I've had a desk job for most of my life and so my hip flexors are a huge issue for me. However, the most benefit I've gotten from a workout has been to train my glute medius and posterior chain. With both stretching and strength exercises. I've shared my routine with two beginner climber friends and they've found themselves more aware of their legs and felt less strain on their arms. Thanks for the video, now I'll add strong toes to my routine!
The last one definitely for me. I feel I generally have decent mechanics, but my mind muscle connection just doesn’t like to engage closed grip positions. Been doing some bw high half crimp hangs and really focusing on actively closing my fingers and not sagging onto the pulley friction mechanism thing. Three months later and seems to be paying off, I’m having this weird sensation where my fingers suddenly start going into closed positions on their own, almost like they want to!
My shoulders are kind of bad so the first training I did when getting into the sport was strengthening rotators, based on your earlier video. I think I need to keep training them specifically though, they didn't magically get really strong when I started climbing lol
Hey, I ran into you at the Potato Chip boulder at Red Rock Canyon. It was really nice talking to you and I forgot to mention that your video with GeekClimber helped me rehab my strained A2 pulley and wanted to give my thanks. Hope you and your crew had a nice trip.
the face pull really hit the spot for me, I hadn't noticed but my pullup's form was getting horrible and while hangboarding I felt that I had no strength to keep my shoulders down ! I feel really blessed that resources like these exist for free, thank you !
Good to see climbing specificity in the majority of this list, especially the top spot, and mention of minimal focus when doing anything leg related. Solid list.
Woah, at 10:20 you moved your pinky while keeping your ring finger straight! Did you train that? I can't even come close to doing that. My ring and pinky are bros that move together...How do I train my hand to do that?
Definitely the glutes. Everyone I train struggles to really activate the cheeks in a way that pushing their hips and lower body into the wall. When they do it maximizes foot stability and takes load off the fingers on worse holds.
Great video super informative, I have just 1 question. How do these tips apply if I am solid in every catagory in terms of strength and mobility, but struggle on endurance. For example, I have great trap(upper and lower) strength in bouldering but end up hanging on my bones on lead routes where endurance comes much more into play. Same with my toe strength, I can push on the tiniest hold with my toes bouldering but if I have to stand on a micro and place gear my calf and toes are crying for help. Is this just a function of aerobic capacity or is there more the the equation?
I get the impression that the age old saying that we were always bothered with by more experienced climbers "climb slowly and pay attention to good form" would solve all of these issues we have with undertraining. Except for the last one.
This is a great video, not only is it super educational which I LOVE but you also give great exercises to work everything you bring up. Education + Action is amazing. Thank you for taking the time to make this!
I've had both lumbrical injuries and painful wrist instability on slopers. I initially tried training wrist curls and occasional stretches/pulls for my lumbricals, but found they didn't help. What helped the most was training 3 finger drag. I'm still significantly weaker but no longer feel like I'm about to hurt myself on slopers and pockets
I'd love to see these exercises done on the wall as opposed to via other mechanisms. Certainly the antagonist exercises are a special case, but aren't most of these possible through actual climbing motions? Thanks for considering the question. Kind regards, Daniel
I managed to get pretty good at climbing while being terrible at toeing down hard and as I’ve been working on that I keep getting noticeably sore/fatigued in the muscle shown in #7 and nobody else seems to have experienced this haha. Cool to see it here
most underrated muscle group in my opinion: chest and legs. lost my shot on a professional career as an athlete bc of muscular disbalance, bc I mostly trained what I needed. If I would have spend 15-30min more in a session... who knows. but seeing climbers and seeing what an great overall training climbing can be, I dont get it why people ignore what is not trained. but then again I had to learn it on the hard way and probably a disbalance between chest and back is less problematic than in the hip. still in hindsight I always had the best results when I trained the most balanced/was the most balanced
Amazing video, would have loved to have seen this 5 years ago, somehow managed to stumble across most of these exercises over the years except the 'toe curls', which I'll be adding to the routine. Thanks!
