Climbing Techniques

Basic Principals

1. Climb with the strength of your legs rather than pulling your body up a route with your arms. The legs are a bigger and stronger muscle group that tire less quickly than your arms. The goal should be to place your hands on a given hold for balance and step up using your feet and legs.

2. Do not overgrip hand holds. Often, beginners will hold on as tightly as possible, partly because of fear, partly because they believe it will give them the greatest chance of success. This is wrong. The harder you grip, the more precious energy and endurance you waste on a hold that could be gripped with much less force.

3. Look Down! (And up, and around!) The best climbers constantly search their surroundings for the best foothold, handhold, or next sequence of holds. This saves time and allows the climber to avoid using an incorrect sequence. It is especially helpful to scan a boulder problem or top rope climb with your eyes prior to leaving the ground to get a better idea of the likely sequence of moves that will lead to the top.

4. With hand holds, the closer the fingers are together, the more power the grip will have.

5. The speed at which you climb will matter, but the most appropriate tempo for a given climb varies quite a bit. For a balance intensive friction slab, slow controlled movements can be a real benefit. On a steep overhang, a seasoned climber may realize the need to negotiate the sequence rapidly in order to pass difficulties before becoming ‘pumped’ or exhausted.

6. Look for places to rest. If a very large hold allows one hand to grip it without much effort, let go with the other hand, point the fingers down, and shake your hand to allow the blood that is swelling in your forearms to dissipate, and for new oxygen rich blood to take its place. One of the main factors determining whether or not a climber successfully completes a route is endurance. Short rests throughout a climb help preserve your energy for more difficult sections. Use them!

Types of Holds

1. Jugs are the most basic type of hold. A jug is a hold that can be held with the entire hand with minimal energy. To grip a jug, use a cling grip, or all fingers wrapped over the top of the hold, fingers close together.

2. Slopers are rounded knobs or slanted ledges that require friction rather than a gripping motion to keep a climber’s hand on them. Slopers are traditionally very difficult for beginners to use, due to the beginner’s tendency to try to pull up on them with the arms, rather than use them as a balance point for the hands while moving the legs and feet up. Once greater balance is learned, slopers can provide some wonderful challenges. Keep your arms straight and hang from them with as much of your hand on the hold as possible.

3. Pockets or Heucos are holes in the rock that allow you to hook in one to three fingers. For a one finger pocket (also known as a ‘monodoigt’) use your strongest finger which is generally your middle finger. For a two finger pocket, the middle and ring fingers are best. For three finger pockets, the index, middle, and ring fingers should be used. To increase strength, keep your hand in a fist if possible. Also, in vertically stretching pockets, it helps to stack fingers on top of one another.

4. Pinches are usually vertically oriented holds that require a climber to use the thumb to create inward pressure on the opposite side of the hold from the remaining fingers.

5. Crimps are the smallest holds that a climber can use. They require the climber to put the tops of the fingers directly down on the hold (rather than the finger tips) and then wrapping the thumb across the tops of the fingers (or against the side of the hold) to create the most powerful force. This creates incredible pressure on the joints and tendons and should be reserved for the intermediate to advanced climber who has developed sufficient finger strength to use this grip with less risk of injury.

Footwork

1. Edging is using the inside or outside edge of the climbing shoe on a hold to achieve balance.

2. Smearing means using the sticky rubber soles of the climbing shoe to create friction against the rock. Smears are best used on slab climbs or where there is a deficit of holds for the feet. To achieve a good smear, lean away from the rock and with toes pointed upwards, use downward pressure to create a high static coefficient of friction.

3. Flagging means moving a leg that is not in contact with a hold either behind the body or out to the side in order to maintain proper balance and position of the body. This is especially helpful if moving diagonally up the rock.

4. Twisting is a method of reaching a far away hand hold with as little straining as possible. This is done by putting the outside edge of the climbing shoe on a hold, twisting the same side hip into the wall and reaching up to the high hand hold.

5. Rock On technique is used to position the body over a high foot hold. If a high step is needed, it can be difficult to create enough downward pressure to step up over the hold. To avoid this straining (which often has the effect of pushing the climber away from the wall), simply put your foot up on the high hold and rock your body sideways and up, allowing the momentum to push you up over the hold.

6. Toe hooking is a move used to take weight off the hands or to assist the climber in maintaining proper body position while moving into the next sequence. If a pocket or edge exists near the feet, the climber can insert and pull with the toe while pushing with the heel. This creates a toe jam that can take weight off the arms and reduce the strain on the abdomen when reaching for the next moves. Similarly, a heel hook is effected by placing the heel on a hold higher than the level of the hips. This will take weight off the hands and arms and can be very particularly useful in overhanging or very steep bouldering.

General Notes on Footwork

1. Practice placing your foot or toe precisely on the best part of a foothold. Simply dropping your foot onto a hold without thought as to its best edge or use will result in sloppy footwork that will force the arms and hands to do more work balancing and stabilizing the climber. This lost energy will make a serious difference as a climber progresses into the harder grades.

2. Practice footwork by climbing a low angle slab or boulder without the use of the hands.

3. Traversing is another great way to improve both footwork technique and endurance. One advanced method for doing this is to do one arm traverses. Remember to do this with each arm individually and in both directions.

4. Another way to improve footwork is to climb an easier route with only one foot. This will greatly improve sense of balance and body positioning in newer climbers.

Climbing Movements

1. Manteling is a way to go from a face climb up onto a ledge and is frequently encountered when bouldering. To mantel, place both palms onto the ledge (or summit), walk the feet up as the palms press down onto the ledge, place one foot up on the ledge, and reach for the next hand holds for balance as you step up your other foot.

2. Stemming is a way for a climber to ascend a corner or chimney. Using opposing pressure against the sides of the corner or chimney, move one limb up at a time while holding yourself steady with the other limbs. Stemming can also be used to press against holds on a face climb, but is more often associated with corners, chimneys, and dihedrals.

3. Underclings require the climber to use the hands palms facing up to pull outward on a crack or flake of rock while pushing into the rock with the feet. Leaning out away from the crack helps to create pressure on the hands and feet.

4. Liebacking is achieved by pulling against the side of a crack or flake and pushing with the feet in the opposite direction while in a leaned back position.

5. Gaston is a technique for pushing outwards on opposing holds. Picture opening a sliding glass door with one hand on the wall and the other on the door and pulling them apart.

6. Dynamic Moves or ‘Dynos’ are used to gain out of reach holds by lunging upwards. The best method is to lean away from the direction of the coming leap and swing up and leap using the legs to jump for the hold. Aim to catch the hold at the apex or ‘dead point’ of the jump where the body stalls for a split second before it begins to fall. Catching a hold while already falling (due to over jumping) will make it much harder to successfully grasp the hold and will use much greater energy. If you miss when trying to dyno, you will fall. Thus using a dyno should be a boulderer or climber’s last option.