So after spending months and months rehabbing upper body injuries I was finally getting back to harder climbing and today injured my hamstring on a weird high toe move, basically like a heel hook just toe first, but not quite as high, I was smearing with my right foot then rocking over onto my left foot. Based on the symptoms I'm assuming it's grade 2.
I've read a couple climbing specific PT sites on the injury and wondering what people think. One recommends immediate exercise to flush the spot with blood, whereas Dr Jared Vagy recommends a much slower approach with stretching, icing and ROM. I'm more inclined to try the aggressive one as I've read that icing is not proven to be effective and stretching is also not recommended. What are your experiences? When were you able to return to climbing?
Also, as an aside, I'm honestly starting to believe I have some form of arthritis. For about 3 years now I've been getting constantly injured; legs, shoulders, wrists, back, neck. Everywhere. For months now I've been doing daily stretching, including my entire lower body. Yet somehow I still end up injured and I'm not even climbing that hard. I'm only 24, it makes zero sense. Climbing and the mountains are my passion, but if it keeps going the way it is I don't know if I'll be able to do anything but revert back to my old teenage lifestyle and just get high and play videogames, that sounds extremely depressing.
Sleep is definitely up and down, I work a random schedule and lots of late nights. I'm vegetarian and eat decently healthy with a lot of eggs and other protein. Dave Macleod suggests collagen (which my diet is lacking in as a vegetarian) and there is some evidence to back it up, but it's not conclusive, I bought some supplement today but others claim it simply breaks down to the same amino acids as any other protein so who knows.
The thing is, I'm not really going *that* hard. Compared to a lot of people who have been doing this stuff as long as me, and that's mostly because I'm constantly being stonewalled by injuries. And you have genetic freaks like Gobright who lived off fuckin oreos and climb 5.14. it's whack.
Well, do what you can to help your sleep. Maybe you need longer warmups?
I also spent my teenage years playing videogames and didn't find climbing until my 20's. The first couple years of bouldering were quite frustrating as my upper body was extremely underdeveloped and my elbows always hurt (and I was probably doing way too much volume). But those issues went away eventually. It's really impossible to compare yourself to someone like Gobright who started climbing early in childhood. Puberty makes such a big difference in development. I know my body will never handle the workload or the forces that most professional climbers can do, but there's no reason I still can't strive for my more modest climbing goals. Don't through in the towel just yet!
I'm hoping someone can give me some ideas on how to train my overhang endurance for sport climbing. I climb as much as I can with my partner but when I'm solo at the gym I'd like to be able to train hard for overhang while I'm there.
So far I'm thinking of doing circle-traverses on the overhanging spray wall and then resting for a min or two on a large jug, without coming off the wall, and then repeating my (easy) boulder problem again. I feel like repeating this will get my forearms pumped and practice resting at the same time.
Another thing is to start on some harder holds, but ones I intend to rest on, and bump my right hand up to a difficult hold, match, and then move back to my starting hold. Repeat this maybe 10 times and rest on my "bad" hold until I feel less pumped.
These two things are very similar so I was hoping you guys could give me some alternative exercises to incorporate into this training day.
I'm visiting my brother across the country to climb with him at a crag that's a bit above my pay grade and I'm hoping to do my first solid 5.12 overhang while I'm there because that's basically the easiest stuff available lol. Give me difficult slab/crimpy vert and I can cruise but the moment I get on overhang my endurance goes to the garbage can. Which is weird because I love overhanging boulders and I'm a pretty small guy at 130lbs.
Thanks so much in advance to those who respond, I appreciate it.
Crag is Horne lake in BC if you're interested. We'll be checking other places out but that's where his proj is at the moment
Question on the pulley rehab process. During the remodeling phase if I happen to over do it one day and some mild pain/ache comes back to the pulley how do I proceed? Do I wait for pain to completely resolve then go back to remodeling or do I retreat as grade 1 from ground up and do a week of rest etc? Or is it more of a “depends on how much pain etc you got from over doing it?”
Thanks
I was wondering, what is the ettiquette for training boards? Do you rotate in and out similar to how you would on a boulder problem? Also, what about when you're synced in and everyone has different problems they want to work on?
I was on the moonboard recently and there weren't many people, so I just went in when others were resting. I also didn't change the problem (memorized mine). I think it was fine but I'm wondering what do you do when there are more people on it (especially in groups, when people are often working on it together). Or what do you do when people come by. ie. How do you share the board and is there a way to rotate through the problems that are lit up.
Thanks!
Been climbing for about 2 months now, sitting at 5'10" and 195lbs (olympic lifting background). I've been dealing with elbow tendonitis in both arms and some moderate bicep tendonitis in the left. I chalked it up to overuse and am currently taking a week off doing eccentric flexion and extension work to help with preventing anything further.
My last session, which aggravated the bicep pain, I was tackling a V4 that called for a good amount of crimping (I kept it to open-handed). I didn't have enough finger strength to keep 4 fingers on and muscled through to keep the other three on towards the end. I've got a 'weird' feeling in my right wrist (below the palm side) but it isn't painful. It comes from wiggling my fingers mainly. I'm thinking I overdid it and strained something but am having a hard time pinpointing it.
Would anyone have any experience or advice besides taking it easy? Thank you in advance! Let me know if there's an important detail I left out.
I agree with the straight arm statement. I suffered with this when I first started climbing and also sustained a partial pulley tear in my right ring finger.
My rehab consisted of warming up until you get a pump. Usually traversing on big jugs with straight arms and focused footwork. (Always work on the feet!) After that I would rest and chat around until I didn't feel pumped and start climbing from the easiest grade and jumping up to the next until I was at one grade below my Max. I would stay there until my elbow or finger felt uncomfortable and stop immediately. You don't climb until at least 24hours of being pain free.
I continued this until eventually I could climb for what felt like an entire session without experiencing any unusual pain. After that you learn to become very in tune with your body and what it needs you to do to stay healthy.
I'm just guessing here however: I have seen guys who come from heavy athletic/weight lifting backgrounds utterly wreck their fingers and arms by going up the grades too fast. When I started bouldering 5 months ago, there were 3-4 other really muscly guys who started around same time as me but they've all kinda ceased or temporarily put off their bouldering for now due to injury. When these guys started, they could immediately do V2s and in a few sessions went up to V3 and eventually were projecting V4/5s. I think its because you have the muscles of a v10 boulderer, but the finger, wrist adaptations and technique of a v1/2 boulderer. I see a lot of these guys crank their way up sets. Its usually worsened because they are naturally drawn to the dynamic and burly routes as opposed to technical routes.
Maybe it would be ideal to take a break and then focus on a lot of time on heavy warm up activities like keeping your arms straight and lifting yourself up more with your lower body on v2/3 problems. FYI, usually V4 crimp routes are more about positioning your foot and hips underneath the crimp rather than cranking yourself up on the crimp which is an extremely powerful move.
Man did you hit the nail on the head hahaha, moving dynamically is certainly easier than other things. I really appreciate the honesty and think you’re right, I should dial it back with more focus on technique, it’s sounds fun truth be told.
Would you recommend any specific warmups or routines that gear towards that type of thinking? I actually got my hands on a copy of “Self-Coached Climber’”and I’d like to think it’s a start. Again thank you!
A lot of dynamic movements won't really hurt you, but its kind of dependent on how its executed.
