Depth Perception and footwork

Long time lurker, first time poster.  

I got my little brother into climbing within the last year.  Like many of us, his footwork isn't great.  I've noticed this for a while and I try to work with him on footwork almost every session.  We don't necessarily do drills but we at least spend some time focusing on foot placement/usage etc. every session.  HIs footwork still isn't great but everyone's footwork could improve so I don't want to beat him up about it/discourage him and make him want to quit.

Last week I took him climbing outside for the first time and it brought some new information to light.  I noticed that he missed almost every foot placement he tried to make.  These misses weren't by just a little bit either, he missed by about three inches either above or below the hold.  At first I thought it was just that he was having trouble distinguishing the differences on real rock since it's not a bunch of colored chips bolted to the wall, so I put some chalk on the holds to make them more distinguishable.  This helped some but he was still missing by more than a comfortable margin.  It was at this point I remembered that when we were kids, he had crazy depth perception problems.  He had to wear an eye patch in an effort to correct a lazy eye (I've done some reading on the subject and it said that if you don't correct the lazy eye/ perception problems by about age ten, they are likely to persist for life) but it doesn't seem that the problem was altogether fixed.  We couldn't throw baseball because he couldn't track it and it wasn't unusual for him to take one to the face, if that gives an example of the problem.

My question is, are there specific drills or training tactics we could work to compensate for this issue?  My first instinct is to teach him to aim high and smear in to every hold but that seems like a short term fix and will wear shoes.  Should we just start doing normal footwork drills more often or is there something more specific that could be useful?  I'm operating under the assumption that his vision is as good as it can/will be so something else is necessary should he want to improve.  Curious if anyone else has dealt with something similar and if so, what they did/ how effective it was.

Does he wear glasses or contacts? If you're correct this is more of a medical issue, isn't it?

To respond in line with your question, one thing I advise (and heard from others, in my own time) is to watch the foot all-the-way to the placement. Since I don't understand the nature of your brother's visual impairment I don't know if this is useful or not. He should not look away until his foot is on the exact spot he intended. A thing I advise with newer climbers - spend far more time looking at your feet and your next footholds than you spend on hands and handholds. When looking up, you need to be intentionally looking on behalf of your feet too.

I too lack stereoscopic vision for the same reason (as I understand it's fairly common--something like a lazy eye as an infant, your brain never learns to combine the images from your right and left eye into one).  Unless something's changed since I've last looked into it, there's no medical treatment for this--it's just somewhat of a minor (IMO) disability.

Other than commiserating, I don't have much concrete to add--I've been criticized for having in some ways bad footwork and missing holds, likely for the same reason.  I think I tend to drag my feet more than most climbers, but it's something a lot of people do more or less.  Other than wearing out shoes faster and basically always needing rand work when resoling, I don't think foot dragging is the worst thing in the world and maybe even that's the way for your brother to look at it (no pun intended):  spot the hold, get the foot as close you can visually, then maneuver physically until you seem to be standing on the hold in the best way.

It's tough to say since I only have my own vision, but I don't think this is a major handicap in climbing, and in fact climbing is probably better than most other sports with this vision impairment.  While I'm nothing special as a climber, I'm also not notably bad at it and I've climbed actively for decades, so if your brother wants to climb, don't use this as a reason not to or really even as a reason not to excel--whatever holds me back as a climber, I don't think this is it except possibly to a small degree when on-sighting certain routes.  (Feel free to tick up holds to help when climbing, just follow good ethics and brush off ticks when you're done.)

pfwein Weinberg wrote:

I too lack stereoscopic vision for the same reason (as I understand it's fairly common--something like a lazy eye as an infant, your brain never learns to combine the images from your right and left eye into one).  Unless something's changed since I've last looked into it, there's no medical treatment for this--it's just somewhat of a minor (IMO) disability.

Other than commiserating, I don't have much concrete to add--I've been criticized for having in some ways bad footwork and missing holds, likely for the same reason.  I think I tend to drag my feet more than most climbers, but it's something a lot of people do more or less.  Other than wearing out shoes faster and basically always needing rand work when resoling, I don't think foot dragging is the worst thing in the world and maybe even that's the way for your brother to look at it (no pun intended):  spot the hold, get the foot as close you can visually, then maneuver physically until you seem to be standing on the hold in the best way.

