I love riding my bike to the beach on rest days, it gets rid of the boredom and the jitterbugs while still being super easy recovery stuff.
DominicProvost
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I’d prioritize getting rid of aerobic deficiency, it might be enough to allow you to achieve your goals without having to be hungry. It might also make a change in your body composition, and allow you to lose fat more easily later on.
Losing weight is tricky and you don’t want body composition to be a temporary thing. You also don’t want to be in such a big caloric deficit that you jeopardize your health and fitness. I also think being in a caloric deficit is extremely uncomfortable, demotivating, doesn’t feel good, is very hard to sustain and generally fucking sucks.
Do the math. If you eat at a maintenance level and train for mountaineering, the food you eat will go into replenishing glycogen you used and healing muscle tissue you broke down. The muscles you don’t use as much as you used to will atrophy, and some of the fat that’s lying on your body will get used to fuel efforts when you’re at a slightly more depleted point of your day. Body recomposition doesn’t have to be complicated, it’s just the result of wise training over time. Trying to make things happen fast (like loosing a bunch of weight to send a project or win a competition, or trying to race the tour de france*) isn’t healthy, probably hurts you in the long run and is where things get tricky.
*It wasn’t mentioned in the UA podcast about grit, but the performance oriented starving these athletes go through is incredible. Look it up but also understand that you’re not trying to win the tour de france and that these guys are absolutely willing to jeopardize their health to perform at that level.
DominicProvost on August 25, 2020 at 12:33 pm · in reply to: Question about Hill sprints/bounds workout #44506I think the idea with the active rest part of the interval is to stimulate the lactate shuttle. Do something low intensity that works your slow twitch fibers so you metabolize the lactate.
DominicProvost on August 17, 2020 at 10:52 am · in reply to: One-day multi-pitch packing list #44359Having a belay jacket on top of waterproof pants and trousers would be overkill to me in a lot of routes I do in Canada. If it starts to rain on a rock climb I’m abseiling (or french freeing the easiest way up if it’s more convenient) and walking to safety as fast as I can, which in a lot of case might mean cold and wet for long enough to be uncomfortable but not long enough to become hypothermic. Also my weather forecasts tend to be pretty bomber when I commit to a long climb.
There’s a point at which base building has severely diminishing returns and you need to improve maximum strength output and local muscular endurance (while maintaining the aerobic base) to create significant improvement.
DominicProvost on August 3, 2020 at 1:41 pm · in reply to: The downclimbing face first mantle #44047It’s a movement pattern I use a lot descending easy ridges and I feel that my body isn’t used to it because I build a slight shoulder/back pump-fatigue when I’m downclimbing. I never trained anything specific to that movement pattern, my dips are probably super weak. There might be low hanging fruit and an opportunity to save a bit more energy on long ridges.
Also, I find the movement on steep talus can be very interesting. So much cool chimneying and stemming/bridging, going through corridors and tunnels made up of big block creates a very three dimensional type of climbing, it’s stuff you don’t usually see on easy sport climbs or gym problems. It could be an interesting way to make fun gym boulder problems.
DominicProvost on July 9, 2020 at 11:30 am · in reply to: What physiological adaptations does high intensity workouts cause in tissue?? #43435When it comes to max strength it’s either hypertrophy, the creation of more muscle cells, or recruitment, making the connection between your brain and muscle cells better. The UA blog has an article about myelination that’s a great explanation. https://uphillathlete.com/myelination-make-you-better-athlete/
Local muscular endurance is a little more complicated, I don’t fully understand it and I’m not sure science has fully explained what coaches have found out works yet. It involves your muscle’s tolerance to the metabolites of high effort; the ability to reuse lactate (that’s where your aerobic capacity comes into play) and your muscles tolerance to hydrogen ions (which is trained by pushing through painful muscular pump), allowing you to sustain that high effort for a little longer. Hopefully a more knowledgeable person than me will be able to complete my answer.
DominicProvost on July 7, 2020 at 11:08 am · in reply to: Getting back to the mountains after fatal accidents #43352The American Alpine Club has the climbing grief fund, it might be worth having a look at that.
Alpine starts and lack of sleep are just part of the inherent stress that needs to be overcome to climb mountains. I think you might be putting too much blame on the lack of sleep and not enough on the lack of fitness. Rainier is not an easy mountain. If you had been fitter the effects of the lack of sleep would’ve been the same relative hindrance but you would’ve still been able to perform at a satisfactory level to keep slogging.
If I have to drastically shift my sleep schedule I take melatonin. It allows me to fall asleep much earlier than I usually would, thus getting enough sleep so that my day just starts super early on the alpine start. If you know in advance that you’ll need to get alpine starts (say you’ve got days scheduled on rainier), shifting your sleep schedule to going to bed super early could completely solve the issue.
I’ve also had pushes where I’d drive from revelstoke on a friday evening, get a nap at the columbia icefields parking lot and start climbing in the middle of the night. I don’t habitually drink coffee, if I’m doing something like that I’ll have tea with my breakfast. Caffeine is an extremely effective stimulant when you’re not addicted to it. I find I can move for about 12 hours before the lack of sleep really starts catching up to me, with enough fitness for a properly planned objective it’s enough for me to be out of the way of objective hazard (I wouldn’t want to be there mid afternoon anyway) and able to catch a nap back at the parking lot or in an island of safety. I’ll usually squeeze a few minutes of shut eyes if I hit a warm spot with no overhead hazard on a summit ridge or a col or whatever, and then get a couple hours nap at the car after climbing before safely driving back into town.
