optimum weight for a climber

Chris Sharma is 183 cm and weighs around 74 which is his natural weight. Different climbers have different natural weights. As soon as you start to manipulate with your weight you will suffer mentally. I do think that you for certain short periods can manipulate your weight but in the long run you will always loose. PS I am not Dr 8a.

Thanks for the answer Jens! However,I do not quite understand why the "mental" suffering.I have read that it causes muscle mass loss,but haven´t heard anything about mental yet. Can you explain it a little bit more?

What an earth is a "natural weight"??? There´s no such thing. Maybe you mean a weight that stays about the same whatever you do? What is a natural weight for let´s say me? I have been anything between 80-115 kilos during my adult life and always felt very natural. Manipulating weight is an excellent way to climb harder. There´s no psychological barrier or if there is it´s for the good. If you cut down your weight in a smart way you keep your strength and endurance. You climb harder when you´re lighter. That´s not from me, it´s mr Newton a while ago :) It´s obviously easier to move 60 kilos for 40 meters up than 70 kilos etc.

If you go for a hard diet, obviously you have to sacrifice something and in the long run you would not be as happy as when you can eat whatever you want. I would also like to add, that once you try to start perform on a competition or on a travel, you are more likely to get anxiety if you do not produce. You will be thinking, "so much focus on diet and I am just as "bad" as I used to be." As climbing performance is extreamely depending on your mental strength and as it involves so much thinking, compared to other sports, you should avoid mental stress through a diet. Your natural weigth is what you weigh when you are 20, more or less.

Of course mr Newton is right,and of course is easier to move 60 kg up rather than 70 kg. But the point of my question to dr 8a was,where is the optimal balance between weight and height for someone around 183 cm. Hipothetically speaking,if I were to lose let´s say 10 kg now,I´m sure that apart from the fat that would be also a lot of muscle,and I would be left skinny.I think it´s questionable whether that would improve my climbing and i guess would be unhealthy.But I am the one asking,so I do not know for sure,that´s why I asked :)

Well..  its not the kg in it self that matter, its the muscle/fat %. And where you muscles are. And your fat % is a big factor in climbing. I read a study that compared good climbers, versus elite climbers, and the fat % was a very big factor in there performance. I try to loose some weight before I go on climbing trips, and eat more during hard training. And you dont have to go on a diet to loose some weight. You can do some running, say in the morning before breakfast. And natural weight is not a good term to use. if you have low metabolism and dont train you natural weight would not be good for climbing performace. What you are looking for is optimal weight for climbing. That depends on you bone size etc. But low fat % is a key factor in climbing.

The natural weight is not a word I would use at all. There´s no such thing. If there´s something that should be used it might even have something to do with BMI. So Sharma´s BMI is about 22. For not that muscular person like Sharma that´s quite normal (20-25). Then  again you have Graham and Ondra etc who look like anorexic girls when rudely said. Still performing quite adequately :) Diets won´t have to be so spartan that you´re starving all the time. Not at all. And: happiness comes from different things for different people so someone would actually enjoy the diet as he knows it´s gonna do good for the performance. Same thing like training. It´s not always nice but it will do good for you. Cutting the weight down is natural for every sport where you have to move your own body like long jump, gymnastics, running etc. I think you actually gain mental edge when you´re lighter. There´s no extra weight to carry etc. I think there´s no link to anxiety levels but of course that´s a personal thing. The overall anxiety comes anyway if ticking record grades is your goal and you´re not used to high stresses. Handling the mental stress is an all around thing in climbing too and it should be trained as well as other skills. About losing muscle: it´s true that you always lose muscle when you diet and not just fat. It depends a lot of how you´ll execute the diet. I myself lost about 25 kilos in 5 months when I moved from weights to climbing years ago. When I did some testing along the way I noticed almost no loss in general strength like deadlifts etc even if I cut so much weight off. Climbing is in good position as you really don´t need that much muscle as the main performance is neural. So no need for a lot of cross sectional size but make your neural forces more effective. And if you keep climbing during the well planned diet you won´t lose that much even from your "climbing" muscles. For your exact question I think there´s no such thing as a optimal or natural or whatever weight. It depends on many things like body structure itself. Keep you BMI around 20 and you´re close. Lose a couple of kilos before road trips and fly up those routes :) Cheers.

