Periodized Training for Climbing

Climbing is an odd activity that blurs the line between lifestyle, hobby, obsession, and sport.  If you get into climbing, you'll want to get better if for nothing else than the ability to explore more places and more climbs.  Getting better involves two distinct components, namely 1) technical skill and 2) physical ability.  In this post, I'll discuss methods and means to improve physical ability.  **Disclaimer:  this is not professional advice, nor is it for novice climbers.  Novice climbers should climb a lot, pay attention to movement efficiency and balance, climb on varied terrain and find a mentor.

If you want to know more, read these books:

• The Self Coached Climber - the most current book on the market that brings it all together
• Performance Rock Climbing - a little dated, but still full of good info
• An Eric Horst book (How to climb 5.12, Training for Climbing, one of the other equivalents)
• The Making of  Rock Prodigy / Anderson Brothers' Training Guide - this is essentially the beef from the above books; what exercises to do and in what order to get results.  It may not be the be all end all, but it gets results for a lot of people.  

What I do:
My training is essentially based on these books plus what I've picked up from friends.  I don't want to restate what others have said better, but as a brief summary, I try and periodize my training as follows (3-6 weeks per step):

1. ARC:  build up aerobic endurance/increase anaerobic threshold through long times on the wall.  
2. Hypertrophy:  build muscle mass, one rep max weight lifting style by hangboarding.
3. Power:  force divided by time, improve explosive strength by campusing
4. Anaerobic endurance:  climb through more pump with 4x4's

Try it once and listen to your body.  Then individualize your regimen.  Here is my current schedule (note the incorpration of bouldering, antagonist muscle training and spreading out of hard workouts):

A few more details on each phase:
ARC:  Look at professional marathon runners and you'll see that their mile splits are faster than you can run a single mile.  What pushes you into unsustainable anaerobic excercise is within their sustainable aerobic capabilities.  According to running literature you can train yourself to run at 80-90% max intensity and be in your aerobic state by running a lot at your aerobic limit (right under your anearobic threshold).  So do long sets on the wall over easy to moderate terrain, like 30 minutes of 5.8 climbing.  Take this time to work on movement, practice backsteps, footwork, and flagging.  Then reap the rewards of recovering while climbing sections of routes that within your aerobic limit.

Hypertrophy:  This is building muscle to gain strength.  You do this by working so hard that your muscles fail within a very short time.  The rock prodigy method suggests choosing 6-8 grips on the hangboard and doing 3 sets consisting of 6 reps of 10 sec hang / 5 sec rest.  Furthermore, rock prodigy suggests using weights and rigging a pully system to add or subtract weight as needed.  I have also been mixing in "frenchie's" (pull up hold, drop, pull up, lock off at 90 deg, pull up, lock off at 120, repeat...).  And to keep it interesting, boulder problems that focus on small holds with stopper moves, essentially fast failure but on a route.

Power:  also known as max recruitment, this is about getting all muscles to fire simultaneously to generate maximum force.  The classic exercise here is campusing.  I do 4-6 sets of ladders, that is start with hands off set (left hand low, right hand on the rung 18 inches higher, then reaching the low hand to the next rung 18 inches above the right hand).  I have also been doing 1 arm lock offs / negatives (with assistance as needed) and it is paying big dividends.  Not sure if that is more hypertrophy, but it helps with low lock offs while climbing.  To avoid campusing too much I am also aiming to do dynamic bouldering - big moves to small holds that focus on explosive power and contact strength (its not about finishing the problem but trying hard).

Anaerobic Endurance:  This is supposed to be the fastest to gain, but the fastest to lose, so it goes at the end of the periodization.  All I know to do here are 4x4's - choose 4 problems that are below your grade such that you can just barely do them all back to back to back to back.  Maybe you could eak out harder problems by doing running style repeats - alternating hard problems with short rest or an easy down climb.

Putting it all together:  
It seems easy, but the details are critical.  Find your target peak period - send season (October in my case) or a trip date, then plan backwards.  You have to do it to figure out what your body can handle.  Remember, injury free is the number one goal, so take a day off or drop down to one hard workout per week if you are feeling off.  Note in my plan the included antagonist muscle training.  Make sure to do pushups, wrist rotations, elastic therapy band workouts for your shoulders (rotators and stabilizers) at least once a week.

That got a bit long... I'm curious to here what else you guys do for exercises in each phase.