Do you think you could handle a workout based on rock climbing techniques the pros use to scale up vertical routes along mountain sides?

More often than not, people who lift for size and love to “feel the burn” could probably take a few pointers from the guys and gals who travel the globe to see the world from a whole different perspective few others will ever dare. While I do have a huge amount of respect for anyone daring to take on this challenging sport, I also know this sort of training will not be everyone’s cup of tea.

(Photo: Björn Söderqvest)

From wall to cliff, having the ultimate strength based workout that fuses together body weight training and climbing is just one example of how you can forego typical weight lifting and still manage to get in an awesome workout.

How to Get Strong with a Rock Climbing Routine?

How strong is strong? Check out this an example of the type of strength that’s needed to pursue this adventure sport.

First off you’ll want to train to exact the kind of endurance the body will be tasked during this type of training.

What are Some Practical Exercises?

The exercises I would recommend for building up your upper body muscle groups are meant to stimulate the chest, shoulders, back and trap muscles:

Chin ups:

This is meant to work your biceps. Focus on building up your initial strength with both arms, either starting with negatives or assisted, and then concentrate on isolating one arm at a time for better performance.

Frenchies:

To work the triceps. Practice on perfecting this exercise so there is minimal body swaying during reps. You’ll want to be as still as possible.

For instance bouldering (which often uses mats in case of a fall) requires strong arms and shoulders. And while possessing these two fundamentals is important, so is having a great amount of stamina. Remember climbers are often working for hours, so using routines based around long steady-state cardio can be super beneficial.

Here’s a simple setup focused around rock climbing techniques for developing the upper body.

Grip:

Forearm strength is direly important in a climber’s training. When one has developed hands and fingers negotiating a specifically challenging route won’t seem as difficult, and succumbing to a fall is less likely.

The one, best tool to help with increase your grip strength? Try an ordinary towel.

How to Generate Lower Body Strength

While it’s important to have a strong upper body in rock climbing, the need for having a strong lower body is equally important. One of the main reasons is to spare the upper body from burning out during a climb. Even the most advanced ascentionists know how the legs can help with stability and rest, when needed. That’s why you don’t want to have weak legs.

The areas you’ll want to specifically target in the lower body are the calves, glutes, hamstrings and quads.

Squats:

These should primarily be in every routine. Being a compound exercise, you can stimulate multiple muscle groups with just this one movement.

When you are ready to move on to a more challenging progression, you can further the benefits of this exercise by engaging your squat technique with goblet squats.

Calf Raises:

Putting these into a routine will help to keep them strong enough while shifting your way up towards your destination.

Core Training is Important

Just by adding in a few abdominal exercises into the sessions will round out our ultimate goal here, and that’s to build an overall functional physique. Mountain climbers (no pun intended) and L-sits are a couple of good choices for better training the ab muscles.

Check out this one exercise for better preparing the abs for rock climbing.

Concentration:

Lastly, I want to discuss how much being able to focus on the task at hand plays an important component when nailing down rock climbing techniques. Sometimes the brain needs just as much exercise as our bodies. When you’re negotiating the face of an Arete, you’ll know what I mean.

How To Use Your New Found Strength?

Now that you’ve got the strength needed for climbing, why not try it out. Just because this blog focuses on “home fitness,” the point I always try to stress is you can get a great workout without need a gym.

Yes, there are a few sport clubs that offer in-door training areas to hone climbing skills, but why not get a good pair of climbing shoes and bust of the chalk and try this sport out for real.

Bouldering is generally the preferred introduction for novices to start on. Usually, this can be done over matting, which will cushion the impact of any fall, or over water because there’s a reduced risk of injury. Not to say you can’t get hurt, however, usually this is done at a low enough height for someone to regain their confidence easily enough.

Another option is to post up a campus board, which is how many choose to build up their rock climbing techniques.

And, if you’re game and have the space, a home climbing wall might be a wonderful addition to your home gym.

This is often referred to as a bouldering wall, and you can practice your climbing abilities in the comfort of your home when you don’t have the luxury of an exotic locale.

For Indoor Practice

For Outdoor Practice

Even if you’re deathly afraid of heights, you can still get the full benefits of a rock climbing routine. The basic exercises that I highlighted here are based on training your muscles for functionality, and not aesthetics…but try and tell someone who can manage a climb graded at 5.10b (5 meaning vertical; .10 meaning one of the most difficult in that class; and b meaning mid level difficulty in that class) their body isn’t pleasing to the eye. I dare you!

And one of the best things about practicing with rock climbing techniques is you can surely develop a rock-hard body in no time.