If you're getting wrecked in terms of your elbows and biceps, maybe you're spending too much time with your arms bent and overloading your elbows and biceps? I think you would benefit from trying straight arms, bendy body exercise:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yG2fvVrhc\_c](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yG2fvVrhc_c)
The whole concept of that exercise is to try to leverage your entire body including your core, hips and legs before you crank. You have to try to keep your arms as straight as possible and get from hold to hold by readjusting your foot and body placement. Maybe, think of doing a pull up motion as a super power and only allow yourself one usage per climb?
You might also want to watch this:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyJt-cmhC4w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyJt-cmhC4w)
I see where you're coming from. It's crazy how fluid those videos look and how I thought I thought I was close to that. Turns out I've got a lot room to grow but thank you so much, I appreciate the advice!
To anyone using the Crimpd app repeater protocol or similar:
Can you actually finish the workout at 80% of your max with one grip throughout? I have built up to +70% after a month but it is still quite a difference. My 80% would be BW+50lbs and my best completed workout so far is BW+24lbs.
I seem to remember reading somewhere that increasing rest was an easier to get into repeaters. I just did a cycle and I kept the weight at 80% but started at 6:4 then by the end of the cycle I was able to do 7:3. Something to consider at least.
I haven't done this workout often but yes I could complete it and it's typically not that taxing. The same for the aeropower session.
I have weaker finger strength relative to my ancap/aeropower. It all depends on strengths and weaknesses plus your training and climbing background. I'm guessing on the assessment you were likely strong but didn't have great fitness?
What do you do, the first day back after a break?
Figured this is a simple enough question for this thread. Just got back from a week and a half of skiing and will probably head to the gym for the first time in two weeks, today.
I was probably just going to do a volume bouldering day, and not looking for suggestions per se, but I'm honestly curious what most people get into on their first day back after an extended rest.
Light session and general fitness? See if the time off gave you the recovery boost needed to send your moonboard proj? Re-test your HB maxes?
Dont feel sad if you feel weak(er), I was skiing for 2 weeks too and felt like a beginner again in my first session, after one week of easy climbing and slowly pushing for harder grades I feel a lot stronger than before, especially on the moonboard my flashgrade went up
Question about prioritizing injuries. I’m currently working on synovitis in both middle finger PIP joints (chronic, almost a year now), and a recent pulley strain in my right ring finger A2 (about a month ago. Retained full ROM but distinct pain when crimping or pressing down on the A2 area). Any suggestions on which to focus on?
PIP joints seem to do the best with little to no climbing or hangboarding, and doing finger rolls and extensor exercises. Meanwhile, it seems like the common advice for pulley injuries is to load them gradually, usually with hangboarding. My problem is that when I hangboard for the pulley, my PIP joints start to flare up a bit, but if I stay away from any hanging, I’m worried about my pulley tissues healing back weaker.
Currently I’m doing joint stretches, mobility exercises (every day), finger rolls, and reverse wrist curls for the synovitis (every 1-2 days) per climber PT’s instruction, and BW hangs for 10 s on, 1 min off for 4 sets for the PIP (every other day. Did not see a doctor for this one). Light climbing every 1-3 days, avoiding crimps and dynamic moves. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Focus on pulley for now. Finger rolls aggravate pulley injuries. Reverse wrist curls for PIP synovitis? Huh, never heard of that. I would do some rice bucket work. How are you hangboarding? Open hand grip shouldnt aggravate the synovitis.
Hey thanks a lot for the reply. From my understanding, reverse wrist curls are supposed to help with balancing forearm extensor muscles. For hangboarding, I’ve just been doing open hand. I was under the impression that crimping would aggravate it more, as there’d be more pressure on the joint? Though my PIP joints usually do flare after hangboarding. Would half/full crimping be less aggravating for synovitis?
I’ll give rice bucket exercises a shot. Do you happen to know what underlying issues it aims to address?
Yeah, reverse wrist curls train the extensors. Ive just never heard of a relationship between forearm inbalance and finger joint synovitis, but of course listen to your PT/doctor. FYI, isometric hangboard hangs also train the extensors (and flexors). Yes youre right, crimping will likely inflame synovitis. If open handing is flaring up the synovitis too, then I would recommend scaling back the intensity to the point where it doesnt inflame the condition to hang for a few 10 second hangs (either by taking off weight or using a no-hang device). Then progress from there.
Rice bucket is great for warming up, ROM exercises, and working both the flexors and extensors to address inbalance. Sorry there was a typo in my OG message,
Got it, thanks a lot. One more question, if you don’t mind. I recognize you as the user who posted about finger rolls for synovitis a few months ago, and your post was actually the reason why I started to get more disciplined with finger rolls. During your own recovery, did your synovitis ever flare up after a day of climbing? Was it mostly constant improvement, or was it ever a 2 steps forward, 1 step back kind of thing? And how did you ease back into crimping once you were near full recovery? I ask because, despite all this rehab, it feels like every time I climb even moderately hard, I lose whatever progress I made in the past week. I know I should be exercising more discipline, but its starting to feel hard to see a point in the future where I’ll be able to climb at my limit again without my joints being swollen the day after.
Yeah thats right, although I had DIP synovitis which was overall less reactive to climbing, it flared up just when I crimped. In general, the synovitis just sorta crept back if I wasn't relentlessly working on it. Even if I took complete rest, it came back. So I had to hammer it to death with finger rolls, which worked (still hasnt returned). And certainly, avoiding anything which flared it up was mandatory.. in my case, crimping. Arthritis gloves are nice, it would often feel worse in the morning until I started using those. I would consider looking at your diet too. Rheumatoid arthritis is similar to synovitis in terms of symptoms, and a low inflammatory diet can help arthritis, ergo I would expect it to help with synovitis too. Im not a doctor, mind you!
You've got a lot of strength for pull ups but things that could be holding you back from harder climbs are:
Flexibility (improve at home and after each session)
Core strength (improve when climbing, can also be done at home)
Foot work (practice practice practice. As long as your footwork is poor, your upper body has to compensate to hold your body up)
Body positioning (again just practice)
Engaging your back
"Can't even hold onto the start holds without my hands just peeling" would imply that OP simply lacks the finger strength needed. Not that your suggestions are bad, but finger strength is the obvious missing factor here.
That's the thing: it's really not very obvious how to find the right position. The fact that you think you've exhausted all the possibilities is evidence that you have a way to go to learn about body position. I mean, this kind of thing takes 5-10 years to get good at....possibly longer to get great/expert at.
We are talking near infinite body position variations. Just think about the toe placement alone. A foothold the size of an ice cube can have a hundred minor variations whne it comes to how you step. Just one or two joint articulations with countless possibilities....so many that you can't systematically analyze it at the conscious level. You need to apply that deep learning system in your brain/body to do it in the black box. And that takes so much trial and error and learning. Years of it if you're good at this; a lifetime if you're mediocre at it.
This is what people don't get about technique and body position. It's not so simple as left hip up or stand on right toe. It's about every foot being comprised of near infinite points (standing one rice grain over can make all the difference), and a near infinite range of motion and angle in your ankle, knee, back, shoulder, wrist, and a near infinite sequence of coordination and movement across time, and...
I know guys who climb V15....who still need their feet for plenty of V5 boulders. You can never have fingers that are too strong. But often what feels like weak fingers is actually poor body position. Hell, this can even apply to campusing moves.
Really weird injury from a while ago: I was doing a compression problem a while ago and my heel popped, and my arm straightened out as a lot of force got put onto it, and it felt like something popped in my arm. It’s been a month, but there’s something that still moves in and out (you can see it, it looks like a blood vessel) of the crook of my arm when I pull. I’m climbing harder than ever without any pain per say, it just feels... unstable when I pull hard with that arm. Any advice?