As a smaller climber especially in overhangs: definitely the kind of core muscles that help to put pressure on the footholds. Lower back and those muscles in the upper back that are active doing inverted rows I think should be targeted more. A lot of old-school 9a climbers like e.g. Alex Huber climbed so many overhanging lines in LaSportiva Mythos with jus this one ability to bring tons of tension down to their feet despite have real shit shoes...amazing
I have the feeling that in general hamstring and glute is quite overlooked. Isn't it those muscles that allow one to push down the feet, keep them on the wall and reduce the weight on your arms? Especially compared to ab flexing exercises, I think one should train the reverse movement like bridges much more. Does it make sense??
I'm kinda late here. But as a dancer, while going on pointe in climbing shoes is a cool party trick, having "worked out" my toes, so-to-speak for a long time has most definitely been helpful on small footholds as well as just footwork in general. The same goes for the hamstrings and heel hooks.
i think for climbing specifically it is not important at all, but the erector spinae muscles are very undertrained among climbers, which often leads to to a compromised back and head posture
My FDP got aggravated due to overuse. Extreme pain all the way down my muscle starting at the attachment point near my elbow. Are there good antagonist exercises for popular climbing muscles? Will that help a FDP injury?
The copenhagen plank hurts my shoulder a lot, especially if I try to add hip dips into the mix... am I doing something wrong? Or should I train my shoulders first lol
I really liked this video, but that was a lot of information to digest in one go. Could you help with a training routine of a month or so to fix most of these issues? Also it would be amazing to have a list of the material you would recommend in case our gym doesn't have bands or weights?
Thanks for the suggestions! We will try to incorporate home equipment alternatives in our videos more frequently! As for the training routine, it probably wouldn’t be ideal to try to address all these muscles at the same time in one routine; rather, pick a couple that are your biggest limiting factors and work on those until you see solid improvements, then assess whether you need to continue working on them and/or if you can add in more exercises/load to your routine. And of course, the primary movers that aren’t in this video like lats, biceps, triceps, etc are still very useful to train for many climbers. We will consider making a general workout routine video to address the biggest limitations many climbers face, however!
Hah well that might just be a personal preference ;) but also your lumbricals may hate the pockets but your FCU and FDP may be totally fine with the slopers.
Q: regarding lumbricals and the surrounding area. I have visible dupuytren's contracture in my left hand, is my contracture likely to cause me issues in staying strong and pain free in that hand? Are there solutions to train around it? Appreciate your channel and the time you put into it! ✌
I also have DC on my left hand pinky. As of now it’s never noticeable and has never affected my climbing or been a source of pain. However, a video/deep dive on DC in climbers and what to do/not do about it would be appreciated. I’d be interested to hear your take on it.
this is such an awesome video in so many ways. sometimes thinking that maybe it's not so necessary what i'm doing - training these groups of muscles, but it feels so much better now when i see that i'm on the right path haha
One thing often underestimated in addition is hamstring strength combined with hamstring flexibility. It changes the whole game, especially when working a lot in a seated position in front of a computer. Thanks for your video!
True! The hips are quite complicated. We do have a video on high feet with climbing (focusing on the hips) as well as a yoga collaboration that also focuses on the hips 👌
I'm a beginner, so I haven't invested in a fingerboard yet (I can't even do an unassisted pull-up yet). But I have been training my fingers (ie. lumbricals) using the doorway frames in my house. All of them have different lip thicknesses, and are just the right amount of distance off the ground for me to either keep my toes on the ground or hang, if I so wish. Also, hamstrings are important for speed and projection - so if you want to dyno, train those hammy's! An exercise I would recommend is nordic bench hamstring curls (@kneesovertoesguy has a good video on this), but just be careful not to overdo it.
While climbers have great upper body pulling strength due to obvious reasons. I find the pushing strength could be weak. Thus being prone to backpain and not seeing the gainZ, when the back is strong but chest / triceps is not gaining as much use. That's why I do a lot of press action every time I climb, pushups in rings and is working on ring-dips. Omg. And yes, pushing strength is used in climbing too. Shoulder moves, press and whatever, be creative.
