Rock Climbing Exercise
GENERAL. During exercise, your muscles will use up stored carbohydrates (glycogen) that need to be replenished by sugar from the blood. The liver supplies sugar by providing a store of glycogen. When the liver runs out of glycogen, you will get that heavy, no-energy feeling. You can prevent this simply by eating about 500 calories from fruits (simple carbohydrates - but avoid processed sugar as a source of simple carbs). Do this about an hour before your rock climbing exercise session. If you run out of steam during your training session, drink a sports drink or eat something with carbohydrates. Whatever you choose, it should have a high carbohydrate content.
Fluids. Rock climbing exercises are strenuous. During exercise your body will lose water due to sweat. Replacing fluids during and after climbing exercise is absolutely essential. Drink before you feel thirsty. If you are thirsty, it is because you already have started dehydrating. Lack of water in your muscles will decrease contractile strength by up to 30%. Drink water during exercise to keep your strength and endurance up. Water weight is minimal compared to what you lose in strength. Fluids must be in your system ready to replace what is lost through sweat before your body signals thirst, so drink ahead of your thirst.
Recovery. After the rock climbing exercise session, eat complex carbs - (bread, potatoes, rice, fruits, pasta) and avoid fatty and oily foods. You need to replenish your glycogen stores. Carbohydrates will do that for you. Eat spaghetti (without the sauce), potatoes (no sour cream or butter), lots of fruit and vegetables, rice (no gravy or butter). This type of eating is not that appealing, but is the most effective way to replenish the depleted glycogen in your liver and speed your recovery. If you don't get enough carbohydrate calories in the first two days, your recovery time will take longer. See carbohydrates.
Get rest. Along with carbohydrates and fluids, rest is essential for a speedy recovery and the rebuilding of muscle glycogen. Take time to put your feet up and relax. Stretching, sports massage, or even a soothing bath can help rebuild your muscles for the next strenuous workout. See muscle stretching and overtraining.
Rock Climbing Workout.
Forearms. You have probably noticed that your grip goes before anything else. Generally speaking, improving a climber's grip strength is the quickest way to improve climbing, and again, generally speaking this is true at all climbing levels. How long does a typical route at a comp take? - four minutes or so… can you static-hang that long? Probably not. Of course you don't climb with your forearms exclusively. The point is, when your forearms are gone, you are done climbing. Add the forearm workout for rock climbers to your rock climbing workout and extend your climbing by improving your forearm strength. This forearm training is one the best for rock climbing exercises. See Forearm Exercise for climbing.
Shoulders. Several variations on the pull-up will improve strength in your arms and shoulders. This is a key element to your climbing workout. Climbers can improve dead point and smoothness by working shoulder muscles in a way complimenting climbing moves. Side and upward movements where your feet are not directly under you require strong arms and shoulders.
Pull Ups. Muscles in upper body are worked and developed in a way needed by climbers. Read more about chin ups for your rock climbing workout. Pull ups are key to developing shoulder, back, stomach, forearms, grip all needed for climbing. The pull up or chin ups are an important exercise for your climbing workout routine. See Chin Ups.
Hanging side crunch/twist. For climbing, the obliques add the necessary body tension and stability to climbing moves. Obliques get a good workout by doing twists and crunches while hanging from a bar. The obliques control twisting and body tension. There are two layers of obliques. The internal and external obliques wrap around the sides of your waist and allow you to twist the torso. Also see chin up bar rock climbing exercises for how to workout this set.
What not to do in a climbing workout: In short, don’t workout muscle groups that have less contribution to climbing movement. Climbers do not need extra weight. Muscle density is about 18% more than the same volume of fat. There’s no need to replace the volume with more weight. For example, pushups and bench press work the Pectoralis Major muscles located on the upper front of the rib cage. While these muscles are important for general movement, highly developed pecs (like body builders) are not really needed for climbing. They get plenty of development from actual climbing. Another example is the anterior thigh and leg. These muscles can get huge from doing leg press, but it’s not value added for what the climber needs from muscular performance. These are examples. What muscles do you need for climbing? Think about it-- While climbing, be conscious of what muscles you are using. Add exercises into your workout that target these muscles, but not exercises that do not add value.
Climbing for Exercise. There's nothing like a workout for climbing than by climbing. Gym climbing lets you work the specific muscles used for specific moves, and gain muscle memory at the same time. However you can't always make it to the gym. These rock climbing exercises should be used in a robust scheduled rock climbing workout. Forearms, arms and shoulders are important muscles to target. By doing these exercises you can workout the most important muscles for rock climbing and improve your climbing ability.
Chart your progress with a graph. This is the best way to see how you are doing and keep yourself interested. A graph will help you set goals and work toward and achieve your objectives. A good forearm workout plan will result in steady incremental progress.
Books about Exercise and Rock Climbing Exercise:
- Maximum Sports Performance
- Youth Strength Training
- Conditioning for Climbers
- Training for Climbing
- Hand And Forearm Exercises: Grip Strength Workout And Training Routine ($7.94 paperback, $0 Kindle Unlimited)