Lock-Off Training Information Needed

I'm considering incorporating some lock-off training this winter and in trying to plan the best way to do this, a few questions came up.

1) Frenchies: Frenchies seem to be the basic lock off training exercise. However, it makes little sense to me in a climbing application since I have never been on a route requiring me to lock off with both arms at the same time. If that were the case, you would basically be doing a pull up on two holds at nearly the same height, and then locking off on one arm and either dead pointing to the next hold (if you're weak like me) or holding a one arm pull-up to statically reach the next hold. The situation I encounter much more frequently is hanging on to two holds at different heights, locking off with the one arm on the higher hold, and reaching past it with the other. Obviously, in a climbing setting, feet and body position play a role, but for training purposes, it doesn't make sense to me to train on holds at the same height.

The obvious question to me is what is the advantage of training lock offs from two identical holds at the same height, a la Frenchies? My thought was to hang a rock ring below my hang board and using a poor hold on the hang board (above) and a larger hold on one rock ring (below), to pull as high as I could on the higher hold and maintain that position for a set time period (more questions on that below). This seems to be a more practical climbing exercise but I'm no training expert. Perhaps someone could chime in about the value of Frenchies or the fact that I'm a complete idiot for locking off on uneven holds. I'm open to criticism.

2) Time: I have a hangboard routine I'm comfortable with. It is essentially the Anderson Bros. routine with minor modifications. The gist of it is I do repeaters, 10 seconds on and 5 seconds off. Does that same schedule make sense for lock-offs? I was thinking of applying the same timing schedule, doing six reps, and alternating which arm grabbed the higher hold each rep (in other words 3 reps with my right arm higher, and 3 reps with my left arm higher). Does this make sense or am I going to die?

3) Height: Obviously, the lower the rock ring hangs, the harder the lock-off is. Can anyone speak to a recommended distance between the lower hold and the higher one? Is there even is a recommended distance or is this something that needs to be tailored to the specific climber?

4) Holds: The worse the higher hold is, the more difficult it is to maintain the lock-off because of the increased pressure on the lower arm. I'm assuming this is just a trial and error process and I should apply the same "aim to fail on the last second of the last rep" mentality that the Anderson Bros. employ for hang boarding to figure out which holds make the most sense for my individual climbing ability/strength. Any thoughts on this?

In my mind, lock-off training is really the ability to hold a static position with the majority of the weight on one arm so it really becomes a subset of one-arm strength training. Am I way off base here? As I said, I'm just a guy with some anecdotal training experience and certainly no sports scientist or even that good of a climber. I'm just trying to figure the most effective way to maximize my lock-off strength. Any insight is appreciated.

Why do statically what you can do dynamically?

Edit to add: I've always been of the opinion that grip strength of the lower hand is the limiting factor for both static and dynamic reaches. I know for me it is. I can lock off like a champ if my lower hold is a jug, but this isn't the case with many long moves.

So, perhaps paradoxically, anything that increases grip strength including dynamic climbing is likely to improve static lock-off strength.

marty funkhouser wrote:Why do statically what you can do dynamically? Edit to add: I've always been of the opinion that grip strength of the lower hand is the limiting factor for both static and dynamic reaches. I know for me it is. I can lock off like a champ if my lower hold is a jug, but this isn't the case with many long moves. So, perhaps paradoxically, anything that increases grip strength including dynamic climbing is likely to improve static lock-off strength.

Anyone?

If you have campus board access, just use that. Then you can play around with height and hold size all you want

How often are you climbing in the gym? Lock-off training is one of those skills that you can work on during the warm-up/moderately difficult period of a gym session.

What you do is climb like normal, but whenever you reach to a higher handhold, right before you grab it, force yourself to hover over the hold for X amount of seconds(less time for harder moves, more time for easier...) and then move your next hand. You could even drop your hand to your side and then reach back up the hold and continue on.

You'll get practice locking off on a variety of holds and positions, and it's more specific than doing Frenchies or Campusing.

Bump.

I find one arm eccentric pull-ups (i.e. pull up with both arms then lock off and lower with just one) give me the quickest improvement in lock off strength. Pretty high impact on the elbows though. I have to do them one rep per set, not strong enough to do multiple reps.