I have experience with forcing myself to stay awake through my late teens’ party years. I wouldn’t recommend skipping sleep on purpose, it’s just unhealthy. However I do think there is value in experiencing how your body responds to lack of sleep and learning how far you can push through, as well as what happens when you sit down completely exhausted and just fall asleep no matter how much you’re trying not to. With more alpine starts and long pushes you will become familiar with how your body reacts to being tired, and you will learn how to deal with it.
I’m glad you asked the question. I’m sharing my experience and thoughts here and hoping it’ll be of use to you, but I will be really happy to read other climbers’ insights on the matter. If I can piggyback on your thread, I’d love to hear if there’s anything that can be done with regards to recovering after skipping sleep due to getting an alpine start.
My guess would be that a weekly gym climbing day focused on ARCing couldn’t hurt, maybe replacing another workout that hits the same energy system if adding it to current load hurts recovery. I’d wait for confirmation from the actual coaches, I’m not sure how they balance the high intensity of rock climbing with the low intensity necessary to remediate ADS.
DominicProvost on May 28, 2020 at 10:57 pm · in reply to: Female athletes training for Denali loads #42183Part of the weight you carry is on a sled that you drag.
A treadwall is great for ARCing. With a hangboard and rings you could probably complete all the rock climbing training plan workouts that don’t involve touching rock, if you make the speed really slow and make the angle steep you pretty much have a systems wall type of board on which you could set hard moves.
I find plastic subpar to rock for broad skill building, the footholds are just so big and the sequences obvious. You can make gains and drill specific movement patterns (
The boredom factor is real, get some good music playing and use your imagination, you’re not in a cold shed anymore, you’re free soloing 300 meters above the bergschrund, you better hold on when you’re tired, try a stupid move and start barn dooring.
Treadwalls are expensive. If I could afford one I’d probably have room for a really nice home gym and would get steep cracks in challenging sizes (cupped hands, off fingers, offwidth) and a dedicated steep board for building power intensive moves, my friend’s gym which I train in during winter also has those and they’re really nice to have.
This article is relevant too.
DominicProvost on February 15, 2020 at 5:00 am · in reply to: What's the difference between power to climb fast and power to climb hard moves #38212I’m sorry if my question was not clear. I’m wondering about something that may be a little abstract. The objectives I have in mind is a stout full value 5.hard pitch (I dabble in bouldering but I find it’s a ton of effort for very little actual climbing, I’ll boulder inside for training) vs moving as fast as you can on easy-for-the-climber technical terrain. Obviously both efforts require some power endurance and the aerobic base to support it. I also understand that a redpoint will be done near lactate threshold while a long speed burn on a long climb would be under aerobic threshold. However both events require a certain amount of power to endure. My question is more about training the power base that is endured than comparing two energy systems.
I’m basically wondering whether climbing really fast will be effective if I want to be faster below my limit on long climbs but also climb harder stuff at the crag. Would it be worthwhile to do climbing speed work to increase limit power if I want to increase my speed on alpine rock climbs for example, or would there be the risk of reinforcing poor form by climbing in a maybe insecure manner (it could be avoided by taking the time to climb in a secure way, but then I’d be climbing slower), in which case I’d be better off doing something such as pulling moves near my limit on a training board to train power (which could then have transfer in increasing speed without reinforcing bad technique). I’m also wondering if training to climb fast would have a worthwhile training effect from a physiological standpoint when it comes to climbing harder moves, it’s obviously not as specific but does something to your muscles. Thinking further my question may be dumb because limit climbing is already done as fast as we can go, it just feels slow because it’s really hard not to fall off.
My questioning stems from the data I’ve seen and things I felt from ARCing on my friend’s treadwall (it’s addicting trying to go faster for longer, I get crazy pumped without doing very hard moves when I try to go as fast I can, my movement efficiency does suffer when I try that), the ultrarunners I know who do speedwork, a much stronger sport climber than me running up a project I’d just redpointed last summer and then seeing reel rock 13’s speed climbing film during a showing at the banff mountain film festival tour.
Your mention of onsighting is also interesting, because there’s clearly a visual aspect that can probably be trained when it comes to climbing fast as well as climbing hard. If you could suggest drills specifically for that I would be all ears, although I’m not opposed to being reminded that gaining experience is all I can do, climbing is fun and I do it a lot.
I apologize for being all over the place with my thoughts (I’m also coming off a 10 hour evening shift in a restaurant so my brain isn’t at it’s best) and thank you for your time. I’d be happy with whatever general insight my questioning yields because I don’t expect a clear cut answer.
DominicProvost on December 11, 2019 at 4:50 pm · in reply to: Rope: single + tag, half, or twin? #34165My personal opinion/method is halves for leading ice, single+tag if you’re going to haul stuff on rock and want longer rappels, single 70 for straightforwards rock climbs, 30-40m half rope for glacier travel and short rappels (you can also pitch out stuff and make decent length rappels if both partners carry that). The range really doesn’t matter as much as the specific climb, and if you do a lot you’ll end up with several ropes.