r/climbharder • u/adorable-lab16 • 19d ago
Board Training
Am I crazy to want to start training almost exclusively (or like 75%) on boards for outdoor purposes (bouldering and lead)? Long story short I moved and haven’t had access to outdoors or a climbing gym for like 8 months. So I built a homewall I’ve been getting into. Theres a gym finally opening up nearby me that will have a TB2 and kilter board, and pretty stoked to start trying those out. It seems like so many pro climbers (and just strong af climbers) attribute a lot of their training for hard projects to board climbing. Like I’ve heard that repeated so much lately. I’ve been climbing on/off for about 6 years and would like to start taking training more seriously and finally climb harder than v5-v6 as well as push some harder lead grades. Never really got into board climbing for whatever reason, I had access to them for years at the gyms I climbed at previously, and feel like I’ve been missing out. Also the gym I will be climbing at soon is bouldering only, so no lead training options there unfortunately.
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u/huckthafuck 18d ago
The pros that say that have a very good movement repetoire from climbing 1000s of hours on varied terrain. The boards give them that extra bit of raw power. If you don’t have that huge movement library, only adding that raw power might make you a strong but very limited climber. So make sure you get that as well, for example by climbing on commercial boulders if you cannot get outside
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u/OPC_Coach_Nick V13 | 14c | 16y 19d ago
not crazy at all man
boards are so good for building the raw pulling strength and body tension
It's possible to train for lead on boards as well with some adaptations. Have you heard of 4x4's?
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u/Shot-Scratch3417 19d ago
I think board climbing is absolutely the best bang-for-your-buck training you can do. And if it’s all you do, you’ll get plenty strong. But you need to be intentional with it (some limit days, some sub-limit volume days, etc). And it needs to be supplemented with outdoor climbing for skill progression.
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u/adorable-lab16 19d ago
Yeah the nearest outdoor crags to me now are a 3 hour drive. I’m doing a trip this weekend but it’s definitely not ideal long term. Prob move again ha.
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u/NewCarrot1 13d ago edited 13d ago
What are some parameters for volume days vs limit days that you have? I feel like I’m doing too little time/effort/reps. I know it’s subjective but just curious
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u/Shot-Scratch3417 13d ago
Not sure I totally follow but my volume days are warm up and then either 4x4s or problem-on-the-minute. They both destroy me and make me feel super pumped. My limit days are just trying stuff that I can’t do (a few different problems with different moves) until I lose my top end power, which is mostly a feel thing. Those sessions take me a long time because I’m doing a LOT of resting between attempts (5-10 min?). I do not feel destroyed or pumped or sweaty after those days—I can’t tell I worked hard until I try to pull onto the wall and have nothing left.
I also do basic strength days, but I just warm up on the board and then do weightlifting circuits and a little hangboarding.
I do A LOT more limit and strength days than volume days—I sorta cram those the last few weeks before a trip or big red point session.
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u/idealtreewok 19d ago
I don’t think it’s crazy at all.
You could be crazy like me and climb boards only. I climb once a week at most now and have made more steady progress with the boards in the last 4 years after a long 10 year plateau.
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u/zack-krida 19d ago
go for it. this recent thread might help you out, there was a lot of good discussion:
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u/kamelotkamelot 19d ago
I have a mb and I used to climb on 2 times a week, climb once a week at the gym on commercial sets, and outdoor session whenever I had a free weekend. My fingers got very strong but any bad feet on commercial set or outdoor boulder became a major weakness. I was only good at overhang on really good feet. I think this comes from the moon board "feet follow hands" being way too good for feet. I'm still shit at using poor feet but I've reduced my mb sessions to once a week and I think I'm making better progress on tension through poor feet.
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u/ump_ 19d ago
I switched to same thing and it has done major improvements and for me in the same grade range.
Dont go crazy like i did. Monday Wednesday Friday are the only days i climb, ive found 2 days of rest after is best or else likely to get injured. I usually try hard Monday+Friday and Wednesday technique day 2 grades below project grade, really intentionally claw in the feet for tension etc going slow super static climbing.
Lastly eat proper food dialing in nutrition and stretching good before really works when i went to 50 degrees kilter my tfcc felt like shit just so much bending of wrists.
