Nate Drolet, a climbing coach from Power Company Climbing and a YouTube training expert, joins the discussion to enhance bouldering performance. He emphasizes building a strong foundation through pyramid training and developing endurance, even for pure boulderers. Drolet shares insights on assessing progress via benchmarks, the importance of tailored training metrics, and the '7 Try' rule. He also advises on the right approach to tackling challenging climbs without solely relying on strength, ensuring climbers maximize their training efficiency.
Building a climbing pyramid is crucial for structured training, enabling gradual skill development across various difficulty levels.
Establishing baseline problems allows climbers to effectively track progress and evaluate their growth in bouldering skills.
The '7 Try' rule encourages climbers to persist through challenging moves, fostering a deeper understanding and improving overall performance.
Deep dives
The Role of Bouldering in Climbing Goals
Bouldering plays a significant role in achieving climbing goals and can enhance overall climbing performance. A key focus of the conversation is the importance of adopting bouldering as a core training method, particularly for climbers looking to increase their strength and technique. This training approach highlights that a climber can gain significant benefits from focusing more on bouldering difficulties and less on purely strength gains. By refining bouldering skills and understanding different climbing methods, climbers can improve their grades without only relying on increased finger strength.
Importance of a Pyramid Training Approach
The concept of building a climbing pyramid is essential for structured training, emphasizing the need to develop all aspects of climbing skills. This pyramid approach involves setting achievable goals at various difficulty levels, ensuring that climbers steadily improve their performance at lower grades while also tackling harder challenges. By working on flashes and quick sends at lower grades, climbers can boost their confidence and technical ability, setting a foundation for more difficult climbs. The podcast emphasizes that this foundation will aid in progressing through harder routes and boulders effectively.
Setting Baseline Problems
Establishing baseline problems is pivotal for tracking progress in bouldering. Climbers should identify specific boulders to serve as benchmarks so they can later assess improvements over time. These benchmark problems should ideally be at various difficulty levels, allowing for a comprehensive evaluation of growth. Documenting the attempts and success rates can help climbers identify areas needing improvement and motivate them towards their goals.
The Seven Try Rule
The Seven Try Rule is a valuable mindset shift for climbers approaching challenging boulders. By committing to attempt a specific move seven times before passing judgment, climbers enable themselves to better understand the move and make necessary adjustments. This rule counters the instinct to dismiss difficulty prematurely and encourages persistence in the learning process. Adopting this mindset broadens a climber's ability to push through tough problems, as many improvements come simply from repeated attempts and slight modifications in technique.
Training Considerations and Strategies
Implementing a diverse training strategy is essential for improving overall climbing performance, especially when combining bouldering with traditional sports climbing. Balancing hard bouldering sessions with endurance work and strength training emphasizes a well-rounded approach to fitness. Such training can include various strength exercises like hamstring curls and deadlifts while focusing on specific climbing movements relevant to bouldering. This combination prepares climbers for a wider array of techniques and improves overall durability on the wall.
Targeting Outdoor Bouldering Goals
Outdoor bouldering presents opportunities for climbers to expand their skill set and increase their overall experience with different climbing styles. Planning trips to areas known for bouldering allows climbers to practice specific tactics and techniques on real rock, broadening their understanding of outdoor climbing dynamics. It’s beneficial to climb with more experienced boulders who can offer insights and expose climbers to new challenges. Setting realistic and varied goals for each trip can help climbers make the most of their time outdoors while ensuring steady progression.
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In this episode, Coach Nate Drolet consults with me on my bouldering goals and beyond, including:
The importance of building a pyramid as a sport climber
The benefit of a developed endurance system even if you’re a pure boulderer
My test metrics and what they mean for my training plan and goals
How to improve one's bouldering grade without getting stronger
The diff between a sport climber who boulders, and a boulderer
How to try really hard every single go
How to craft gym bouldering sessions
Filming ‘baseline’ boulder problems to gauge progress
The value of lighting up improbable problems and grades
The "7 Try" rule
Route selection
Training legs for bouldering
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This show is produced and hosted by Ryan Devlin, and edited by Glen Walker. The Struggle is carbon-neutral in partnership with The Honnold Foundation and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective, a diverse group of the best, most impactful podcasts in the outdoor industry.
And now here are some buzzwords to help the almighty algorithm get this show in front of people who love to climb: rock climbing, rock climber, climbing, climber, bouldering, sport climbing, gym climbing, how to rock climb, donuts are amazing. Okay, whew, that’s done. But hey, if you’re a human that’s actually reading this, and if you love this show (and love to climb) would you think about sharing this episode with a climber friend of yours? And shout it out on your socials? I’ll send you a sticker for doing it. Just shoot me a message on IG – thanks so much!
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