1. use your feet and be precise

Your legs are much stronger than your arms. New climbers often try to pull themselves up using only their arm strength and forget to use their legs at all. But your legs are your engine! Trust your feet. Climbing shoes are designed to give you stability even on small footholds. The more you use your feet, the longer you can climb without getting exhausted.

A great exercise to improve your footwork and stop flailing around is to try to be completely silent when you climb. Overdo it in the beginning, and really place your feet without a sound. This will teach you to place your feet properly and with intention instead of thrusting your foot towards the hold and hope that it sticks.

Even beginner shoes do pretty well on small holds

2. hang, don’t hold

Similarly, your skeleton is stronger than your muscles. If you’re taking some time to look for the next hold or find yourself stuck, relax your arms so you are hanging straight out from the wall. Don’t bend your arms and use your muscles to pull yourself in towards the wall, this will tire you out immediately. Hang back and take a deep breath. You can actually hang like this for quite a long time. It’s called the resting position – you can hang with only one hand and shake out the other behind you to relax the muscles in your forearm.

3. relax and don’t overgrip the holds

Easier said than done…? Climbing is so different to any other form of exercise that you will discover muscles you didn’t know you had. Your forearms will fill with lactic acid (known as “pump”), and your hands might feel too weak to hold onto holds. Your brain is telling you that you’re about to fall. But in most cases, you’re actually not going to – you are stronger than you think. The reason your arms feel like they’re on fire is because you are gripping the holds way too hard in fear.

Exercise to improve over-gripping: Get on a wall really low to the ground (like 30 cm) and start climbing sideways instead of upwards. Many gyms have boulder traverses for this purpose. See how loosely you can grip the holds without falling off. Pretend the holds are made of glass if that helps. Challenge yourself to hold so loosely that you actually fall, that way you will know how much energy you need to use.

Pro tip: engage your core! If you use your core muscles to stabilise your body when reaching for a hold, you will save a lot of energy. If you struggle to activate your core and tense your body, try doing a 30 sec – 1 min plank exercise before you get on the wall.

4. start out with bouldering

Bouldering, top roping, sport, lead, trad… Hold the insider lingo already! So basically, climbing happens on a tall wall, and you will be attached to a rope, some other lifesaving pieces of gear, and another person - your belayer. Bouldering, however, is climbing on low walls without a rope. All you need is a pair of shoes and some chalk for your fingers.

Most climbers I know like to combine bouldering with other forms of climbing because it is a great way to build power and practice technique. For beginners, it’s a low threshold entry into the world of climbing. You don’t really need any skills or learn gear technicalities, it’s just you and the wall. What I also love about bouldering is how social it is! You can go with a group of friends and help each other figure out the “problems”: each boulder is like a puzzle – and you need to piece together the series of movements that will get you to the top hold (with both hands!).

5. practice falling

The thought of falling can be super daunting. On a bouldering wall you will fall to the ground. On a top rope wall you won’t fall, but it can take a while to convince your brain that you are indeed attached to a rope that won’t break. New climbers typically hang onto the top rope for dear life when they are lowered instead of shaking out their tired arms. Don’t worry, you’ll get over it! (Falling while lead climbing is another matter, but we won’t cover that in this post).

Most bouldering gyms advise that you climb down. Let me insert some cheeky advice: practice jumping down a couple of times, if only from halfway up the wall. If you practice jumping down safely, chances are you will feel more comfortable should you actually slip.

Ironically, most beginners don’t usually fall because they over-grip and are sending routes that are almost impossible to fall off because the holds are so big. You will typically start falling more as you gain confidence and start challenging yourself to send harder routes.

Lead climbing fall practice and one very cemented knot

6. climb with someone you trust

Again, safety first. I was dropped once by a newbie belayer on a 15m wall. By some miracle, I managed to turn around in the air and self-arrest by grabbing the parallel top rope. But it was a terrible experience, and since then I’ve been extremely selective about who I let belay me (to the point where friends got a little offended). If I don’t trust my belayer, I can’t climb properly. Don’t ever do something that makes you feel uncomfortable, it’s completely okay to ask to watch someone belay before you let them belay you. Climbing should be fun and safe, you are literally holding someone’s life in your hands!

Fellow thru-hiker Jake and I have cultivated a one-year “belaytionship”. I call him the Soccer Mom because he refuses to lower me down until I’ve sent the route

7. hooked? Get your own gear!

Renting gear is a great option the first few times you go climbing, but quickly becomes a waste of money if you get hooked and want to pursue climbing as a serious hobby. Shoes are the most important piece of climbing gear, and individual shoe preference varies enormously. Your first pair should be beginner shoes, there is no point in torturing yourself trying to squeeze into those bird’s claw-like advanced shoes. Your shoes will not be comfortable, but they will widen out over time. Some people insist that climbing shoes should feel like Chinese foot binding – take this with a grain of salt. Climbing shoes are meant to be tight, but what’s the point of climbing at all if you can’t even stand on your feet?

As for the rest, you can find pretty cheap harnesses online. And remember: you only need one locking carabiner and belay device, so if you climb regularly with a friend you can share these between yourselves.

The La Sportiva Miura were my second pair of shoes, I still only use them for hard performance routes

For those of you who love climbing, it is also necessary to prepare some durable and non-deformable TPU Patches on equipment. They can protect your fragile clothing.

TPU patches

8. don’t overdo it

I know just how addictive climbing can be! It’s basically an entire subculture of hip, kombucha-drinking people. Iconic figures like Alex Honnold and Tommy Caldwell document their lives full of Clif bars, sunshine and sixpacks, and you wanna get there too. Climbing is cool. Climbing is rad. An ultimate sports combo of adventure, socialising and mental game, internal lingo, and g-e-a-r (omnomnom).

However. Don’t let your pursuit of on-the-wall greatness override your health. Your fingers are especially at risk of so-called pulley injuries. It takes a very long time to build strength in your tendons and ligaments. Much longer than it takes to build muscle. So, while you may feel strong and ready to take on the world, your fingers need a lot of careful attention. DO NOT start hangboarding or buy a high-tension finger strengthening device until you have climbed for at least a year. I made this mistake after climbing intensely for 3 months, and I got pulley injuries in four fingers. Not only did I have to take weeks off climbing and regressed considerably… I now have to tape my fingers every time I climb, be very careful with warmups and my fingers still hurt intermittently.

Slow and steady does it.

The H-taping technique keeps my fingers happy when I crimp down on small holds

9. progress requires effort

Climbing can be both a motivating and frustrating sport. Some people, usually the beanstalk of the friend group, have a natural advantage and appear stronger because they weigh less. Others seem fearless and quickly rise up the grades while you cling onto 5’es for the longest time. Natural advantage can feel sucky for those who don’t have it (I don’t have it).

However, the great thing about climbing is that once you get those hidden muscles going, you will notice a real difference in a short amount of time. In order to progress fast and steadily, I highly recommend climbing at least twice a week. 3x per week is ideal to get to an intermediate stage (grade 6) in relatively good time.

Sadly (#covid19), there is nothing that can mimic climbing. Alternative forms of exercise can’t maintain your climbing form, and you will find yourself regressing annoyingly fast if you ever take weeks off the wall. Hopefully you can find a gym not too far away from you, some good people to climb with, and dedicate a decent chunk of time for your awesome new hobby. Before you know it, you’ll be sending mountain routes in the sunset like a pro!