Always surprised I never see anyone talk about the piriformis, most people seem tight there. I’ve got a few climber friends to touch there toes for the first time in years/there life just by rolling this and alleviating that sciatic pressure. Also made there lower back glutes hamstrings have less tension and be more active
Two things. The Copenhagen plank hurts more my glutes and they fatigue quicker than anything else. Thoughts? I injured my hamstring a year ago heel hooking and it hasn’t healed. There’s a lump there and it affects my sciatica
For an athlete who has been a gymrat for 7 years and it’s only been 7 months since I started climbing, I would say my weakest and the absolute dumbest muscles in my body are my wrists 😂! They would take the first place in this pyramid for me 😂
It’s strange that the most common way to train the flexor digitorum profundus is with static holds on a hangboard (i.e. isometric exercise). Why is that? Do the pulleys create too much friction under tension? Is it because it trains tendons and ligaments more and in a safe way? (apparently isometric or eccentric exercise is great for tendon growth/strength)
I tried to train my external rotators once with the scarecrow. It doesnt matter how much weight I use my shoulders are making a cracking sound and it doesnt feel really comfortable. Do you have any idea what the problem could be?
Always surprised I never see anyone talk about the piriformis, most people seem tight there. I’ve got a few climber friends to touch there toes for the first time in years/there life just by rolling this and alleviating that sciatic pressure. Also made there lower back glutes hamstrings have less tension and be more active
Hooper, it would be great if you would do an episode on different body types and how that effects movement pattern. It would be beneficial to know their strength and weaknesses. People with externally rotated hips or duck footed generally are better at wide stances and drop knees. People with narrow tight hips are better at crimping small edges and keeping their feet under them. I would love to know the general strengths and weaknesses of each body type. Thanks! I’m a PTA and I really enjoy getting the PT point of view.
I recently discovered i have gout in my left foot and I'm worry about the impact it might have on my climbing, are there any foot exercises i can do to maintain motion and strength in my feet after a flare up of gout?
Definitely flexor hallucis longus training has become a primary concern for me since several months ago i suffered a lisfranc joint sprain and has been a terrible injury as has modified completely my way to walk and stand on that foot and has brought much ankle and knee pain in the last months. Adapted shoes, toe mobility, and similar exercise to those seen here are slowly returning my foot and biomechanics to normal
A common short table like in school or uni can help you train your toe hooks. Put your toes on one end and your hands on the other. Pull your chest up to the table as far as possible and repeat until your toes stop holding you. Use one foot if it gets easy.
I'm consistently surprised when I look at the subsciber count on this channel. The production quality and expertise make it easy to forget this isn't the multi million subscriber channel it deserves to be.
What role do you think obliques play in high stepping? Anecdotally at least, I've noticed oblique training can help with high feet quite a bit, as well. You're not just lifting your leg, you're also pulling your hips up on the side you're stepping and creating a concave space where your midsection is to make room for your leg to come up. This is a place where obliques can either help pull your hips into position, or where you struggle to make the space for your leg to come up, no matter how flexible. I could be overstating, but I've noticed worse high strapping ability when I fall out of oblique training.
Hey Hooper awesome video, I love the videos you talk about different exercises. You could make different videos with gym training routines, from noobs to pro. Or even sell a training routine course I would definitely buy it. I am a Gym rat, have been for years, now that I started climbing I need to adapt part of my training, your videos are helping me changing one exercises here other one there, but a course for about 50 to 100 bucks with a routine set would be awesome.
Hi Hooper! Thanks for this once again very clear and instructive video. I have a question about wrist exercises (as it is my big weakness): why do you recommend reverse curls for extensors work out and not small range wrist extension like for the flexors?
Good question! Small range wrist extension is also fine, but I like the added benefit for the brachialis with the reverse curl as well as the coordination between muscle groups.
Great set of exercises! For my limiters, I’ve been working with the hamstrings a lot but am going to start thinking about the face pulls as more of a workout item than a warm up item. I like the RDLs but also ‘seated good mornings’ for the hamstrings plus a nice hip opener/stretch. The other area that gets me is the inevitable awkward reach back that happens on some ‘Gastons’ and single handed mantals. I think I’d actually include something for that pressing motion on the mental - a move that isn’t used a lot but is essential for a lot of climbs. Thanks for this one!
Undertrained? BRAIN, beginners have undertrained brain, they focus on doing pullups and situps and they dont listen to anything 🤣 😅 Make a video on how to train your brain for climbing !