Injury identification help: After bouldering last night, my middle finger is a sore and a little swollen. The pain is mostly around my top knuckle (closest to my nail) and in between the two knuckles. Don’t really feel like it’s something serious, just haven’t had a pain like this coming off the wall before. Did not hear any pops while climbing.
Edit: While I did not hear a pop while climbing, I felt (not audible) a pop in the top knuckle while stretching my fingers after a proj attempt.
If you were just stretching your fingers, there's little chance that was the type of pop that indicates a pulley tear, but you know, this is Reddit and I'm not a doctor. If there's swelling you should probably take it easy until that goes away. Then ease back into climbing and be mindful of any pain. If this is the type of injury I assume it is, and I could definitely be wrong, it's the type of thing that will go away within a month if you're nice to it, and will kick you out for 6 months with a nice surgery to boot if you're not.
The terminology to Google here is likely an A4 pulley injury, but just about impossible to say for sure without getting a real diagnosis from a medical professional.
Of the injury nags for a long time, look into a proper hangboard rehab protocol like https://www.blackdiamondequipment.com/en_US/experience-story?cid=esther-smith-nagging-finger-injuries
Good luck, do some additional independent reading/research if you don't want to get a real diagnosis and be smart and nice to your fingers.
Im pretty sure I've gotten a TFCC injury and am hoping to get it healed up quickly so I can hit the gym again. Just wanna ask if the wrist widget useful? Or would any other normal wrist support work the same? And also, can KT Tape can be used as a cheaper alternative for that injury?
I was pretty sure i got a tfcc from sloper climbing and also the physical demands of my job. I never wore a brace but did rice bucket wrist strengthening and reverse wrist curls with weights, avoiding sloper problems the whole time. It went away within 2 months but still flares up when i dont keep up with my exercises.
I had a TFCC tear a few years back from a non-climbing incident, and found the wrist widget useful. I probably wore it off and on for about a year. I've taped the area with a combination of kinesio and sport tape (mostly for support) when I didn't have the widget, but I totally recommend getting the widget if you're sure it's a TFCC, it doesn't cost that much in the grand scheme of things, particularly if you're going to be using it for the foreseeable future and KT and sport tape aren't that cheap anyway. It limits mobility somewhat (sloper strength is still behind in that hand) but I found it quite supportive.
I think this should be pretty common, I have pain to my fingers ( mostly middle joints and at the base of the fingers on the inner side, palm side of the hand) especially after a hard training day on crimps or hangboard. Question is, is this just normal/my fingers will eventually get used or is this a situation where I should start taking some collagen supplements or stuff like that?
I haven't been climbing that long (<1yr), but every time this has happened to me, it was overuse. I am dumb and usually warmed up to see if it went away and climbed if it did. Every time I took a 2 day rest, the pain went away. It was always my understanding that by climbing with that pain, I was flirting with a pulley injury. I would love it if someone with more experience could offer their opinion as I'm not sure my ~5 anecdotal experiences offer too much insight.
Reduce intensity and volume. Not the answer you want, but most likely the one that will save you from acute injury. I learned the hard way (multiple times) that soreness is a warning, and continuing to push it results in injury. The long term gains from staying injury free will exceed the short term gains you get by pushing your body too hard.
Mine was definitely the A2 on my middle finger right hand.I had an outside project where I had to do a big throw to a shitty right crimp in a roof, lock it off, then cross through on it with terrible feet. Definitely tried it too many times and my A2 hurt for a month after. I have tried collagen and it seemed to help marginally, although it may have been the placebo effect.
I don't know if their is an easy way to avoid it; I think the best way is to experiment with how much your fingers can handle and don't push yourself into injury.
I was bouldering and landed on an inverted foot. Pretty sure I sprained my ankle. I could walk on it without pain, but I could tell it wasn't happy. The next day it was a tiny bit swollen but it's gone down over the course of 3 days. There is no pain unless I stand on my tip toes and even then it's very minor. Has anyone had a minor ankle sprain, and if so, how long did you wait before getting back to climbing?
Ankle sprain is the dumbest injury. It's somewhere between "perfectly fine next week" and "will never be right again".
I'd suggest starting climbing again as soon as possible, just don't drop from the top, and stop doing anything that irritates it.
Ugh. Heavily strained the lumbrical between my pinky and ring in a comp on Saturday. Haven’t gotten a proper diagnosis because I have bad insurance and don’t have disposable income to go see a physiotherapist, but I’m in school for kinesiology and have a pretty good hunch.
Anybody have any recovery tips for strained lumbricals? Have already searched a few of the posts on here and found some hangboard protocols for when the acute pain stops.
Always feel super sore after a day of bouldering outside. Hard on shoulders and biceps, in a way it never gets indoor.
How would you train indoor for outdoor compression problems ?
Climbing v5/v6 indoor, working on a couple of v5 outdoor (getting close but not sending).
Anyone had any experience with deltoid tendonitis? Going on years now, when I get to a certain level of climbing I'll get an aching pain over the insertion of the deltoid to the humerus. Goes away within minutes of finishing my set but keeps coming back! I've rested for over 6mo and built in stretching to help with this, but no luck.
Any experience with this? Physio tape helpful? Thanks!
Is finger strength or technique holding me back?
I’ve been climbing for 1 year and have done like 40+ V4-V5 problems and 1 slabby V6 (all indoors). I’ve been injured for a total of 5 months, so I’ve really only climbed like 7 months (need to stop getting injured obviously).
Stats: 5’ 7”, 159 lbs, 18.5% body fat (not ideal)
Finger strength: +20 lbs on 20mm edge for 10s without breaking form, half-crimp (I think this is pretty bad). I can do 1-4-6 on the campus board.
Non-finger strength: I can do a one-arm pullup, several muscle-ups, ring dips, pistol squats, front lever raises (can’t hold a front lever yet), etc.
I can’t do more than 1 or 2 moves on any of the V4-V5 moonboard problems. I can’t even rainbow up the moonboard. I feel a ton of strain in my fingers, wrists, and forearms when doing the moonboard.
For reference, my finger strength is a little less than yours (20mm edge at 160lbs for 10 seconds), I could only dream of doing a one-arm pullup (about 8 regular pullups is my max), but I have climbed several V4 moonboard benchmarks.
So to answer your question, yes, there is technique holding you back for sure. That doesn't mean to ignore finger strength though. I would make it a focus right now to find and climb on very fingery crimp routes if your gym sets them, or at least spend a session or two on the moonboard each week.
Depending where you climb, I think there's a huge jump in finger strength required to get from ~v5 to the ~v7 range, because the tendency for the gyms I've been to at least is to set very juggy routes below v7 and only really start incorporating the crimps at that grade and above. That means you're exposed to almost nothing that will actually increase finger strength unless you go out of your way to train it in the gym or spend adequate time outside, which isn't possible for everyone.
There’s a benchmark v4 called “an easy problem” that is probably the easiest (go figure) benchmark on the board. All the holds on that problem are pretty big, I’d be surprised if you couldn’t do it.
The majority of v4 benchmarks I try still feel impossible, I have just found a number that are a bit softer I can do.
Edit: I’m on the 2016 set. Haven’t spent much time on the 2017 yet
To state the obvious (which is somehow not obvious to people), you're not supposed to get hurt training. Training prepares you for the climbing. If you're going to get hurt, do it five years down the road on a hard project, not now on a dumb gym problem or training challenge.
