as it is the complete opposite - loading the fingers quickly with a lot of weight. @everyone: please correct me, if I’m wrong ✌️
Checking into Dr Tyler Nelsons recent two part series on this with Climbing Magazine. Hangboards are greatly beneficial to newer climbers, even not looking for climbing training yet the habit of using them for warming will be a gain, but if you’re asking then you should start on a board.
I do a lot of fingerboarding with my feet still on the ground. You can control how much force you put on your fingers while building strength. I normally do this as part of my warm-up, but it's a good way to start fingerboarding while avoiding injury.
The risk of pulley injury is probably reduced by hangboard training. Just do what you can and slowly progress. You don’t have to use the smallest edge , or even take your whole body weight to have it be very effective
This should not be a hard rule as it does not take into account indivuidal circumstances. If you are approaching V6 you will soon be catching small grips at speed and loading the connective tissue in the fingers with a lot of force. The hangboard is a way safer method of loading the fingers and will act to build training tolerance and robustness that supports your progression on the wall. The risk comes in when new climbers don't understand the principles of training and get carried away chasing strength on a hangboard. And in turn can overload the whole system. Lots of hangboarding + lots of climbing done too soon is risky. The hangboard itself is not risky. As Zack said in their comment, Tyler Nelson has been trying to break the myth that beginners need to avoid a hangboard. It's far more to do with the education around hangboarding that presents a risk. If you can read up and become informed, it's not risky in our opinion. We are actually working on a collab video with Tyler about this very topic and will be dropping that in April or early May.
You guys are the best, great tips.
Thanks Ash 😊
hot damn, who crimps slopers???
guilty as charged
@@thisjustinm that's not how sloppers work!!! You gotta have your weight under them, I'm so confused how you would even do that
#marigolds lol
Do you know if they have any sponsorship deals going? Asking for a friend.
Super helpful, love the content
Thanks Carter!
7:43 Tipp number 9.5 get a dishwasher ;)
🤣