An "ideal" weight for a given eight will always be a scope rather than a specific value... you can have naturally heavy/light bones, or be very thin or large depending on your bone structure rather than on your flesh, and these aspects cannot be changed. Unless you are naturally a skinny person, there is nothing good in maintaining or forcing your body into that direction... Normal weights (BMI) exposed in magazines are not appropriate when it comes to athletes. Muscle is heavy, but healthy. Considering that climbing is about lifting yourself up by sollicitating muscles and tendons, you must simply try to carry as little "dead" weight as possible. That includes fat, and muscle mass which is not necessary... for example, a guy doing a lot of sprint running will have tree trunk instead of thighs, but these muscles won't be too helpful when it comes to climbing... Also, be aware of the fact that certain exercises will develop your muscle volume (and your weight) without greatly increasing your power or endurance on those same muscle groups...

I'd say "optimal" weight is very subjective.   it is clear that too much fat and leg muscles are unwanted mass (attention : extremely low body fat, less than 7% or so, is dangerous for your health, so they say in a book at least...). but then, it really depends. Do you want to be super-strong on small crimpers and excel at vertical/slightly overhanging tests? It must be admitted that climbers with a naturally skinnier frame do better. Why? Because for static moves on small holds strenght-to-weight ratio must be calculated for forarms and fingers in the first place. If you think that forearms are relatively small muscles that won't weight a lot even when they look "massive", that you can't grow infinitely strong finger tendons and that also your skin can't bear infinite pressure without cutting and tearing and eventually slipping off really small holds, you understand why... On the contrary if you look at fontainebleau hardmen and most of them are heavily muscled, because the typical compression moves on slopers are harder on your big muscles than on fingers... so, the ideal weight? the lowest you can achieve with only a moderate attention and healty eating, because anyway if you are generally fit you can always find a climbing style where your frame shines. Let your body be your friend...

Hi Enigma You have a lot of answer allready below is my view with a background 30 years in sports medicine/physiology research 1. there is certainly an optimum weight for each individual in each sport - it would take some testing and deliberating to calculate yours for this purpose but... 1. you need to keep your weight down so body fat should be 8-10% - any lower and you will be more prone to infection and injury as well as healing less well 2 you need a certain amount of muscle but muscle is the heaviest tissue in the body ( the bone mass is not a factor - the difference between a heavily boned individuel and a lightly boned one , both weighting the same , does not differ more than a couple of hektograms!) so back, shoulder,arms and abdominal muscles but avoid adding leg muscles - it easily gained and hard to loose. as pointed out - how much muscle and what body part to build depend on your physique and your climbing goals (boulder, overhanging, sloopers etc.- all favor slightly different physiques) your training should be focusing on building strength and endurance in climbing not on pumping up muscle. read up on my article -"Does climbers have to be scarecrow skinny?" in the forum as well as the article on taking care of your hands (gives some insight into specific strenght training). If you have a hard time finding the articles I can mail them to you finally as long as you stay healthy, have enought strengt to do the moves and perform better over time there is a great benefit in keeping your body weight as low as possible in order to climb your best give it your best Björn

no mather what your weight is, it is super importen that you gain as much strenght as possibly - but still keep the same weight. so what there is importen is weight to strenght ratio - and climbing teknik!!! it is ok to weight 120kg.  if you still can do the campus moves just like the "strong" 60kg. climbers.  if not - loose some kg's it is highly individuelly. 183cm vs. 74 kg. sounds perfekt. unless you would look like a female modell?? :-) keep your weight at 74 - but work on the max. strenght to rise it. to be able to do 25+ pull-ups and one-arm campus hang for 5 sec. can be a nice goal.

Dr 8a, Any good way to lose muscle mass on the legs ?

wheelchair ;-) no serious, Check your nutrition and change it to a well diet - low carb would be the best. Reduce the calories and avoid doing hard intensive exercises for your legs. Dont forget to eat a lot of protein: 2g/kg body weight is minimum if you train hard (two times a day, 4 hours and more) during a low-calorie Diet

Train two times a day,4 hours or more? Mate,what´s your job?I think I´m going to change my university degree,I also want so much time to train :) :) :)

been woundering about how to lose some muscles in the legs myself.. lets hear it professor 8A

@ Enigma: Get rid of your Tv and your computer ;-)