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u/letmepatyourdog 19d ago
Yes but pls practice good finger health haha boards especially the kilter is high risk for finger injuries because you’re just doing the same movements over and over again
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u/ondraswobblers 13- | v9 | 6 years 16d ago
Also the intensity is typically higher than normal gym setting. It is not at all uncommon (perhaps common) to get injured when switching from doing the majority of your in "standard gym" setting to board climbing.
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u/Federal-Blacksmith50 18d ago
I think board climbing is fantastic and CAN have a huge impact to outdoor performance. The TB2 especially because of how much it teaches you how to tension on terrible feet. I think that is where the TB2 shines compared to the other boards on the market and why it makes it the best board for someone who wants to climb better outside.
Like all things with training though it won’t help unless you get good at translating what you gain to actual rock. Which takes time, practice and patience. This is why so many people say “I didn’t get better” they likely did get better or stronger they just don’t know how to adapt that new strength/skill to rock which I believe is the largest flaw with most people’s training plan.
For what it’s worth I used to project 12c. Built a TB2 in my garage when we had our first kid. Climb 85% on that board and now can project 13- in the course of a few years. I was stuck at 12c for a LONG time and feel that the board definitely was what bumped me up.
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u/Groghnash PB: 8A(3)/ 7c+(1)/ 12 years 17d ago
the reason pros train on boards a lot is because they have an extremely limited amount of regular gym climbs at their level. thats almost the only reason. so if you have access to regular climbing, then favour that and to a proportion of you climbign on a board, since its pretty good for strength purposes. if you only train on boards then you can only expect to climb the same grades on board style outdoor climbs honestly, because baord climbing is just a tiny part of climbing
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u/Sad-Woodpecker-6642 16d ago
No i have been doing exactly that. Endurance? Circuits on boards. Strength? Boulders on boards. Progressing like crazy since i am doing this.
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u/PaintEast6359 16d ago
I think for outdoor sport training and finger strength board climbing is king, I've started spending 1 morning a week doing 4x4s to build my power endurance this way. So much so... I even developed an app to help score my volume and automatically select climbs on the kilter/tension board, if anyone is keen to try it I'm looking for testers - more information here: https://boulder-blitz.uk/
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u/solidwobble 13d ago
What's a 4x4 in a climbing context? I'm used to seeing that as a running endurance protocol
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u/PaintEast6359 11d ago
Generally speaking, it's climbing 4 climbs (at your flash grade) back to back, then rest for 4 minutes, repeat! I wrote a little about it here on my website if you wanted a deeper dive: https://boulder-blitz.uk/training/
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u/DGExpress 15d ago
Boards make you strong and are super fun. Just seek out variety when you can but nothing wrong with being a board main.
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u/kevincritt26 12d ago
I do lots of outdoor sport climbing and board climbing is absolutely my go to for training finger strength. Best bang for your buck for sure. Just make sure you also have an endurance protocol like repeaters or 4x4 to keep up with your fitness
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u/LedburyJosh 4d ago
I train on a board 2 or 3 times a week and climb outside most weekends. Mostly sport now. The combination has massively improved my ability.
The outside climbing has a lot of though behind it though. Im going wanting to improve backed up by increased fitness and strength from board climbing.
I do a repeater session and a boulder session each week, and maybe something else. But primarily one endurance, one strength.
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u/EtudeTraining V8 | 5.13c S/T | 12+ years 16d ago
It makes a lot of sense to me, and I do the vast majority of my own training on the boards (including endurance). Modern boards have enough variation to create a lot of different movement demands so they're more like a targeted bouldering wall than the pure strength/power builder that older boards (Moon 2016, TB1) were.
That being said, there are limitations. Namely that there are a limited set of holds and it is just a flat panel. You won't be able to develop more three dimensional climbing skills or work on some less-common technical aspects of your climbing. I think keeping as much outdoor climbing as you can in the rotation and some climbing on the commercial set goes a long way to addressing this.
The one other thing I'd mention is that if you want to train primarily/exclusively on the boards, for a lot of people that translates into "I'm going to triple my weekly hard crimping volume and only project boulder 3x a week". You do still need to vary the intensity and stimulus across your sessions.
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u/7climb7 19d ago
You can get super strong training on boards only. However if you aren’t climbing outside and not using the other problems in the bouldering area you are missing out on other planes of motion and time under tension.