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10. Summary

This chapter provides a summary of the rest of the manual as well as an introduction to a basic training cycle that you can use when preparing for a competition, or any other climbing related goal that you may have.

10.1 Preparing a Training Cycle

Difficulty competitions require you to be fit, strong and mentally prepared. This manual introduces several topics which can prepare you in each of those areas. There are several important things to remember when creating a training cycle:

10.2 A Sample Training Cycle

The training cycle presented here is based on a six month lead up to a difficulty competition. It assumes that you are climbing at least four days a week and for approximately three hours at a time. The cycle will start with core body strength training and move towards power training, then power endurance and finish with a month of endurance.

Each day begins with a warm up and cool down. If you cannot fit all the exercises into the time alloted make sure that you do not skip out on the warm up or cool down. Try to minimize the transition time between exercises and the timing should be okay. Remember this is just a sample training cycle and you may have to adapt it to suit your time schedule.

Here it is assumed that you climb two days on, one day off, one day on, one day off, one day on, one day off. Day one and two are assumed to be the two days on. If you climb more than that make sure that you do not train strength two days in a row. Try and spread out the strength training and focus on technique or just climbing on the fifth or sixth day.

You may also notice that the next series and the previous series of the cycle are incorporated into the exercises to try and make the transistion smoother.

10.2.1 Month One

In the first month you want to concentrate on pure strength training, not necessarily climbing strength but general strength training. You should create a circuit of 8-10 strength exercises. These exercises can be taken from the strength section of this manual. A weekly training schedule could look like this:

If you wish you can modify the exercises after three weeks or so and try to reduce the amount of rest between exercises.

10.2.2 Month Two

Month two will focus on climbing strength training and start power training. You will want to create a circuit of 8-10 climbing strength exercises and 4-5 power exercises.

10.2.3 Month Three

This month you will start to concentrate on longer boulder problems and power training. Set up a circuit of 4-5 power problems. Set up boulder problems that are 8-12 moves in length. Set routes that are direct and 15-25 moves in length.

10.2.4 Month Four

This month will start to focus more on power endurance and longer boulder problems still. Set boulder problems that are 8-12 moves in length and routes that are 20-30 moves in length. Create a new power training circuit or use the one from the previous month.

10.2.5 Month Five

This month will focus mainly on power endurance and redpointing longer hard routes. For this period you will want to have longer routes 25-35 moves long and try to make them as consistent as possible. You will want to set boulder problems on varying angles and make them 10-15 moves long. In addition to this you should try and set a circuit of boulder problems that you can run laps on without getting off the wall. Look at the power endurance chapter or the chapter on resting for a more thorough description of a boulder circuit.

10.2.6 Month Six

This is the final month before the competition. In this month you will focus on power endurance, endurance and competition preparation.

10.2.7 Maintainence

During the competition season there may be a 1-2 month period where you need to be in competition shape the whole time. This is a period called maintenace where you may not be getting stronger, may not be getting more endurance, but where you are maintaining your competition fitness.

During these times I suggest trying to structure your days to incorporate several aspects of climbing. Have days where you start out bouldering and finish with redpointing, or days where you start with redpointing go to bouldering and finish with endurance training. The key during these stages is to climb lots and keep the volume of hard moves high.

10.3 Final Words

This manual was created with youth competitors in mind. If you have any questions about this manual or would like to add a drill or chapter please contact Mike Doyle (mgdoyle _at_ gmail.com, replace the ' _at_ ' with the sign). Please feel free to use and distribute this manual as you see fit.

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