Continue with onX Maps
Sign in with Facebook
Climbers in the 1000 lb club and 5.13 or higher Senders
|
So I’m not particularly good at climbing nor strong in any way. I’m prepping for my first 12a here in a couple of weeks and have been lifting 2-3x a week with my buddy. We’ve been talking about trying to join the 1000 lb club which is pretty doable in the next couple of months. It’d just be a fun goal to reach since I was a cyclist in high school and didn’t start lifting until this year (I didn’t commit to becoming a climber until recently). Any of you climbers in the 1000 lb club and how hard do you climb? Just curious after listening to Steve Masich on the nugget climbing podcast and learning about Steve’s guidelines for strong climbers. My buddy and I can’t fathom a 5.13 and above climber benching BW 15 times (but maybe at 6’3” and 190lbs I’m just too heavy and weak) though squatting BW 15 times and deadlifting 2x or more BW seem reasonable (probably cause I can do them at this time - maybe all that cycling is paying off). Update as of 10/19/22 - I followed a climbing plan during the summer, but it took too much time to keep climbing with my summer associate position and family. If Contact Climbing were to open at 5AM or stay open till 11 or 12 PM that would've been super helpful. Even still, I believe I would've been able to climb 5.12 with a couple of tries since I made it up a few V8s, and 5.12's on the second or third try @ Contact Climbing, and I felt stronger than ever as far as climbing goes. But, I had a hard time finding climbing partners who could go when I could and when it wasn't too hot. I was also unable to complete most climbing training sessions which seemed to take a solid 2 hours/session, 4-5x/week. I started lifting again, 3x/week, in August for about 45 minutes/session, haven't gained any weight, and just got a combined lift of 1,050. I think if I had time to commit to climbing, I'd be able to get the goal of 5.13 and 1k club, but it's just not going to happen right now. |
|
Prediction: you're about to see a bunch of dudes exaggerating both their redpoint and bench press numbers. |
|
Muscle is heavy! The time you are wasting lifting you should be climbing! |
|
There’s a point in which muscle mass on your legs becomes counterproductive for doing hard sends. We just are not ever going to need to squat 500 pounds as a rock climber. Pistol squats with some added weight is probably the hardest leg exercise that we would need for climbing. |
|
1000 lb club member here. At 6'1 and 200+ lbs, the mass I've accumulated over the years is not necessarily a benefit to my climbing. I don't climb that hard (low 11s), but my size isn't my limiting factor. I see no reason I couldn't climb 5.12 with better technique and more finger strength. I'm just doing what I can splitting my time between lifting, climbing, running and riding my bike(s). |
|
Climbing is as much about technique (more) as it is strength. The strength you need the most is in your fingers - tendons. As others have said - extra muscle = extra weight... if the route is overhanging... :( |
|
No power clean in the 1000 lb club? Boo. Best lift ever! From sophomore year of high school through college, I could lift 1k in bench/squat/deadlift, while weighing 170-180. Not hard to hit with a 400+ lb squat. I would imagine that most crushers couldn’t come close, but this is interesting to think about. Lifting for the 1k club and climbing are two different beasts in my mind. |
|
Mile High Club here, but don't know what the 1000lb club is, but it sounds like something not necessary for 5.13. A woman I climb with sends .13 but can barely do a pull-up and I don't know her Mile High Club status. |
|
Dammit, I really called this thread incorrectly. I should have gone with, "You're about to see a bunch of dudes talking about 5.13 climbers who can't do a pullup." I guess MP is going more toward r/climbharder than it is to supertopo. |
|
Max bench: 285 But two 5.13a sends. If you like weightlifting for the sake of weightlifting, it's fun and keeps you busy so you don't end up over climbing. I would expect there to be no significant correlation between 5.13 sending and weightlifting, and I don' think one will put you on a trajectory for the other. (There may even be an inverse correlation, but I don't know.) Most high level climbers I know are relatively scrawny and "weak" by weightlifting standards. The benching keeps my shoulders healthy and happy, but it's not like I climb better when I'm benching more. In fact, during redpoint season, all that weightlifting takes a back seat and I come back to the bench later pretty weak. In your case, the jump to 12a is generally a finger strength and technique factor. Spend some quality (not quantity) time on a hangboard and get really good at footwork. More weightlifting will probably be counterproductive, especially if it eats into time that should be spent on climbing-specific work. |
Short Fall Sean wrote: HA! I wrote that specifically after reading your reply, trying to think of the most generic, stereotypic response possible... I wanted to work in microfracture and YGD, but failed. But seriously, I don't know what the 1000lb club is, but if it isn't a measure of grip strength or weekly protein intake, I doubt it has much to do with sending .13. |
|
I'm aware that my climbing game may be benefitted by lifting less and climbing more. In about a year (post graduation) I plan to stop lifting so frequently and will be climbing more. However, I'm currently climbing 3 days and week (~2 hours per session at the school climbing gym), doing cardio 1-2 days a week (45-60 min sessions) and while I lift 2-3x a week, I follow tactical barbell’s program which only takes about 45 minutes so it's not eating into my climbing time much (especially since I’m lifting early morning when I’d otherwise be sleeping - I lift in the morning and climb in the evening MWF). Plus, I'm lifting with a close friend in the military and we’re attending law school together so we talk about the subject matter a decent amount between lifts. In other words, I'm not just lifting for the sake of lifting, it's also a mild form of a study group. My buddy proposed the idea since my aggregate is just over 900 and I could definitely squat more right now (385 deadlift, 205 bench, 315 squat). |
|
