Why Get Stronger When You Can Get Better?

Being good at rock climbing is all about learning proper technique and then ingraining it so it becomes second nature. In the long run, technique will take you much further than a strong back and a vice grip. Yet most climbers are hyper-focused on trying to “get stronger” … oftentimes at the expense of learning good tecehnique.

Emily Harrington, who has climbed multiple 5.14’s in various stages of personal fitness, recognizes the superlative of proper technique. Emily has been climbing for 13 years, putting in well over the requisite “10,000 hours” one supposedly needs to master any craft. As a result, she believes that no matter what shape she’s in, she will always be able to climb at a baseline of 5.12a throughout life.

“If you know how to move your body, you should be able to climb 5.12a,” Emily says, “no matter how ‘strong’ you are.”

This may seem surprising to the climbers out there for whom 5.12a is a lifetime goal, yet the point is not that 5.12 is “easy,” but rather that proper technique honed over many hours of practice is more enduring than one’s momentary form (strength and fitness). The problem is, it’s easier to get stronger than it is to get better. Anyone can go to the gym and rip off a bunch of reps or climb a bunch of boulder problems and feel as though they have accomplished something. Training with the goal of improving technique is more cerebral, requiring a certain degree of consciousness about what you’re doing. This is because good technique is all about ingraining movements, coordinating the upper and lower body and maintaining awareness of how much effort you’re expending to the point that it becomes second nature. Great climbers aren’t thinking about what they need to do—they just do the exact right thing. This is the art of free climbing.

Improvements in one’s technique are much less tangible—harder to measure or gauge. Thus, it can be difficult to know how to approach the gym with the goal of becoming a better free climber. Here are a few tips that you may find useful:

First, be good: Many beginner and intermediate climbers have approached me wanting to know how to get strong, but I’ve never heard anyone ask how to get good. The two are undoubtedly related. But instead of jumping on the hardest route or boulder problem you think you can do, focus on making perfect ascents of easier routes and problems. Try to be good before you try to be strong. How perfectly can you climb something?

Bad feet: Problems in the gym typically get harder as the hand holds become worse and farther apart, while usually the foot jibs remain pretty good. But if you have the ability to help set some problems wherever you climb indoors, I recommend setting decent hand holds and the worst, most polished, difficult-to-stand-on footholds you can find. You want them to be bad, but not so bad that you just force a campus move. You want the focus to be on using your feet properly—the first and most lastingly important step in becoming good. As a double benefit, nothing will get you stronger than climbing problems with bad feet.

Stand Up: You’ve undoubtedly heard the advice, “Keep your arms straight!” But, of course, if your arms were straight the whole time, you wouldn’t be able to flex them to pull yourself upward. When you’re hanging on holds, indeed, it’s a good idea to keep your arms straight. But the second part of this advice that's left out is how to begin initiating your upward movement. Typically, beginners will initiate the move with their arms: pulling themselves up, locking off like on a pull-up bar, with their feet way low. Instead, try to always initiate your upward movement with your legs. Keep your arms straight and lever yourself upward by pressing with your feet. Eventually, you'll have to flex your arms, but try to do so only after you’ve initiated the upward movement with the legs--even if it's just a little bit. Teach yourself what this feels like by climbing easy (5.6) routes in the gym. Hang from straight arms and try to drive yourself upward as far as you can by high-stepping your feet and using only your leg muscles to stand up on every hold.

For the rest of the tips, you can visit the full Rock and Ice article here :-) 

Happy 'better' climbing!

oo nga naman

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from small business online community

about today

a day made complete by...

1. time spent with mom, dad, ate, kuya, trina, kala, kayin, and loula

2. pitching in for a few hours at the cafe

3. a few precious hours with miel, who was away for three days

4. and a relaxed time watching the first episode of glee season 2 and 'funny people' on hbo

#1 and #4 are rare, which make them a real treat.

having all four happen in one day makes it awesome.

wasn't even planning to watch tv tonight, and i'm so glad to have caught nice shows. though i don't know if 'funny people' left me happy....it kinda left me with mixed emotions and things to think about :-/

but still, there's much to smile for. good night!

flashback

i would go there around 4pm, after class. i would assist in opening the door, welcoming guests, giving them a smile while saying, "sandali lang po!" 

i would lead them to their seats, hand them menus, and help traffic more people who would come pouring in in big, then small, then big waves again.

when the halls would get a bit too crowded, i would station myself behind the cake counter, taking orders, either putting the slices on the small oval plate, or in a take-out box. as the coffee machine worked, i would carefully place one piece of spritsar cookie, a packet of sugar and cream, and a teaspoon over a saucer, before completing the order with its cup of freshly brewed coffee.

i had also memorized the menu by then, which enabled me to write corresponding prices in guests' order slips without using a cheat sheet. one thing that hasn't changed, though, is my poor arithmetic; i was heavily dependent on the calculator, which i clicked on with confidence and ease. (must have something to do with my piano-playing that rouses me with keypad-related activities, haha). even more with the heavier keys of the cash register. 

i loved the pace of those evenings. i probably didn't think of it this way back then, but i guess i already loved being useful and productive. 

fast forward to thirteen years later, and i'm re-acquainted with this particular joy of being in our cafe dining room. the rush of people who are ever-so-patient with the waitlist, the unbelievable amount of food that comes out of the kitchen, the seemingly-synchronized movement of the servers, and the constant, joyful buzz in the air...i swear, i almost forgot i had experienced it before.

but here i am again, and i'm happy to be reunited with these sensations. 

this time, i know i will never again forget.

learn, learn, and learn some more!

at the start of 2010, i told myself that one of the things i'll do this year is to attend at least one writing workshop. and after waiting patiently for an opportunity in the Filipinas Heritage Library website (one that will fit my schedule, specifically), i think the time has come.