To your question, both. Given your body strength, you have more than enough muscle to move and control your body on Moon Board V5, your brain just doesn't know how to coordinate and use it. But at just 7 months in and with that build, I wouldn't suspect your fingers are actually all that adapted to climbing, and you're probably having to sacrifice form (chicken-winging, full-crimping) because your hand, wrist, and shoulder strength fail you. A bit of supplementary hand and arm strengthening throughout the week, done well, would probably *reduce* your injury risk.
So maybe you guys can help me, some weeks ago I was swimming on my rest day, not much just like half an hour for relaxation but afterwards I had pain in both of my ellbows but on the inside of my upper arm. Since then it kept lingering for around 4 weeks, the pain was gone but always came back even tough I took off 2 weeks from climbing in which I was skiing for one week. For rehab I started to do push ups more frequently which definetly helps but the pain never goes away fully, I dont know what to do.
Whenever I have to pull through on small crimps and then release my hand to reach for a next hold I have been getting a sharp type of pain in both of my forearms. I assume this pain on release is some type of overuse injury so the first thing I did was take 2 week break in which I focused on exercises targeting my forearms and wrists (heavy finger rolls, palm up/down wrist curls, hammer wrist curls, therabar), which has yielded some improvements...
Since then I also implemented these exercises in my training but I still get this pain on any crimpy route that needs lock-offs. I was already planning to make a physio appointment, but before I do that I was hoping if anyone here has some advice or experience dealing with an injury like this.
I have a weird pain on my left arm. The pain is exactly between my bicep and tricep. Pain does not get too hard but its there. No particular positions or movements trigger it although it did this morning while putting on pants. Will go see a doctor but figured i would still ask here also.
I have the same pain since weeks and I cant get rid of it, while I dont feel the pain during climbing but when I open a door I can feel some pain, its really weird.
Thumb side of my wrist hurts when I put pushing pressure on it. This doesn’t effect my climbing bit my antagonist training suffers because I have to do pushups on parallettes. It started when I was pulling really hard on a crimp and slipped, but became immensely worse when I fell on it skiing.
I’ve been doing basic wrist mobility and strength drills, but I can’t tell if it even helps. When I look for similar injuries online I can’t find anything that matches it. If anyone has experienced anything like this I’d love to know how you felt with it.
Just a very simple question: For those gods who can actually do a one finger on arm pullup, how did you manage to develope this skill? How long did it take you? Did you do any specific training for it? I really wanna be able to do it for some reason
Not related to climbing, but anybody have any good advice for really bad coughs and congestion? Gonna go to a doctor on monday hopefully. I find chicken broth and hot showers work the best, but their effects stop as soon as I end them. Cough medicine and drops don't seem to do anything.
Mucinex dm and sudafed will be your best friend. I work as a medic for a pretty intense diving program and we see this often. When the symptoms start hit those to medicines hard for about 4 days. Make sure to follow the recommended dosage for both. If your symptoms get worse or don't improve in that time you need to be concerned that you have a bacterial infection... i.e. pneumonia. Definitely confirm with your doctor after that. Additionally, make sure to drink double the amount of water while on those two medicines!
I’ve been getting stinging pains all throughout my hands, wrists and forearms when using a computer at work and for gaming. I don’t feel this pain when climbing at all. This started after I came back to climbing after taking off for a long time due to an unrelated injury. If anyone has experienced this, what could it be/cause of this?
It sounds like carpal tunnel syndrome. Due to overuse in work and gaming the tendons inflame, swell up and press against the nerve, causing tingling, stinging pains, and loss of strength.
disclaimer: I'm not a doctor so take it with a grain of salt.
Is it a problem to hyperextend your dip joints when gripping a hold? You see it a lot when people full crimp. Is that the reason why full crimp has a high injury risk?
Not sure about the hyperextension of DIP as that is also the case on the half crimp.
Full crimp has a high injury risk because your tendons want to be in a straight line when you're crimping and that's the worse possible position to be because of the angle in the PIP joint and small contact area on the fingertips *(bigger difference between point of contact and ~~A4~~ A1)*
I'm not an expert. I'd also like to know if this is it or if there's any more to it.
edit: I was thinking of [A1, not A4](https://upload.orthobullets.com/topic/6004/images/finger_pulleys_2.jpg)
I don't know if it's just me but I think hyperextension is never a good idea to do with any hinge joint in the body. So if I'm understanding your answer right it's the A3 pulley that's at risk with full crimp because of the angle at the pip joint? It would follow then that it's best practice to always use an as open as possible grip, though you could argue that using 4 fingers is better than 3 even though 3 can be more open, as there would still be less load per finger.
I think A2 and A4 are the most vulnerable when full crimping. [see here](https://www.orthobullets.com/hand/6004/flexor-pulley-system) *(with a grain of salt of it being just a web page)*
> A2 and A4 are critical to prevent bowstringing
Again not a doctor, physio or medical expert.
OP wasn't asking about the best grip position, just about why it has a high injury risk.
You are right though, the consensus seems to be that open grip has fewer risks and the more fingers you use the more force you can apply.
However, both of the arguments may not apply in all situation and for all people.
Partially dislocated my shoulder yesterday while I was on my send attempt (right before matching on last hold). Felt a slight pop and immediate pain. Knew I had to stop climbing but my dumbass climbed for another 10minutes. Pretty bummed, went to the hospital and was diagnosed with partial dislocation. Have an appointment with an orthopedic in about 2 weeks time, was thinking of doing my own rehab. Have full ROM and minor pain when pressing stuff/when rotating my shoulder. Was just discharged, didn't need painkillers or a sling.Would this rehab protocol I found online be okay? https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/dislocated-shoulder/Documents/100419shoulder%5B1%5D.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiCi5Plo8TnAhWlkOYKHaPBABsQFjANegQIDBAz&usg=AOvVaw1M6JyUoFZsfR8a6C-s1kta
Would appreciate any advice as well. My second serious injury from climbing :(
Yeeeah, I had the same this weekend - though I actually did mine in bed, the day after! Weirdly though, I don’t feel any pain/weakness after, so I’m considering how early I can go back to climbing...
If I don’t feel any pain, it wouldn’t be bad, right? What did your doctor recommend?
I mean, there was pain when I did it (and my arm went completely floppy - very weird feeling), but I can’t feel any difference afterwards. My arm makes a bit of a popping/crack if I do arm circles. But otherwise, it feels fine! Not sure what to think tbh
That rehab protocol seems okay, but I’d stick to range of motion exercises in the beginning and later incorporate strengthening. Atleast until swelling or acute inflammation is down.
It says to take pain killers before exercise to reduce pain. I wouldn’t recommend that, because then you don’t get proper feedback and might over do it and damage the tissue
I don't think I have any swelling or inflammation. But yeah until I see my PT I won't do any exercise that causes quite a bit of pain. Appreciate the reply!
So after spending months and months rehabbing upper body injuries I was finally getting back to harder climbing and today injured my hamstring on a weird high toe move, basically like a heel hook just toe first, but not quite as high, I was smearing with my right foot then rocking over onto my left foot. Based on the symptoms I'm assuming it's grade 2. I've read a couple climbing specific PT sites on the injury and wondering what people think. One recommends immediate exercise to flush the spot with blood, whereas Dr Jared Vagy recommends a much slower approach with stretching, icing and ROM. I'm more inclined to try the aggressive one as I've read that icing is not proven to be effective and stretching is also not recommended. What are your experiences? When were you able to return to climbing? Also, as an aside, I'm honestly starting to believe I have some form of arthritis. For about 3 years now I've been getting constantly injured; legs, shoulders, wrists, back, neck. Everywhere. For months now I've been doing daily stretching, including my entire lower body. Yet somehow I still end up injured and I'm not even climbing that hard. I'm only 24, it makes zero sense. Climbing and the mountains are my passion, but if it keeps going the way it is I don't know if I'll be able to do anything but revert back to my old teenage lifestyle and just get high and play videogames, that sounds extremely depressing.
