Line and Flag Exercises from Self Coach Climber

I have a small number of friends getting into exercises and training from the book; Self Coach Climber, aka SCC. I have been doing the same side traverse and it helped me break into consistent onsights of V3+. I am working to perfect the line and flag exercises. Here is my response to a friend.

So, I did 6 of line and 6 of flag exercises. It felt awkward. I had to backstep more aggressively and different muscles are sore; deltoid, lat and scapula; mostly upper shoulder. This explains why I could not do them before because I started doing shoulder recovery exercises only about a month ago and my shoulder muscles are getting stronger. I just could not rely on my unstable left shoulder.

It means there are different muscle groups I need to develop. We are supposed to pivot but with these small footholds, we can't. I had to do many more foot adjustments to make it happen.

Like my success with the same side traverse exercise, I was forcing my pivoting without good awareness of where my COG is and I had my hand not adjusting to pivoting. This caused two problems; back ache and hand pain. You need to grab holds differently from normal climbing routine. Like Gaston or layback, or just don't wrap your fingers.

What is important is if you can produce high quality moves. Quantity does not matter so much at the beginning. Don't think it is a failure if you could not finish the whole wall. Just do what you can do with sections of the wall.

Massage - Accelerated Rest

I freeze my hands from time to time when I have injured fingers. Dave McCleod calls it freeze therapy. It works marvelously except 30 minutes of finger in ice bucket is a kind of hard. See his video

I have been massaging my hands, forearms and feet. The result is amazing. It takes stiffness out and increases range of motion. It feels amazing especially after a good night sleep.

You need to use oil. Nothing special just vegetable oil. Dry massage does not work.

I like to have a towel and a pail of warm water. Search self massage in YouTube. Basically you warm the part by rubbing, working it with a combination of thumb, side of your hand or a stick. You work any soreness out. The session should last good amount of time. Wash yourself and wipe off excessive oil. Having oil on you is not all that bad as your skin seems to absorb it.

Toe pain and prevention

Revisited: Be gentle with your toes and massage and stretch your toes especially big one every day.

I was having toe problems until I saw Adam Ondra's climbing video. I realized how I was killing my big toe. Everybody climbs with their favorite digit; big toe. I don't know how long but using big toe is drilled into me. After climbing sessions, my big toes are hurting. So much so I would have hot flash in my feet when nerves get blocked. So I must be doing something wrong. I was looking for a solution because my foot techniques wont' improve with pain.

So back to what Adam does, he looks sloppy. He does not use big toe unless he has to. In fact, he frictions where I would use my bt, big toe. It is interesting to watch his videos just his feet. Fascinating.

So, I did what he does. Use metatasal, that is, use parts of your foot not the first two digits of your toes. How do you do this? With care! Use rest of your foot instead of just the same big toe.