Toe strength is the key!

My ortho for my bad knees sent me to a podiatrist to see whether my feet were part of the problem and I walked out of the office with some nice footbeds AND a set of toe exercises. And they're hard!

I thought my toes were pretty strong from climbing, but apparently not. My bad take on this is that STRONGER TOES WILL GET ME OFF MY 5-FUN PLATEAU, so don't anyone disabuse me of this notion!

(But seriously, this can't hurt, right?)

What are the exercises and what are the standard you're trying to achieve?

Long Ranger wrote:

What are the exercises and what are the standard you're trying to achieve?

Reading this I instantly had a vision of the next fad. "Lattice data indicates that 90% of climbers who climb V10 have a one rep max  Slovenian Inverted Toe Curl of at least 30% bodyweight with the big toe and 50% with their back 4 toes. If you can't achieve this, it's a weakness you clearly need to work on....and it goes without saying that you'll probably never climb the pink one in the corner"

Long Ranger wrote:

What are the exercises and what are the standard you're trying to achieve?

One exercise involves picking marbles up with my toes and putting them in a cup. Another is scrunching up a towel (on the floor) with the toes and then moving it back in place. And exercises to isolate the muscles in the arch, big toe, little toe, etc. 

I guess the standard I’m trying to achieve is to actually DO them? (Not quite there yet with the marbles and towel bits)

this is a really important aspect that gets overlooked. crimp strength is important, of course, but nobody thinks of feet as crimping on toes. it should be tested the same way. find a ledge (like a stair case). stand with Just your toes on it. if you can stand with bodyweight on 5 toes, this should be v10, just like it is for crimps. if you need 10 toes, it's closer to v5.

to be fair, however, there are already so many things to work on. shoulder stability, core, latch speed, campus board, max hang, etc. even a full time climber has difficulty maintaining, let alone improvement.

Charles Albert has entered the chat

Kidding aside sounds like you've got a good ortho. It's no wonder that we stick our feet into shoes - let alone climbing shoes, and their natural strength and mobility withers. Also makes perfect sense that this will have consequences to other parts of your body - like your knees as perhaps they take on the job that your feet should be doing. As not a doctor or a PT, I try to just be barefoot as much as possible in my life and it seems to do good - some runners go as far as doing easy jogs in the grass to strengthen their feet and a few crazies do whole marathons shod-less, Abebe Bikila-style.

Most sessions I do sees me in a kneeling position, with my toes curled under  my feet, to give them a good stretch. Toe yoga! 

I think the toe strengthening exercises are a great idea.

Podiatrists love to recommend orthotics and pronation control shoes. Sometimes it’s necessary but for me, I’ve found that they support the already weak parts of my foot and they get weaker.

I’m not saying to become a barefooter but maybe try experimenting with less support sometimes.

Isn’t the point of downturned shoes to create leverage to weak toes?

Not Not MP Admin wrote:

Isn’t the point of downturned shoes to create leverage to weak toes?

One of the main reasons to wear shoes is to add strength to weaken feet (which incidentally got weak because we wear shoes all the time).  Weak muscle groups - even something as seemigly insignificant as a toe can have a domino effect to other parts of the body in ways that aren't always obvious. So could be a good idea to strengthen them anyways. Ice climbers wear rigid soled boots to stand on front points for pitches at a time, though they still complain when their calves cramp up. Probably could benefit from making those stronger, too.

Long Ranger wrote:

One of the main reasons to wear shoes is to add strength to weaken feet (which incidentally got weak because we wear shoes all the time).  Weak muscle groups - even something as seemigly insignificant as a toe can have a domino effect to other parts of the body in ways that aren't always obvious. So could be a good idea to strengthen them anyways. Ice climbers wear rigid soled boots to stand on front points for pitches at a time, though they still complain when their calves cramp up. Probably could benefit from making those stronger, too.

I agree to an extent, but I think having stronger hamstrings would be far more beneficial, and see more noticeable results than strengthening your toes…at least when climbing steeper terrain. I’m not sure how much strengthening your toes will reduce your calves cramping on small holds and/or slab routes, but it’s also been a while since I’ve taken a kinesiology class lol

Not Not MP Admin wrote:

I’m not sure how much strengthening your toes will reduce your calves cramping on small holds and/or slab routes,

Me neither, but I didn't make that claim. 

An interesting test to do is stand on your toes, and see how long you can stay that way. Then do it again on one foot. Having good control would make me think you would also have good footwork while on the rock.

Try mimicking Scott Franklin climbing 5.14 vertical edge testpieces @ smith in a pair of late 80’s boreal ninjas or Patrick Edlinger free soloing 5.12c multi pitch barefoot in the Verdon.