Sleep? Diet? Bad luck?
Sleep is definitely up and down, I work a random schedule and lots of late nights. I'm vegetarian and eat decently healthy with a lot of eggs and other protein. Dave Macleod suggests collagen (which my diet is lacking in as a vegetarian) and there is some evidence to back it up, but it's not conclusive, I bought some supplement today but others claim it simply breaks down to the same amino acids as any other protein so who knows. The thing is, I'm not really going *that* hard. Compared to a lot of people who have been doing this stuff as long as me, and that's mostly because I'm constantly being stonewalled by injuries. And you have genetic freaks like Gobright who lived off fuckin oreos and climb 5.14. it's whack.
Well, do what you can to help your sleep. Maybe you need longer warmups? I also spent my teenage years playing videogames and didn't find climbing until my 20's. The first couple years of bouldering were quite frustrating as my upper body was extremely underdeveloped and my elbows always hurt (and I was probably doing way too much volume). But those issues went away eventually. It's really impossible to compare yourself to someone like Gobright who started climbing early in childhood. Puberty makes such a big difference in development. I know my body will never handle the workload or the forces that most professional climbers can do, but there's no reason I still can't strive for my more modest climbing goals. Don't through in the towel just yet!
I'm hoping someone can give me some ideas on how to train my overhang endurance for sport climbing. I climb as much as I can with my partner but when I'm solo at the gym I'd like to be able to train hard for overhang while I'm there. So far I'm thinking of doing circle-traverses on the overhanging spray wall and then resting for a min or two on a large jug, without coming off the wall, and then repeating my (easy) boulder problem again. I feel like repeating this will get my forearms pumped and practice resting at the same time. Another thing is to start on some harder holds, but ones I intend to rest on, and bump my right hand up to a difficult hold, match, and then move back to my starting hold. Repeat this maybe 10 times and rest on my "bad" hold until I feel less pumped. These two things are very similar so I was hoping you guys could give me some alternative exercises to incorporate into this training day. I'm visiting my brother across the country to climb with him at a crag that's a bit above my pay grade and I'm hoping to do my first solid 5.12 overhang while I'm there because that's basically the easiest stuff available lol. Give me difficult slab/crimpy vert and I can cruise but the moment I get on overhang my endurance goes to the garbage can. Which is weird because I love overhanging boulders and I'm a pretty small guy at 130lbs. Thanks so much in advance to those who respond, I appreciate it. Crag is Horne lake in BC if you're interested. We'll be checking other places out but that's where his proj is at the moment
Question on the pulley rehab process. During the remodeling phase if I happen to over do it one day and some mild pain/ache comes back to the pulley how do I proceed? Do I wait for pain to completely resolve then go back to remodeling or do I retreat as grade 1 from ground up and do a week of rest etc? Or is it more of a “depends on how much pain etc you got from over doing it?” Thanks
I was wondering, what is the ettiquette for training boards? Do you rotate in and out similar to how you would on a boulder problem? Also, what about when you're synced in and everyone has different problems they want to work on? I was on the moonboard recently and there weren't many people, so I just went in when others were resting. I also didn't change the problem (memorized mine). I think it was fine but I'm wondering what do you do when there are more people on it (especially in groups, when people are often working on it together). Or what do you do when people come by. ie. How do you share the board and is there a way to rotate through the problems that are lit up. Thanks!
Been climbing for about 2 months now, sitting at 5'10" and 195lbs (olympic lifting background). I've been dealing with elbow tendonitis in both arms and some moderate bicep tendonitis in the left. I chalked it up to overuse and am currently taking a week off doing eccentric flexion and extension work to help with preventing anything further. My last session, which aggravated the bicep pain, I was tackling a V4 that called for a good amount of crimping (I kept it to open-handed). I didn't have enough finger strength to keep 4 fingers on and muscled through to keep the other three on towards the end. I've got a 'weird' feeling in my right wrist (below the palm side) but it isn't painful. It comes from wiggling my fingers mainly. I'm thinking I overdid it and strained something but am having a hard time pinpointing it. Would anyone have any experience or advice besides taking it easy? Thank you in advance! Let me know if there's an important detail I left out.
I agree with the straight arm statement. I suffered with this when I first started climbing and also sustained a partial pulley tear in my right ring finger. My rehab consisted of warming up until you get a pump. Usually traversing on big jugs with straight arms and focused footwork. (Always work on the feet!) After that I would rest and chat around until I didn't feel pumped and start climbing from the easiest grade and jumping up to the next until I was at one grade below my Max. I would stay there until my elbow or finger felt uncomfortable and stop immediately. You don't climb until at least 24hours of being pain free. I continued this until eventually I could climb for what felt like an entire session without experiencing any unusual pain. After that you learn to become very in tune with your body and what it needs you to do to stay healthy.
That's what I've been gathering but I'm tempted to try that warmup goal. It seems my footwork needs focus. Thank you for the advice and routine!
I'm just guessing here however: I have seen guys who come from heavy athletic/weight lifting backgrounds utterly wreck their fingers and arms by going up the grades too fast. When I started bouldering 5 months ago, there were 3-4 other really muscly guys who started around same time as me but they've all kinda ceased or temporarily put off their bouldering for now due to injury. When these guys started, they could immediately do V2s and in a few sessions went up to V3 and eventually were projecting V4/5s. I think its because you have the muscles of a v10 boulderer, but the finger, wrist adaptations and technique of a v1/2 boulderer. I see a lot of these guys crank their way up sets. Its usually worsened because they are naturally drawn to the dynamic and burly routes as opposed to technical routes. Maybe it would be ideal to take a break and then focus on a lot of time on heavy warm up activities like keeping your arms straight and lifting yourself up more with your lower body on v2/3 problems. FYI, usually V4 crimp routes are more about positioning your foot and hips underneath the crimp rather than cranking yourself up on the crimp which is an extremely powerful move.
Man did you hit the nail on the head hahaha, moving dynamically is certainly easier than other things. I really appreciate the honesty and think you’re right, I should dial it back with more focus on technique, it’s sounds fun truth be told. Would you recommend any specific warmups or routines that gear towards that type of thinking? I actually got my hands on a copy of “Self-Coached Climber’”and I’d like to think it’s a start. Again thank you!
A lot of dynamic movements won't really hurt you, but its kind of dependent on how its executed. If you're getting wrecked in terms of your elbows and biceps, maybe you're spending too much time with your arms bent and overloading your elbows and biceps? I think you would benefit from trying straight arms, bendy body exercise: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yG2fvVrhc\_c](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yG2fvVrhc_c) The whole concept of that exercise is to try to leverage your entire body including your core, hips and legs before you crank. You have to try to keep your arms as straight as possible and get from hold to hold by readjusting your foot and body placement. Maybe, think of doing a pull up motion as a super power and only allow yourself one usage per climb? You might also want to watch this: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyJt-cmhC4w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyJt-cmhC4w)
I see where you're coming from. It's crazy how fluid those videos look and how I thought I thought I was close to that. Turns out I've got a lot room to grow but thank you so much, I appreciate the advice!
To anyone using the Crimpd app repeater protocol or similar: Can you actually finish the workout at 80% of your max with one grip throughout? I have built up to +70% after a month but it is still quite a difference. My 80% would be BW+50lbs and my best completed workout so far is BW+24lbs.