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Professional Travel Writing

July 29, August 3 and 10, 2010

6:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.

Share your love of travel with others and even get the chance to see your name in print! Join Kristine Fonacier, a writer and travel enthusiast, in this Travel Writing Workshop with a tour to the south of Luzon known as the Viaje del Sol.

The workshop is designed for professional and those with some experience in travel writing. If you want to be published or write a book or magazine about your trip, the Travel Writing workshop is for you.

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AND i felt more excited to see other workshops and seminars that the public can avail of. there's SO many out there, if only someone will compile it properly for all training/skills-seekers out there!

for example:

Fully Booked hosts various events through its venues (The Forum, TopShelf), from painting to language to storytelling to meditation, etc! Just visit their website and check out the "Upcoming Events" bar on the right. One cool one coming up is a FREE workshop by the Center for East Asian Languages which will feature basics in origami, furushiki, and other crafts for an introduction to Japanese culture!!!!

I'm a suki of the Filipinas Heritage Library for writing and photography workshop referrals. So aside from the cool Travel Writing one i mentioned above, they also regularly have sessions on Feature Writing, Basic Creative Writing, Digital Photography, among many others! Just visit their website too, it's regularly updated.

And did you know that even corporate giants offer cool, free seminars? Check out Nokia Pep Talks, which feature talks from premiere learning company Salt & Light Ventures (who organizes their own seminars and can charge at least P2,000 per session). Just some of the super relevant topics they offer are Reawakening Creativity for Effective Leadership, Personal Effectiveness and Stress Management, and Guerilla Brand Planning. And yes, it is really for free! You just have to sign up with Nokia :-)

i'm like a paid advertiser. (but i'm NOT, ok??) just sharing the love for learning! go, sali din kayo!

a new mission

i wrote a whole entry but my browser crashed and erased everything i wrote before i even got the chance to save it as draft. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.

so to get straight to the point of this blog.....

i have a new mission: LEARN HOW TO COOK! 

cooking adventure #1 - beautiful courgette carbonara

cooking adventure #2 - puttanesca with tuna and mushrooms

these two turned out pretty okay, so i'm bracing myself for some full-force failures... ;-) watch out for next weekend.

cheers to more cooking adventures!!! :-D

and so it begins

today, after fighting all my lazy-bratty-mood to stay in bed, miel and i headed to TS to get a dose of exercise. i spent the entire drive to the gym contemplating on my state of mind, doing all possible mind tricks to psyche myself up for a productive climbing session. i was telling myself, "this is just your typical laziness, just a barrier to crawl over. once you get to the gym, once your blood circulates a little faster, once some sweat breaks out of your pores, you'll start feeling better, lighter, and get into the workout mode." what a session of self-talk that was.

so we get to the gym. i robotically put on my shoes ("i. want. to. sleep."), feel extra bad that my shorts and chalk bag strap are too tight around my waist ("i'm fat!"), and drudgingly lifted my arms and legs to the wall to traverse ("nakaka-pump!") 

after our (very very precisely counted) ten-minute traverse, miel asked, "what do you want to do?" i really couldn't care less because i still felt as unmotivated as when the workout started, so when he suggested we give the campus board a try, i simply followed.

first set was like carrying a 200-pound version of myself. despite the positive voice in my head saying i could do it, deep inside i also knew that i haven't completely drowned out the devil. and so i pulled on at the rungs with two hands at a time, not even laddering, and just went as far as four rungs upward. booooooooo.

as i sat down on the bench, i watched as miel did his set of ladders. then out of the corner of my eye, i saw some of stan's friends watching miel as well. and as narcissistic as it may be, that image pretty much gave me the mental punch i needed to get going. i got envious of the look they gave to miel, and thought to myself, "i can do that too!!!" 

ahhhh. a benefit of being competitive. :-P

and so on my second set, the real positive state arrived. i approached the campus board with confidence, remembered to pay attention to my breathing, to strengthen my core, and to deliberately pull with my back rather than with my arms. i campused up to six rungs up, and went down again, in a real ladder sequence. i did it!!! 

when i sat back down on the bench, checking the clock for the next interval, deeply breathing, fingers smeared with chalk-white and throbbing in tightness, and psyching myself again for the next set, a promising thought crossed my mind: "I missed this."

***

now it's evening and i'm doing my research: self-assessments, aerobic vs anaerobic conditioning, finger exercises, training cycles. it's all so familiar and exciting.

actually, the training plan was all i i really wanted to blog about, but i ended up writing about the climbing day. i guess the misadventures and lessons will become naturally integrated in this "project", and today, is actually a fitting prelude to this new beginning. 

[gleek, i am]