Lynn Hill Learning Rock Climbing Advice & Training Method Series - Muscle Balance

Recently, injuries caused by excessive exercise have occurred repeatedly in rock climbing, and impatient beginners and climbers who are not good at finding bad signals are particularly vulnerable to this situation. I know that most athletes understand the basic principles of preventive medicine, but sometimes we often ignore these principles at the most critical moment.

This article mainly reminds readers to listen to signals from the body and always pay attention to using perfect posture in all activities.

All of us have a certain amount of intuition, but to understand what a perfect posture is, we must be aware of this intuition. However, one thing we can consciously choose to do is to develop muscle balance; because muscle balance is a key to maintaining a perfect posture in our movement.

The most important muscle in the human body is our abdominal muscles, which are the central or core parts of the body. There are many exercises that can help us to exercise our abs. What I like most is the gymnastic exercise that requires certain strength, flexibility and balance. I often practice perfect inverted bracing, that is, trying to keep my body straight without moving my hands when I invert. As I had practiced gymnastics in my youth, I have also been doing a practice called slow handstand. These are great exercises that not only require the practitioner to have a certain amount of core strength and flexibility, but also exercise the forearm, triceps, and contralateral muscles on the shoulders, so they can be a perfect complement to climbing exercises.

Some people's shoulders are a bit dislocated in structure, so the connection structure of tendons and ligaments at the shoulders is not conducive to the human body to efficiently and perfectly coordinate the movements. People with this condition need to practice exercises that can strengthen the strength of the deltoid and rotator cuff.

However, most rock climbers challenge their own limits when climbing, and usually the muscles of the forearm first become weak. Therefore, the damage in rock climbing occurs in the forearm, fingers and shoulders.

For the purpose of developing muscle balance and preventing injuries, climbers can refer to some of the following precautions:

Listen to the signal from the body: If it hurts, stop immediately!

Do some supplementary exercises for the contralateral muscle groups. For example, for the forearm, do some positive curling and make sure to stretch the forearm before and after practice or before and after the actual rock climbing.

Do some training for deltoid exercises. You can use dumbbells or an elastic exercise to practice different levels of pull or resistance training in all directions.

Do any abdominal exercises you like. My favorite exercise is aerobics. This is because aerobics is easy to practice at home and helps to enhance functional fitness (my name). Such exercises can help our body learn how to exercise effectively while enhancing strength, coordination and balance. Any exercise or activity that mobilizes the body by overcoming gravity resistance is an exercise that improves functional fitness.

Make sure to use different types of rock climbing in a balanced manner. Too many repetitions of the same or similar actions can result in injuries caused by excessive exercise. If you are climbing on a rock board and need to hang on a small rocky corner, you may damage your finger or forearm. As a good complement to this action, you can climb some steep terrain within your own ability. The overhanging terrain requires the rock climber's forearm and shoulders to have considerable balance and strong enough core strength. This rock climbing type helps to develop a balanced force. But climbing a route far beyond its current level can also cause damage. If you want to exceed your own strength limit, the posture is likely to become non-standard, resulting in the wrong use of skills, and ultimately causing damage.

Practice rock climbing with perfect fluency and posture and enjoy the climbing process!