How do you set climbing goals?
Write down everything that appeals to you over at least 6 months, ideally a year. Check that these are your own dreams, not other people’s. Then sort them by priority.
Training can turn into a pile of exercises collected from everywhere. Each exercise makes sense inside someone’s specific goals, so you need to find yours: you want to be stronger, but why, and by what measure? Félicien Roy, a kinesiologist and climber, walks through the whole process in Finding and organising your climbing goals.
What do you expect from each goal?
Define it in detail. Clear expectations make the path clearer, lower the risk of drifting off course, and let you tell whether you reached the goal.
Expectations can be qualitative (descriptive) or quantitative (measurable). The ideal is to combine both, and each one then becomes a sub-goal.
How do you plan the training?
Compare what each sub-goal requires with your current state. The gap shows what to work on and how much time you need. Work on your weaknesses first, while maintaining your strengths with much less time.
Your current state has to be assessed with valid tests, repeated under identical conditions: same warm-up, same measuring tool, same fatigue state. Only after the planning does it make sense to choose exercises. If something unpredictable happens, such as an injury, the goal does not change; the means and their timing do.
What should you do on the day of the performance?
Set the questions aside, execute and enjoy it. Give what you have, whatever it is. The questions come after.
Once the season is over, take stock. Was each goal reached, nearly reached or not? Did you over- or underestimate the goals or your ability to meet them? Was the training effective, and was the plan followed? This makes the next season better.
How do you stop climbing for other people?
Ask whether your satisfaction comes from your own successes or from other people’s recognition of them. Then use personal objectives and visualize your behaviour, not the crowd’s view.
Sabrina Thayer-Head, who spent a competition season on the mental side, aims at things she can work on: specific movements, grips, or behaviours around fear, attitude and comparison. She says objectives centred on her own capabilities push her more than objectives tied to a grade or a ranking. See Training your head to climb harder.
How do you stay focused on the wall?
Orient toward the task, not the result. In front of a boulder, think about how you will do the moves and use your time, and consider the result only at the end, because you have almost no control over it.
Thinking about how others perform or what result you will get only distracts. Put your energy into preparation, mental and physical, then let go on the wall. The mental training article covers this too.
How do you deal with stress and fear?
Understand the real cause. Ask yourself what the worst that can happen is. Then practise in a more controlled setting: deliberate falls to practise landing, or falling in front of people if that is what stresses you.
Stress can also point to a lack of confidence or something to work on. Use the moment to practise breathing and calming down. You can also change your thinking in the moment: catch the point where your attitude turns negative and take a breath. It is difficult, continuous work. Details are in Training your head to climb harder.
How do you start trad without getting hurt?
Three habits: get on easy-to-protect projects where falling is inevitable, place a lot of protection, and get decent gear.
The first works like a top rope, since you can place as much gear as you want and make the fall safe. Place three pieces instead of one: the motto “when in doubt, run it out” is stupid even if it rhymes. A double rack, and friends who have one too, keeps you from finishing a run-out with nothing left. A physical margin also helps you keep your head, because it lets you downclimb and stay calm. See Avoiding ground falls on trad.