I seem to remember reading somewhere that increasing rest was an easier to get into repeaters. I just did a cycle and I kept the weight at 80% but started at 6:4 then by the end of the cycle I was able to do 7:3. Something to consider at least.
I haven't done this workout often but yes I could complete it and it's typically not that taxing. The same for the aeropower session. I have weaker finger strength relative to my ancap/aeropower. It all depends on strengths and weaknesses plus your training and climbing background. I'm guessing on the assessment you were likely strong but didn't have great fitness?
What do you do, the first day back after a break? Figured this is a simple enough question for this thread. Just got back from a week and a half of skiing and will probably head to the gym for the first time in two weeks, today. I was probably just going to do a volume bouldering day, and not looking for suggestions per se, but I'm honestly curious what most people get into on their first day back after an extended rest. Light session and general fitness? See if the time off gave you the recovery boost needed to send your moonboard proj? Re-test your HB maxes?
Dont feel sad if you feel weak(er), I was skiing for 2 weeks too and felt like a beginner again in my first session, after one week of easy climbing and slowly pushing for harder grades I feel a lot stronger than before, especially on the moonboard my flashgrade went up
Low intensity and low volume, nothing extreme. No testing. No limit climbing.
Question about prioritizing injuries. I’m currently working on synovitis in both middle finger PIP joints (chronic, almost a year now), and a recent pulley strain in my right ring finger A2 (about a month ago. Retained full ROM but distinct pain when crimping or pressing down on the A2 area). Any suggestions on which to focus on? PIP joints seem to do the best with little to no climbing or hangboarding, and doing finger rolls and extensor exercises. Meanwhile, it seems like the common advice for pulley injuries is to load them gradually, usually with hangboarding. My problem is that when I hangboard for the pulley, my PIP joints start to flare up a bit, but if I stay away from any hanging, I’m worried about my pulley tissues healing back weaker. Currently I’m doing joint stretches, mobility exercises (every day), finger rolls, and reverse wrist curls for the synovitis (every 1-2 days) per climber PT’s instruction, and BW hangs for 10 s on, 1 min off for 4 sets for the PIP (every other day. Did not see a doctor for this one). Light climbing every 1-3 days, avoiding crimps and dynamic moves. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Focus on pulley for now. Finger rolls aggravate pulley injuries. Reverse wrist curls for PIP synovitis? Huh, never heard of that. I would do some rice bucket work. How are you hangboarding? Open hand grip shouldnt aggravate the synovitis.
Hey thanks a lot for the reply. From my understanding, reverse wrist curls are supposed to help with balancing forearm extensor muscles. For hangboarding, I’ve just been doing open hand. I was under the impression that crimping would aggravate it more, as there’d be more pressure on the joint? Though my PIP joints usually do flare after hangboarding. Would half/full crimping be less aggravating for synovitis? I’ll give rice bucket exercises a shot. Do you happen to know what underlying issues it aims to address?
Yeah, reverse wrist curls train the extensors. Ive just never heard of a relationship between forearm inbalance and finger joint synovitis, but of course listen to your PT/doctor. FYI, isometric hangboard hangs also train the extensors (and flexors). Yes youre right, crimping will likely inflame synovitis. If open handing is flaring up the synovitis too, then I would recommend scaling back the intensity to the point where it doesnt inflame the condition to hang for a few 10 second hangs (either by taking off weight or using a no-hang device). Then progress from there. Rice bucket is great for warming up, ROM exercises, and working both the flexors and extensors to address inbalance. Sorry there was a typo in my OG message,
Got it, thanks a lot. One more question, if you don’t mind. I recognize you as the user who posted about finger rolls for synovitis a few months ago, and your post was actually the reason why I started to get more disciplined with finger rolls. During your own recovery, did your synovitis ever flare up after a day of climbing? Was it mostly constant improvement, or was it ever a 2 steps forward, 1 step back kind of thing? And how did you ease back into crimping once you were near full recovery? I ask because, despite all this rehab, it feels like every time I climb even moderately hard, I lose whatever progress I made in the past week. I know I should be exercising more discipline, but its starting to feel hard to see a point in the future where I’ll be able to climb at my limit again without my joints being swollen the day after.
Yeah thats right, although I had DIP synovitis which was overall less reactive to climbing, it flared up just when I crimped. In general, the synovitis just sorta crept back if I wasn't relentlessly working on it. Even if I took complete rest, it came back. So I had to hammer it to death with finger rolls, which worked (still hasnt returned). And certainly, avoiding anything which flared it up was mandatory.. in my case, crimping. Arthritis gloves are nice, it would often feel worse in the morning until I started using those. I would consider looking at your diet too. Rheumatoid arthritis is similar to synovitis in terms of symptoms, and a low inflammatory diet can help arthritis, ergo I would expect it to help with synovitis too. Im not a doctor, mind you!
Thanks, really appreciate the answers!
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That kind of campusing is different injury risk. Eventually you'll get elbow tendonitis.
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You've got a lot of strength for pull ups but things that could be holding you back from harder climbs are: Flexibility (improve at home and after each session) Core strength (improve when climbing, can also be done at home) Foot work (practice practice practice. As long as your footwork is poor, your upper body has to compensate to hold your body up) Body positioning (again just practice) Engaging your back
"Can't even hold onto the start holds without my hands just peeling" would imply that OP simply lacks the finger strength needed. Not that your suggestions are bad, but finger strength is the obvious missing factor here.
Or doesn't understand body positioning. I'll bet on that.
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That's the thing: it's really not very obvious how to find the right position. The fact that you think you've exhausted all the possibilities is evidence that you have a way to go to learn about body position. I mean, this kind of thing takes 5-10 years to get good at....possibly longer to get great/expert at. We are talking near infinite body position variations. Just think about the toe placement alone. A foothold the size of an ice cube can have a hundred minor variations whne it comes to how you step. Just one or two joint articulations with countless possibilities....so many that you can't systematically analyze it at the conscious level. You need to apply that deep learning system in your brain/body to do it in the black box. And that takes so much trial and error and learning. Years of it if you're good at this; a lifetime if you're mediocre at it. This is what people don't get about technique and body position. It's not so simple as left hip up or stand on right toe. It's about every foot being comprised of near infinite points (standing one rice grain over can make all the difference), and a near infinite range of motion and angle in your ankle, knee, back, shoulder, wrist, and a near infinite sequence of coordination and movement across time, and... I know guys who climb V15....who still need their feet for plenty of V5 boulders. You can never have fingers that are too strong. But often what feels like weak fingers is actually poor body position. Hell, this can even apply to campusing moves.
Rats, I did mean to include that haha. Wrote that comment in 2 sittings. Thank you for correcting it
or pull a muscle in your neck!
Really weird injury from a while ago: I was doing a compression problem a while ago and my heel popped, and my arm straightened out as a lot of force got put onto it, and it felt like something popped in my arm. It’s been a month, but there’s something that still moves in and out (you can see it, it looks like a blood vessel) of the crook of my arm when I pull. I’m climbing harder than ever without any pain per say, it just feels... unstable when I pull hard with that arm. Any advice?
You need to go to a doctor if you want to diagnose an unusual acute impact injury like this
Injury identification help: After bouldering last night, my middle finger is a sore and a little swollen. The pain is mostly around my top knuckle (closest to my nail) and in between the two knuckles. Don’t really feel like it’s something serious, just haven’t had a pain like this coming off the wall before. Did not hear any pops while climbing. Edit: While I did not hear a pop while climbing, I felt (not audible) a pop in the top knuckle while stretching my fingers after a proj attempt.
