TBP 251: Climbing Drills for Beginner to Elite Climbers with Matt Pincus
Feb 7, 2024
auto_awesome
Climbing coach Matt Pincus discusses the importance of climbing drills in training, emphasizing deliberate practice, feedback, and overcoming struggles. He shares examples of drills like contrast warmup and one-leg climbing. The podcast explores the benefits of memorization drills, pacing drills, and common pitfalls in climbing practice.
Climb warm-ups twice to contrast static and dynamic movements for improved tension and flow.
Memorize beta in chunks to enhance skill development gradually with increasing complexity.
Practice attack and defend drills for pacing by climbing continuously between rest points with a bouncy rhythm.
Deep dives
Contrast Warm-Up Drill
This drill involves climbing each warm-up boulder twice, first time with slow static movements focusing on tension and second time with momentum flowing smoothly between moves, emphasizing the contrast between styles.
Memorization Drill and Progression
The memorization drill focuses on recalling beta. Progression involves starting with smaller chunks of beta, like clipping stances or half a boulder, and gradually increasing complexity to enhance skill development.
Attack and Defend Drill for Pacing
The attack and defend drill emphasizes continuous climbing between rest checkpoints, practicing with bouncy rhythm and no interruptions in movement. This drill helps in pacing and includes segmenting climbing into attack for movement between rests and defend for recovery at each resting point.
Improving Climbing Pacing with Drills
Drills like sprint laps on a route are used to enhance pacing by focusing on continuous climbing. These drills aim to improve efficiency without compromising accuracy or climbing quality, serving as a valuable tool for climbers who struggle with pacing issues.
Addressing Common Pitfalls in Skill Practice
Common challenges in skill practice include finding the right climb for a drill, dealing with drill repetition, and the difficulty balance in drills. By creatively adjusting drills, climbers can overcome these obstacles, emphasizing the importance of consistency, creativity, and incremental progress in mastering skills.
Coach Matt Pincus uses climbing drills in his coaching (and his own climbing) all the time. He also put them into every single training session in the Performance Training Programs he built for TrainingBeta. But what do you imagine when you think of climbing drills? Maybe practicing heel hooks or drop knees? Perhaps you imagine practicing dynamic moves or campusing?
Or maybe you have no idea what a climbing drill is or why you would do one. That’s what this episode is for. In every other sport, there are drills: basketball, soccer, baseball, horseback riding. Heck, in every HOBBY there are drills: piano, singing, chess, etc. – all in the name of getting better at the activity and making certain movements or thought patterns second nature. But in climbing we sort of gloss over that, opting to just have fun and climb instead.
In this episode, Matt is going to talk about some of the drills he uses in his coaching, why he uses them, why it’s so important to practice them regularly, how to incorporate them into your climbing, and how even the most elite of climbers benefit from doing drills.
More Details:
Why Drills?
Elements of Deliberate Practice
Being Intentional
Appropriate Difficulty
Getting Feedback
Willingness to Struggle
Willing to Struggle
Examples of Drills
Contrast Warmup + One-Leg Climbing
Memorization Drills
Pacing Drills: Attack and Defend and Sprint Laps
Common Pitfalls and Questions
I hope this helps you gain more mastery in your climbing – this info has definitely helped Matt, his clients, and the community in our Performance Training Programs.
If you want Matt to help you with your own goals, whether they’re with bouldering or route climbing, he’s available for month-long commitments where he’ll talk with you over zoom and create a program for you and keep in touch with you via the TrueCoach app throughout the month.
He’ll help you get stronger and he’ll cater to your specific goals so that the timing is right for you to send when it’s time to send.