Hey folks 🙂 It’s time for a crash course in the holy sport of rock climbing. I’ve seen my home climbing gyms become PACKED with new people who are just getting into it recently. I’m stoked about it because I love climbing and I think everyone else should love it too 🙂 In order to be helpful, I’ve put together a list of four tips that will be super helpful for anyone who is new (or new-ish) to the climbing world.
Let’s start with some background:
I’ve been rock climbing for about 5 years now. Admittedly, I’m not the most wellrounded rock climber. I’m definitely a boulder kid, I love my routes short and tough. I almost never lead climb in a gym, but I can definitly be convinced to take off into the mountains on a sunny day and lead on some real rock. Although I’ve been climbing for a long time, I’m only a v6 climber. Traveling in the summer makes it rough to stay consistent. But every winter I find myself circling back to the plastic and loving it just as much as ever.
I was a rock climbing coach at Momentum Climbing and I absolutely LOVED it. The kids I coached did so well that my whole class was moved on to a more advanced club, and I was promoted with them so I could continue coaching them. What I’m doing in this post is breaking down the most simple but integral techniques that I taught and are guarunteed to boost your climbing game with some practice. I’ve never seen these tips fail to help someone improve! If you’re new to climbing and are looking to get better, take some notes, this will be good! Let’s get into it.
1. Straight arms all the way
Okay, all the way might be a bit of an exhageration. But this is SO important. I watch people who are brand new to rock climbing walk into the gym, jump on a route and proceed to do pullups to the top. The natural inclination we have on a wall is to hold on with our arms. To pull ourselves up to the finish hold. That doesn’t work for a few reasons.
First, no one is strong enough to do that for long. You’ll maybe make it up a route or two, but you’ll exhaust yourself before you get any real practice in. Second, you’re not going to learn to use your feet. And if you never learn to trust your footing, you’re very likely to never climb anything harder than a v4, and that’s being very generous.
The best way to practice not overusing your arms and underusing your feet when you climb is to emphasize climbing with straight arms. Go find the easiest route you can climb, and try to get up it without bending your arms once. Do that enough times and it will start to feel easier to trust your feet and relax your upper body. You’ll learn how to use your positioning and momentum on the wall so that rock climbing feels natural instead of forced. This tip is a game changer, let me tell you.
2. Keep your hips close to the wall
Rock climbing has much less to do with strength than people realize, and much, much more to do with body positioning. Keeping your body close to the wall is huge. Especially when you’re climbing in overhung areas, you’ll notice your hips will pull away from the wall and your body position will resemble something like a triangle. Not good.
Here’s why. If you’re hips aren’t close to the wall, it’s because your core isn’t engaged. If you’re core isn’t engaged, you’re feet are going to be useless. Your arms, once again, will be carrying all your weight. Since your center of gravity is away from the wall when you’re in that “sitting” position, you’re going to be actively fighting against gravity instead of working in line with it. And you’ll struggle to keep your feet on the wall. It just causes a whole lot of problems.
Keeping your hips close to the climbing wall will optimize your body positioning so your weight goes into your feet instead of pulling you off the rocks. Your feet will stop slipping off footholds, and your arms will last a lot longer. I can’t stress enough how helpful this tip is going to be for you!
3. You’re a ballerina now
For heavens sake, point your toes. I know it feels wierd and uncomfortable but you just gotta trust your big toe. SO many people climb on the inside of their foot when they start rock climbing. It feels more natural to be pushing off of the ball of your foot than your toe. But your sacrificing mobility when you do this. You’re stuck in one body position climbing the whole route. You’ll lose length and leverage, and you’ll never be able to climb anything higher than a v3 because the footholds get too small.
The best way to practice this is by jumping on an easy route and trying to make no noise with your feet as you climb. Watch your foot every time you move it, and once you set it on a foothold, don’t move it around at all. Just trust it. You’re basically practicing being as quiet and precise with your footwork as possible. This is going to help you TONS when you’re trying to break into higher climbing grades.
4. You gotta breath, dude
That’s it. It’s natural to want to hold your breath when you climb because first, it’s scary. Second, your abs are going to be super activated and it might feel like you’re losing tension when you breath. I still catch myself holding my breath during big moves. It’s not helpful for your muscles or your brain, and that’s the end of the story. Breath 🙂
Go find some rocks!
I love rock climbing. So, so much. I think it’s super cool that so many people are discovering it and getting hooked. These 4 tips have helped me tons in my progress, and I know they’ll be helpful to you as well. Stick around because I’m going to turn “climbing for beginners” into a series and there’s lots of good intormation coming your way.
If you’re into rock climbing you’re probably an outdoorsy person SO I think you should click here to read about my time on the little Alaskan island called Port Protection.
See you at the crag!
-Ell