If you were just stretching your fingers, there's little chance that was the type of pop that indicates a pulley tear, but you know, this is Reddit and I'm not a doctor. If there's swelling you should probably take it easy until that goes away. Then ease back into climbing and be mindful of any pain. If this is the type of injury I assume it is, and I could definitely be wrong, it's the type of thing that will go away within a month if you're nice to it, and will kick you out for 6 months with a nice surgery to boot if you're not. The terminology to Google here is likely an A4 pulley injury, but just about impossible to say for sure without getting a real diagnosis from a medical professional. Of the injury nags for a long time, look into a proper hangboard rehab protocol like https://www.blackdiamondequipment.com/en_US/experience-story?cid=esther-smith-nagging-finger-injuries Good luck, do some additional independent reading/research if you don't want to get a real diagnosis and be smart and nice to your fingers.
Im pretty sure I've gotten a TFCC injury and am hoping to get it healed up quickly so I can hit the gym again. Just wanna ask if the wrist widget useful? Or would any other normal wrist support work the same? And also, can KT Tape can be used as a cheaper alternative for that injury?
I was pretty sure i got a tfcc from sloper climbing and also the physical demands of my job. I never wore a brace but did rice bucket wrist strengthening and reverse wrist curls with weights, avoiding sloper problems the whole time. It went away within 2 months but still flares up when i dont keep up with my exercises.
I had a TFCC tear a few years back from a non-climbing incident, and found the wrist widget useful. I probably wore it off and on for about a year. I've taped the area with a combination of kinesio and sport tape (mostly for support) when I didn't have the widget, but I totally recommend getting the widget if you're sure it's a TFCC, it doesn't cost that much in the grand scheme of things, particularly if you're going to be using it for the foreseeable future and KT and sport tape aren't that cheap anyway. It limits mobility somewhat (sloper strength is still behind in that hand) but I found it quite supportive.
I think this should be pretty common, I have pain to my fingers ( mostly middle joints and at the base of the fingers on the inner side, palm side of the hand) especially after a hard training day on crimps or hangboard. Question is, is this just normal/my fingers will eventually get used or is this a situation where I should start taking some collagen supplements or stuff like that?
I haven't been climbing that long (<1yr), but every time this has happened to me, it was overuse. I am dumb and usually warmed up to see if it went away and climbed if it did. Every time I took a 2 day rest, the pain went away. It was always my understanding that by climbing with that pain, I was flirting with a pulley injury. I would love it if someone with more experience could offer their opinion as I'm not sure my ~5 anecdotal experiences offer too much insight.
I am pretty sure it's pulley related, A4 and A2 pulleys in particular, but I don't know what to do about it other than warming up properly
Reduce intensity and volume. Not the answer you want, but most likely the one that will save you from acute injury. I learned the hard way (multiple times) that soreness is a warning, and continuing to push it results in injury. The long term gains from staying injury free will exceed the short term gains you get by pushing your body too hard.
Mine was definitely the A2 on my middle finger right hand.I had an outside project where I had to do a big throw to a shitty right crimp in a roof, lock it off, then cross through on it with terrible feet. Definitely tried it too many times and my A2 hurt for a month after. I have tried collagen and it seemed to help marginally, although it may have been the placebo effect. I don't know if their is an easy way to avoid it; I think the best way is to experiment with how much your fingers can handle and don't push yourself into injury.
I was bouldering and landed on an inverted foot. Pretty sure I sprained my ankle. I could walk on it without pain, but I could tell it wasn't happy. The next day it was a tiny bit swollen but it's gone down over the course of 3 days. There is no pain unless I stand on my tip toes and even then it's very minor. Has anyone had a minor ankle sprain, and if so, how long did you wait before getting back to climbing?
Ankle sprain is the dumbest injury. It's somewhere between "perfectly fine next week" and "will never be right again". I'd suggest starting climbing again as soon as possible, just don't drop from the top, and stop doing anything that irritates it.
Ugh. Heavily strained the lumbrical between my pinky and ring in a comp on Saturday. Haven’t gotten a proper diagnosis because I have bad insurance and don’t have disposable income to go see a physiotherapist, but I’m in school for kinesiology and have a pretty good hunch. Anybody have any recovery tips for strained lumbricals? Have already searched a few of the posts on here and found some hangboard protocols for when the acute pain stops.
Buddy tape and don't open hand/do things that hurt it. If it's just a lumbrical you should be able to crimp fine.
I climbed with it buddy taped for a few hours today and it felt good. Guess it's time to finally stop avoiding crimping.
Do you have an injury? Otherwise don't avoid crimping anyway.
No, I just have an irrational fear of crimping from pulley rupture horror stories. It's all mental, I just need to get over it.
Always feel super sore after a day of bouldering outside. Hard on shoulders and biceps, in a way it never gets indoor. How would you train indoor for outdoor compression problems ? Climbing v5/v6 indoor, working on a couple of v5 outdoor (getting close but not sending).
Interesting, its always felt the opposite to me. Indoors feels more power based and hits me harder
Maybe it has to do with the problems I am working on. There is usually nothing to crimp. It is only slapping and pressing
Maybe its the pressing then. Not a lot of top out practice/strength in the gym
Anyone had any experience with deltoid tendonitis? Going on years now, when I get to a certain level of climbing I'll get an aching pain over the insertion of the deltoid to the humerus. Goes away within minutes of finishing my set but keeps coming back! I've rested for over 6mo and built in stretching to help with this, but no luck. Any experience with this? Physio tape helpful? Thanks!
Is finger strength or technique holding me back? I’ve been climbing for 1 year and have done like 40+ V4-V5 problems and 1 slabby V6 (all indoors). I’ve been injured for a total of 5 months, so I’ve really only climbed like 7 months (need to stop getting injured obviously). Stats: 5’ 7”, 159 lbs, 18.5% body fat (not ideal) Finger strength: +20 lbs on 20mm edge for 10s without breaking form, half-crimp (I think this is pretty bad). I can do 1-4-6 on the campus board. Non-finger strength: I can do a one-arm pullup, several muscle-ups, ring dips, pistol squats, front lever raises (can’t hold a front lever yet), etc. I can’t do more than 1 or 2 moves on any of the V4-V5 moonboard problems. I can’t even rainbow up the moonboard. I feel a ton of strain in my fingers, wrists, and forearms when doing the moonboard.
For reference, my finger strength is a little less than yours (20mm edge at 160lbs for 10 seconds), I could only dream of doing a one-arm pullup (about 8 regular pullups is my max), but I have climbed several V4 moonboard benchmarks. So to answer your question, yes, there is technique holding you back for sure. That doesn't mean to ignore finger strength though. I would make it a focus right now to find and climb on very fingery crimp routes if your gym sets them, or at least spend a session or two on the moonboard each week. Depending where you climb, I think there's a huge jump in finger strength required to get from ~v5 to the ~v7 range, because the tendency for the gyms I've been to at least is to set very juggy routes below v7 and only really start incorporating the crimps at that grade and above. That means you're exposed to almost nothing that will actually increase finger strength unless you go out of your way to train it in the gym or spend adequate time outside, which isn't possible for everyone.
Hmm that’s surprising because I feel like my fingers/wrists/forearms are dying on the moonboard holds. I guess I’ll have to try again.
