Sorry for the holdup on some new ideas– Since I dont have a good excuse, I wont provide a bad one.

Lets get on with some new training ideas to improve your rock climbing. I see a lot of members who can only come in for 60-90 minutes between classes, or during a lunch break. One of the best quick endurance exercises I am enjoying these days is a 30 minute point race.

Point races go like this– for every V-grade, there is a point value. V1 is 1 point, V2 is 2 points, V3 is 3 points and so on. There a a number of different ways to approach this– I am enjoying pushing myself to complete 30 climbs in 30 minutes.

I decided on a difficulty that seems possible for me to that specific grade every minute, for 30 minutes. For me, that is V3– so my target goal is 90 points. I have been trying to break the 90 point goal several times, but have come as close as 89 points.

This sounds great, what if I only climb V1 or V2 at my hardest?

This is an easy problem to fix, create a modified values for your climbs. For example

V0- = 1 point

V0 = 2 points

V0+ = 3 points

V1 = 4 points

V2 = 5 points

Decide what grade you could do 30 of in 30 minutes, set your time, and don’t stop until time is up.

I really like this exercise as you can track progression as the amount of points you complete in 30 minutes increases. I also like to track the number of climbs I actually get in 30 minutes (usually between 19 and 25), and how many points per problem I average (divide point total by number of climbs).

ENJOY THE PUMP!!!