I barely scraped by as a member of the club many years ago (Dead 405, squat 315, bench 285 all were 1RM). I moved away from lifting and focused more on climbing around that time, so I never did both concurrently, but my body weight at that strength was about the same as it is now (180-190 lbs depending on my diet). Best OS is 11c, I've never really projected a climb but I suspect if I did, I could manage into the 12's. If I was motivated, I can imagine getting back to the 1K club and climbing into the low-mid 12's, barring injury (I'm 46, and it's getting harder to push myself without getting injured). I'll say that I am not particularly gifted when it comes to either lifting or climbing, I'm definitely just an "average" guy, so if I can do it, I think most others with a similar build would be able to, if they are motivated. Someone who walks around normally at 150-160 would have a much harder time hitting those strength goals (but an easier time with the climbing). Your height and weight puts you in that sweet spot where it seems totally feasible to achieve that benchmark, especially if you're still young. Based on what I know about my own body and ability, I can't fathom climbing 5.13's and lifting those numbers. My back and fingers would explode. Also, I've never had the mental fortitude to reach those levels of physical fitness, if I am being honest. I'm too lazy. |
Tommy J wrote: When you say climb 5.13, do you mean redpointing a cherry-picked 5.13a outside? Or in the gym? Or consistently leading outside at that grade? You're basically there as far as the lifting goes. A month of concentrated focus on getting those numbers up and you would be there no problem. How long have you been climbing and what grade do you consistently lead outdoors? |
|
Behold the training wisdom of the 5.butteasy crusher. |
James W wrote: Easily onsight 4th class most days. No big deal |
|
It's going to be body dependent. I remember never, ever being able to even bench 225 when I started lifting heavily, but I could do pullups with a 45lb plate one day, and cycle 300km the next because bodies are weird and these numbers are too big of an abstraction to make a formula out of it all. Now, I don't lift at all and I still can't climb 5.13, so stopping weight training didn't help me! Anyways, do what you find is enjoyable, |
Jason Kim wrote: I mean, I'm interested in examples of climbers that are established 5.13 climbers, not necessarily 1-hit wonders, but those who can justifiably say, "yea, I climb 5.13." The article by Steve Masich entitled "The Economics of Training" is what spurred my curiosity. It's because I'm pretty close to the club that makes me want to go for it for kicks and a goal to pursue with my buddy. I've been climbing off and on for the last few years, but previously my focus has been mainly on cycling (road, mountain, and freeride when I was in high school). When I was doing more climbing a few years ago, I wanted to climb interesting alpine objectives, so my goal was never to climb hard. Unfortunately, my wife wasn't a fan of those objectives for safety reasons, so I dropped out of climbing as a sport but then a couple of months ago, after a lot of soul searching and self-discovery, I came back to climbing (specifically sport and bouldering) as something I want to pursue long-term, given its uniqueness (for example, every route is different whereas mountain bike trails remain largely the same, and there are much fewer trails than routes), the associated lifestyle of climbers (health and fitness), and its family-friendly environment (I can take my family bouldering or sport climbing most places whereas I can't go cycling or skiing where we can all simultaneously push ourselves to new levels). So, that's a long way of saying I don't know what I can consistently lead outdoors right now cause I've mostly been climbing at my school gym rather than outside since I started back up. At the gym, I onsighted most of the 5.10's on top-rope and can climb pretty much all of the moderate boulders (I did 17 moderate problems yesterday in an hour and a half and will start trying "hard" problems in a week and a half when I get to phase II of my training plan). While the gyms ratings seem pretty stiff to me, I don't have much to compare them to at this point. Ask me in a month after I've been on winter break and get to spend some time outside, haha. Before I stopped climbing, I was close to breaking into the 12's, but never (and still don't) understood many things about climbing, such as projecting or the importance of shoes (I was using evolve defy's for everything). I've learned a lot since then and feel I can break into the 12's pretty quickly because I don't think I've lost tons of technique, and I'm a lot more knowledgeable about approaching a route. Before it was like if I can't onsight something or get it done within 2-3 tries while placing draws/cams on lead, it doesn't count for anything, and I should go do something easier. I just didn't know anything different and didn't consistently have anyone to teach me any different since I was moving so much for work and school. Of course, you didn't ask for all of that, but there you go. |
Charlie S wrote: Even with skinny climbers' legs, that's a pretty low squat considering you can bench twice that weight and deadlift nearly three times that weight! That's awesome though. Thanks for the tips. I'm planning on starting fingerboard training in a couple of weeks and have been working on my technique a lot. Since technique isn't necessarily an objective skill, anything you recommend other than just climbing more to improve it? I've been working on quiet feet, maintaining my breath, and not adjusting my grip. I know weightlifting is more of an off-season thing to do. Like this past summer when my buddy was at OCS, I didn't weight lift at all but focused on more calisthenics and mountain biked a lot. I imagine and have read/heard that when in-season climbing, to stop weightlifting as much to save for the send. |
Tommy J wrote: I am speculating, but I doubt there are many people that can consistently climb outside at the 5.13 level and lift those numbers. Not because there is anything inherently special or difficult about attaining either benchmark. They just lie at opposite ends of the spectrum for most people who pursue these activities. They each take a certain amount of training and focus to achieve, and let's face it, we only have so much time in the day. I would be impressed with anyone who can do both, because it demonstrates a certain well-roundedness that I've always thought was appealing. If you're able to reach both goals, awesome, but it's unlikely you will achieve anywhere near your real potential since the sports place very different demands on your body. |
|
It sounds like a way off goal with many things to work on ahead of time if you plan to achieve it. For example, sounds like you still need to learn to lead climb. Can’t climb 5.13s on top rope and claim it as an ascent. |