It's tough to say since I only have my own vision, but I don't think this is a major handicap in climbing, and in fact climbing is probably better than most other sports with this vision impairment.  While I'm nothing special as a climber, I'm also not notably bad at it and I've climbed actively for decades, so if your brother wants to climb, don't use this as a reason not to or really even as a reason not to excel--whatever holds me back as a climber, I don't think this is it except possibly to a small degree when on-sighting certain routes.  (Feel free to tick up holds to help when climbing, just follow good ethics and brush off ticks when you're done.)

Same here and same experience. One learns to kind of compensate with line of sight depth perception, but it’s probably not ideal…I wouldn’t know as I don’t know what stereoscopic vision is. That said, ball sports are a pain in the ass and 3D movies are a waste.
Funny thing is, i never knew that I had the problem until an Army ophthalmologist caught it (I had to talk him into keeping it out of my chart, which he did).  As a kid, I always thought that I was just kind of uncoordinated. 

We all could use footwork drills, I try to incorporate them into my warmups.  As a newer climber, your brother will certainly benefit from them.  +1 for watching your foot all the way to the hold.

I found bouldering and down climbing were two thing that helped me work on technique and footwork.  

pfwein Weinberg wrote:

I too lack stereoscopic vision for the same reason (as I understand it's fairly common--something like a lazy eye as an infant, your brain never learns to combine the images from your right and left eye into one).  Unless something's changed since I've last looked into it, there's no medical treatment for this--it's just somewhat of a minor (IMO) disability.

I have this issue as well.  I had a lazy eye (strabismus) as a baby, had it fixed, and have had wear glasses since about 2 years old.  I can't focus on something with both eyes, I switch from one eye to the other.  It's hard to explain but it is what it is.  3D movies look like shit to me... LOL.  I have no troubles climbing or biking but I have a really hard time catching a baseball just like William's brother.  

I think a helpful way for your brother to practice footwork is to try and slow things down. 

I have wondered about this.  I have similar footwork struggles, not as bad as your brother though.  But a similar problem of not having my foot go where I aim to put it, even when I am focusing on just that.  Even for handholds, for big or dynamic moves I also struggle with precision (not over or undershooting a hold).  Precision slot stabbing is my kryptonite.  I have never been diagnosed but my sense is that my depth perception is not amazing.  Even stick clipping I feel like I sometimes have issues.

Progressive glasses mess up my depth perception so much that I am reluctant to walk off sidewalk.  Also when I first got glasses the astigmatism correction messed up my sense of balance. 

Just chiming in to say that I also had/have stereoscopic vision issues - like your brother, I had lazy eye and wore an eye patch as a kid, and it was never fully corrected. I'm terrible at catching thrown objects and was never able to see those Magic Eye things.

For the most part, it hasn't hampered my footwork too much - my footwork isn't the best, but I don't think it's because of my vision. Where I think it might be an issue is in identifying footholds, because it's often very subtle if a tiny patch of rock is just a bit lower angle relative to the rest of the face that you can smear on it. But that again might just be a mileage thing.

I think it's definitely an issue in very precise deadpoints or big dynamic moves. I have a hard time gauging distance. What I usually do is, before winding up for the move, actually pull up closer to the hold, to see how close it will be when I'm mid move. And then sag back down and wind up and do the move. That seems to give my brain the extra info it needs to estimate the distance.

Progressive lenses also mean you have to be able to aim your head where you're looking.  Otherwise the hold can be quite out of focus.  Not good for tiny holds, or trying to look up and then down when it's precarious.

Interesting input.  I figure we can just go for mileage and see if that helps/ do drills.  After reading that several of you have difficulty with precision hand moves as well as feet, it occurred to me that he does as well (especially deadpoint moves).  I'm thinking we can work toward making most of his moves static and focus on precision (to the best we can) footwork.  Thanks for the help.