How to Get Started Climbing When You Don’t Have Upper Body Strength
Like any seemingly hardcore workout space, indoor climbing walls can be an intimidating place for beginners, but they don’t have to. In fact, a common misconception about climbing is that you need to have a ton of upper body strength to get started.
“That’s not true,” says conscientious climber Tess Johnson, climbing instructor at Brooklyn Boulders in New York. Sure, upper body strength never hurts when climbing, but in reality it is technique and perseverance that will really help you reach the top.
“Seventy percent of my students can’t do pull-ups, can’t do push-ups, or really struggle with them,” says Tess. Lack of upper body strength can actually be a secret weapon forcing you to focus on proper technique rather than brute force to get to the surface of a rock.
“Learning a technique is harder than building muscle,” says Tess, who often shares tips to help beginners feel more at ease on the wall.
Climbing was once the domain of climbers and outdoor enthusiasts, and climbing is fast becoming the mainstream with a growing number of indoor climbing walls emerging in urban areas. These gyms usually offer several different types of climbing. Some of them, such as rope rope and lead climbing, use ropes and other equipment. But many beginners start out with bouldering, a climbing style that requires little equipment because you rarely climb more than 15 feet off the ground. The only thing you need to start bouldering is a pair of specially designed shoes that can be rented from most indoor gyms.
Regardless of fitness level, body shape or gender, everyone can get a great full-body workout and have tons of fun by following these six simple climbing rules:
Think Monkey Bars, Not T-Rex Hands
The Beginner’s Mistake: By hanging a few feet off the ground, many of us feel a natural instinct to use our biceps to press our face as close to the wall as possible. But clinging to a wall with “Tyrannosaurus rex hands,” as Tess calls it, means you put in a lot of energy and tire quickly.
Trick: Try hanging with straight arms instead, as if you were a small child swinging on a trellis of money. In general, you will have better endurance (and you will not be immediately marked as a beginner climber).
Climb higher with your shoulders turned
Rookie mistake: Another natural instinct for novice climbers is to keep the shoulders completely parallel to the wall and perpendicular to the ground.
But if your armpits and hip joints are firmly glued to the wall, your range of motion will be limited and distant holds will seem inaccessible.
Trick: Imagine the shoulders twisting at an angle, much like freestyle swimmers tilt one shoulder back and the other forward to increase the stroke.
Once you start experimenting with shoulder angle, your hips will follow. You will soon find that your reach is greater, and you can grab onto clues that once seemed incredibly distant.
Use your toes, not your feet
Beginner’s mistake: Climbing shoes are known to fit snugly around your toes, but fit snugly for a reason – they’re designed to transfer all of your weight onto the pointed-toe rubber rubber. A common mistake most beginners make is to climb a wall by stepping on the arch of the foot as if climbing a ladder.
Trick: Use a shoe design and tiptoe up the wall. By balancing on your toes, rather than on arcs, you can turn easily and you can stand on your toes to gain height.
Drive with your hips, not your hands
Beginner’s mistake: When climbing, it’s easy to think about reaching for the next toe with your hands, it’s harder to think about using the rest of your body. Seizing hold when balance is not secure often means your body will subconsciously balance by tilting your hips in the opposite direction.
Tactic: When trying to move to the palm rest to the right of your body, do not grasp it with your hands. Instead, lean your right hip towards him. Once your center of gravity has moved to the right, the right handle is easy to grasp.
Plan your route
Beginner’s mistake: A beginner climber may be tempted to jump on a wall without first thinking about the route. But the “get up first – ask questions – later” approach means you’re more likely to get stuck halfway up the wall, burning precious energy trying to figure out your next move.
Tip: Go to any gym and you’ll probably see climbers staring at a wall, then mumbling to themselves and mimicking hand movements. These climbers visualize the movements they will make while climbing the wall.
In this example, Tess takes a close look at the route (marked with yellow holds), then imagines each move before jumping onto the wall. This is a helpful exercise that minimizes the chances of her getting stuck halfway up the wall, burning up precious energy because she can’t figure out what’s next.
A good way for beginners to develop the habit of “planning” or visualizing the climb is to observe other climbers, especially those about your height, to see how they climb the route.
Stretching after climbing
Rock climbing differs from most other exercises in that it uses almost all the muscles in your body. For most people, one of the first things that get tired is the hands, especially the hands and forearms.
“Almost no one starts with forearm strength,” says Tess. That’s why it’s a good idea to know a few simple stretches that will help you get back to your starting point and continue climbing, or simply help your muscles feel better after you finish the day.
The first is a forearm stretch that targets the wrists and the inside of the forearms. You can do this by pressing your palm against a wall or floor with your toes pointing down toward your toes. This will stretch the muscles in the forearms, which are the fastest fatigued for beginner climbers.
This is followed by a triceps stretch to help relieve tension in the shoulders and shoulders. You can do this stretch by bending one elbow over your head and bringing your elbow to the midline with the other hand. You should feel a stretch in the back of your shoulder. Alternatively, you can also use the rope to support your stretching, as Tess demonstrates above.
Aside from all these tips, the most important thing about climbing is just getting out, knowing that climbing walls are a friendly place where beginners are welcome, and more advanced climbers are happy to share tips.