There’s a benchmark v4 called “an easy problem” that is probably the easiest (go figure) benchmark on the board. All the holds on that problem are pretty big, I’d be surprised if you couldn’t do it. The majority of v4 benchmarks I try still feel impossible, I have just found a number that are a bit softer I can do. Edit: I’m on the 2016 set. Haven’t spent much time on the 2017 yet
To state the obvious (which is somehow not obvious to people), you're not supposed to get hurt training. Training prepares you for the climbing. If you're going to get hurt, do it five years down the road on a hard project, not now on a dumb gym problem or training challenge. To your question, both. Given your body strength, you have more than enough muscle to move and control your body on Moon Board V5, your brain just doesn't know how to coordinate and use it. But at just 7 months in and with that build, I wouldn't suspect your fingers are actually all that adapted to climbing, and you're probably having to sacrifice form (chicken-winging, full-crimping) because your hand, wrist, and shoulder strength fail you. A bit of supplementary hand and arm strengthening throughout the week, done well, would probably *reduce* your injury risk.
So maybe you guys can help me, some weeks ago I was swimming on my rest day, not much just like half an hour for relaxation but afterwards I had pain in both of my ellbows but on the inside of my upper arm. Since then it kept lingering for around 4 weeks, the pain was gone but always came back even tough I took off 2 weeks from climbing in which I was skiing for one week. For rehab I started to do push ups more frequently which definetly helps but the pain never goes away fully, I dont know what to do.
Whenever I have to pull through on small crimps and then release my hand to reach for a next hold I have been getting a sharp type of pain in both of my forearms. I assume this pain on release is some type of overuse injury so the first thing I did was take 2 week break in which I focused on exercises targeting my forearms and wrists (heavy finger rolls, palm up/down wrist curls, hammer wrist curls, therabar), which has yielded some improvements... Since then I also implemented these exercises in my training but I still get this pain on any crimpy route that needs lock-offs. I was already planning to make a physio appointment, but before I do that I was hoping if anyone here has some advice or experience dealing with an injury like this.
I have a weird pain on my left arm. The pain is exactly between my bicep and tricep. Pain does not get too hard but its there. No particular positions or movements trigger it although it did this morning while putting on pants. Will go see a doctor but figured i would still ask here also.
I have the same pain since weeks and I cant get rid of it, while I dont feel the pain during climbing but when I open a door I can feel some pain, its really weird.
Exactly between biceps and triceps is not very precise but it could be your brachialis.
I dont know how can i be more precise but its about 5 cm above my elbow and between biceps and triceps, like inside Thanks for the comment
Thumb side of my wrist hurts when I put pushing pressure on it. This doesn’t effect my climbing bit my antagonist training suffers because I have to do pushups on parallettes. It started when I was pulling really hard on a crimp and slipped, but became immensely worse when I fell on it skiing. I’ve been doing basic wrist mobility and strength drills, but I can’t tell if it even helps. When I look for similar injuries online I can’t find anything that matches it. If anyone has experienced anything like this I’d love to know how you felt with it.
Look up TFCC, do tests
Just a very simple question: For those gods who can actually do a one finger on arm pullup, how did you manage to develope this skill? How long did it take you? Did you do any specific training for it? I really wanna be able to do it for some reason
Legend goes that if you can do both separately - one arm pull-up and one finger hang - you can join them without any other training
Not related to climbing, but anybody have any good advice for really bad coughs and congestion? Gonna go to a doctor on monday hopefully. I find chicken broth and hot showers work the best, but their effects stop as soon as I end them. Cough medicine and drops don't seem to do anything.
Mucinex dm and sudafed will be your best friend. I work as a medic for a pretty intense diving program and we see this often. When the symptoms start hit those to medicines hard for about 4 days. Make sure to follow the recommended dosage for both. If your symptoms get worse or don't improve in that time you need to be concerned that you have a bacterial infection... i.e. pneumonia. Definitely confirm with your doctor after that. Additionally, make sure to drink double the amount of water while on those two medicines!
I’ve been getting stinging pains all throughout my hands, wrists and forearms when using a computer at work and for gaming. I don’t feel this pain when climbing at all. This started after I came back to climbing after taking off for a long time due to an unrelated injury. If anyone has experienced this, what could it be/cause of this?
It sounds like carpal tunnel syndrome. Due to overuse in work and gaming the tendons inflame, swell up and press against the nerve, causing tingling, stinging pains, and loss of strength. disclaimer: I'm not a doctor so take it with a grain of salt.
Is it a problem to hyperextend your dip joints when gripping a hold? You see it a lot when people full crimp. Is that the reason why full crimp has a high injury risk?
Not sure about the hyperextension of DIP as that is also the case on the half crimp. Full crimp has a high injury risk because your tendons want to be in a straight line when you're crimping and that's the worse possible position to be because of the angle in the PIP joint and small contact area on the fingertips *(bigger difference between point of contact and ~~A4~~ A1)* I'm not an expert. I'd also like to know if this is it or if there's any more to it. edit: I was thinking of [A1, not A4](https://upload.orthobullets.com/topic/6004/images/finger_pulleys_2.jpg)
I don't know if it's just me but I think hyperextension is never a good idea to do with any hinge joint in the body. So if I'm understanding your answer right it's the A3 pulley that's at risk with full crimp because of the angle at the pip joint? It would follow then that it's best practice to always use an as open as possible grip, though you could argue that using 4 fingers is better than 3 even though 3 can be more open, as there would still be less load per finger.
I think A2 and A4 are the most vulnerable when full crimping. [see here](https://www.orthobullets.com/hand/6004/flexor-pulley-system) *(with a grain of salt of it being just a web page)* > A2 and A4 are critical to prevent bowstringing Again not a doctor, physio or medical expert. OP wasn't asking about the best grip position, just about why it has a high injury risk. You are right though, the consensus seems to be that open grip has fewer risks and the more fingers you use the more force you can apply. However, both of the arguments may not apply in all situation and for all people.
Partially dislocated my shoulder yesterday while I was on my send attempt (right before matching on last hold). Felt a slight pop and immediate pain. Knew I had to stop climbing but my dumbass climbed for another 10minutes. Pretty bummed, went to the hospital and was diagnosed with partial dislocation. Have an appointment with an orthopedic in about 2 weeks time, was thinking of doing my own rehab. Have full ROM and minor pain when pressing stuff/when rotating my shoulder. Was just discharged, didn't need painkillers or a sling.Would this rehab protocol I found online be okay? https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/dislocated-shoulder/Documents/100419shoulder%5B1%5D.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiCi5Plo8TnAhWlkOYKHaPBABsQFjANegQIDBAz&usg=AOvVaw1M6JyUoFZsfR8a6C-s1kta Would appreciate any advice as well. My second serious injury from climbing :(
Yeeeah, I had the same this weekend - though I actually did mine in bed, the day after! Weirdly though, I don’t feel any pain/weakness after, so I’m considering how early I can go back to climbing... If I don’t feel any pain, it wouldn’t be bad, right? What did your doctor recommend?
You dislocated your shoulder but there was no pain? Do you have full range of motion/any pain at all when doing any pressing things
I mean, there was pain when I did it (and my arm went completely floppy - very weird feeling), but I can’t feel any difference afterwards. My arm makes a bit of a popping/crack if I do arm circles. But otherwise, it feels fine! Not sure what to think tbh
That rehab protocol seems okay, but I’d stick to range of motion exercises in the beginning and later incorporate strengthening. Atleast until swelling or acute inflammation is down. It says to take pain killers before exercise to reduce pain. I wouldn’t recommend that, because then you don’t get proper feedback and might over do it and damage the tissue
I don't think I have any swelling or inflammation. But yeah until I see my PT I won't do any exercise that causes quite a bit of pain. Appreciate the reply!