The max strength test

Pull as hard as you can with your left hand, then your right, each on its own edge: the app gives each hand’s peak force, then offers the peak of your stronger hand as your max: tap Use as my max. Workouts in % of max aim at a share of that max.

How to start a test, choose your hold and find old results is on Take a test. It is the first test to take: the app says so too.

What you do

• You pull as hard as you can with your left hand, then with your right hand. The briefing shows how long each pull lasts and lists every pull under Overview. Follow the timer.
• You choose one edge for each hand. Use a medium edge, about as deep as one fingerpad, as the note of the Max strength field recommends, and keep it for every test.
• Warm up first, the same way before every test: see Take a test.
• Hang with your arms straight, and keep the same grip at every test.
• Get to your hardest pull fast, then hold it to the end of the timer. Do not jerk: a jerk makes a peak that is not your strength.
• For a meaningful RFD, start still, hands on the hold, then pull as hard and as fast as you can. See What each test measures.

Right after the test

The app shows Max Strength Results:

• PEAK · LEFT and PEAK · RIGHT: the highest force of your pulls with that hand, in your unit.
• BEST RFD: how fast your force went up at the start of your fastest pull. It is not shown if the app could not measure it.
• A grade line (below), only if the app knows your boulder grade.
• Last, the offer to keep your result as your max: see Your max.

Reading your number

What counts is your force for your weight. Divide the peak of a hand by your body weight: 0.5 means you pull half your weight with one hand. The app works it out with your stronger hand. The weight is the one the plate measured when you first set up the plate; you cannot type it. After a test, if the app has none, it uses the weight measured just before that test. Why this number matters most: What each test measures.

The grade line. You see it in two places, and the two do not check quite the same thing:

• Right after a test, the app turns your force for your weight into a boulder grade and compares it with yours. Within one grade either way: About right for your grade. More than one above: Strong for your grade. More than one below: Room to grow for your grade.
• On the tile of the Test tab: Strong for your grade, Typical for your grade or Building toward your grade. The app checks whether your force for your weight is above, inside or below the range usual for your grade. It uses your boulder grade, or your route grade if you gave no boulder grade.

So the two can disagree a little. Both are a rough guide: a grade depends on much more than your fingers. You give your grade in the first questions of the app, on the plan page, or in Settings with Redo the onboarding. More on reading finger strength: How to Test Finger Strength.

Left and right. A gap between your two hands is common. Compare each hand with its own past results: a hand that drops, above all after an injury, is worth your attention.

In the Test tab

The tile shows the latest result of your stronger hand, a bar for each hand (L and R), and the grade line. Without your body weight or your grade, the tile asks for them first.

The section (tap the tile) shows, for each hand:

• FORCE CURVE: your force during the pull, left in blue and right in orange.
• MAX FORCE: the top of that curve.
• RFD 200MS: the speed of the start of the pull. Swipe that tile to see RISE TIME: the seconds your force took to go from almost nothing to almost its top.
• STABILITY: how much your force moved while you held it near its top, in your unit. Green is steady, amber in between, red unsteady.

Neither rise time nor stability has a good number to aim for. A shorter rise time goes with a higher RFD. Compare both with your own past results.

If one hand has no result, its place says No left test or No right test. Tap it to start the test.

Test again when the tile asks, after 28 days, on a rested day. A change of a few percent can come from the day: see What each test measures.

Your max

Your max is one number, for one hand, kept in Settings under Physical Profile: Max strength. Workouts that ask for a share of your max use it for the whole hand. Workouts on one finger use your finger strength test for that finger, and estimate from your max until you have tested it.

Right after the test, the app offers the peak of your stronger hand as your max, and shows the max you have now under the offer. Tap Use as my max: the app saves it at once and says so. You do not have to: one tired test should not lower your max. That is why, when your result is under your max, the button is the plain one, not the coloured one. When your result is within half a kilo of your max, there is nothing to offer, and the app says nothing.

After a guided workout, if your strongest one-hand pull beats your max by 2% or more, or you have no max yet, the end screen offers that pull as your max, with the same button. A workout never offers a lower max: only the test does. A warm-up offers nothing.

You can also type it yourself:

1. Open Profile, then Settings.
2. Go down to Max strength.
3. Type your result.

The Open Test is one more way: at the end of one, its summary (Which pulls were tests?) lets you say which pull was your one-hand max.

If you have no max, those workouts set their targets from the weight the plate measures before the session, and the targets can be far off.

Related

• The endurance test, the next one to take.
• Build your own workout, with loads in % of your max.