Don't really feel like I'm progressing climbing

S

SnorkBoard

Member
Really I only go to the bouldering gym about 4 times a week and climb outside a few times a month. But I'm still stuck on the same difficulty of problems after a few months of trying them. What happens is I get to a point I can get some of the easier V3s and V4s, but still can't get the harder ones even when they leave them up for a few weeks.

I think I need to work on technique cause a lot of the time I feel like I'm just muscling through it. Are there good videos/ training things I should check out?

Just looking for some help.
 
Don't worry about getting the entire problem. Dissect it and take it move by move. Doing this enough will lead to you just being able to read the rock and do this subconsciously. Also you will eventually get the entire problem. I have gone bouldering and only worked on 1 section of the rock trying to figure it out.
 
Work on doing finger pull ups. So your get used to it and try climbing with someone better than you that will call you a pussy. That worked for me
 
Bouldering hard 4 times a week is a lot.... How fast are you expecting to progress? It's easy to rapidly get better as you get decent technique as a beginner, but it gets harder to keep that up. Seems like a lot of people plateau around V3 or V4 (depending on body type, local grading ethic, etc.).

My advice is to try to climb the widest variety of problems as you can, focusing especially on whatever you're worst at. You learn different things from slabby vs steep, slopey vs crimpy, cracks, corners, etc and its really the best way to get better all around technique. That can be hard to do depending on what you're gym is like, but that's just more excuse to get outside
 
Can't say it enough... footwork. Focus on precise footwork and quiet, controlled movement. Doing a lot of traversing is a good way to work on footwork, slabs too. You can also play games like Sticky Feet (when you place a foot you can't move or adjust it until moving to the next hold). There are more footwork drills a Google or Youtube search away.

Rest is just as important as trying hard. If you try to progress through grades too quickly you're going to get injured. Work on doing problems, that personally feel moderate, perfectly. So you're bouldering at a V3-4 level, do all of the V2s on a certain wall perfectly next time before pulling onto anything 3+. Keep doing that until you can do all of the 3s on that wall perfectly before climbing 4+ and so on.

I know it's hard, but don't worry about the grades, they will come when they do. Concentrate on staying healthy and building tendon strength. You can start doing fingerboard, aka hangboard, exercises once a week to start out, but I wouldn't do it any more than that at first. I could go on for a long time about all of this, if you have any questions you can PM me. Here's is a nice little template to start out with: http://www.metoliusclimbing.com/training_giude_10_min.html

Try hard and stay motivated.
 
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