Training/Jens: There are several ways on how breathing can improve your climbing and here are some examples. You should try it out or even take some Yoga breathing lessons in order to best use your breathing while climbing.

1. Breath before you set of = Increase focus and concentration
2. Less nervous by thinking of how you breath
3. Get more alert/stronger by hyper ventilation (fast breathing)
4. Improved resting by slow, long and deep breathing
5. A focus on breathing will make you more relaxed while climbing
6. Hold your breath while doing the crux

Just close your eyes and focus on breathing and notice what happens in your body and soul and you are half way there.

Training/Jens: Let us say you have been going to the gym 2-3 times a week during the winter and now your next trip is just four weeks away. There is no universal trick to get a quick peak. It is individual and different for every sport/discipline but here are some guide lines that might help you to sit with that million-dollar-smile at the After climb.

Avoid power-endurance training, getting pumped and lactate. Instead you should focus on power training through bouldering for two weeks but make sure you rest enough so you do not get pumped.

The last two weeks you should let your muscles rest and just do volume training in order to maximize your blood circulation capacity. While doing your easy moves you could combine this with some technical and stretching drills like; High Step, Cross over, Dynoing, Speed climbing etc.

Every session during the four weeks, you could start with some recruitment training of the gripping position and steepness you most likely will be challenged on. Last and equally important, print out a tick list from the data base and do some analyses of which routes might suite you the best. Good Luck :-)

Debate/Jens: Analysing the moves and route reading will increase your chances of your next redpoint and onsight. However, to much thinking might reduce the fun, increase anxiety and will make you start hesitating. In the long run, the thinking might decrease your performances as the most important thing for your success is the "no thinking", i.e. your ability to move immediately by your instinct your will power.

The "no thinking" focus is especially important for the teenagers who are developing and setting their style and technique. The best thing is of course to have a trainer who is doing the thinking and can come with technical and tactical analyses and tips.

Training/Jens: Doing 10-15 metres routes indoors could initially be called power-endurance training. You normally get a mild pump, that only takes minutes to get rid of. After multiple routes, you feel a more burning pump, and you never fully recover. At that point we are talking endurance training. A boulderering session means power training. Instead of a pump you feel fatigue and sour. If you don't rest enough you will enter the power-endurance stage. Volume training means climbing on easy terrain, to maximize blood circulation. This is how you build capillaries in your forearms. It should feel like an extended warming pump, that keeps your forearm in perfect condition. Recruitment training is doing 1-2 moves to teach your muscles to use a higher percentage of their fibers. It is often done on a campus board. This is only for experienced climbers who want to work on a specific gripping strength. Other definitions are possible. Also, the forearm sensation often differs between climbers based on their training experience. In general, if you cannot get rid of the burning pump in your forearm, you should stop your session. Next time you train try to work with a lower load or longer rest periods.

Training/Jens: The fastest way to improve is normally just to spend a few hours doing unfamiliar moves. i.e. extend your repertoire. It is natural that you start your climbing career by developing your natural talent, establishing your repertoire. Your move repertoire is of course also based on what type of rock or gym you are spending most time.

Climbers with the most limited repertoire are often indoor climbers who do comfortable moves on straightforward routes. With gym season at its peak, here are some examples based on using all holds:

1. High step: Feet as high as possible and push to side/up until you sit.
2. Crossover: Feet high, reach to side and pro long several moves.
3. Match: Switch hands on every hold.
4. No hands rest: Experiment as you do outdoors.
5. Smear: Boulder only on micro foot steps.

Training/Jens: It is easy to quickly and significantly improve your crux move strength - by recruiting the specific muscles used in the move.  You do this by repeating the move over and over again. Your body will learn how to use a higher percentage of muscle fibers, for the specific gripping position and the finger angles. Furthermore, your body will learn to optimize your muscle coordination.

However, as you are working on the moves prior to the crux, you will actually lose your crux move power.  Different moves recruit different strength.

If you are falling on the same move every time, try spending extra time on that move alone.  This will help you recruit this specific crux move strength. This optimization might do the trick instead of repeatedly working the first moves, which actually might lower your crux move strength.

Training/Jens: Your endurance will improve if you can increase the blood circulation in your forearms.  That lets your arms work with more fresh blood, and gets rid of the used blood.

So how do you do it?  By 1) creating new capillaries, and 2) increasing the the size of old capillaries in your forearms.  You accomplish this by simply climbing as much as possible, on very easy terrain.

You should not get pumped.  Getting pumped is a sign that you don't have enough blood circulation. But you should climb as hard as you can without getting a pump.  The blood circulation produces small pressures in your forearms, which creates new capillaries and increases the size of the old ones.

Training/Jens: Endurance training can decrease your max power, as high levels of lactid acid break down your muscles. This means you can become weaker after getting a burning pump from an endurance session.

Never start a training session by doing very hard endurance exercises. Better to start off with some power drills and switch to endurance later. The best way is to divide your training into sessions or even periods.

There is almost no limit of how hard you can train power - as long as you don't get pumped. Endurance training can be counter-productive if you push yourself too hard.  If you are not around 80% recovered after 10 minutes rest, your muscles are at risk of losing performance...

Training/Jens: It is easy to lose power in your lower hand as you look up and put all your focus on sticking the next hold. Try this experiment.  Look at the fingers of your lower hand, and lock off.  You will be surprised how much power you have but are wasting, just because you are so focused on grabbing the next hold.

All top climbers do this automatically.  It may take a lot of training before you can put your focus and power on your lower hand, as all your concentration is on landing the next hold.

While you are pushing hard it is almost impossible to remember to do this.  So ask your friend to say, "Left, Right...etc". 

This works best doing semi-dynamic moves from pinches and side pulls.

Training/Jens: Your centre of gravity is normally moving on a straight line between the holds. If you do a swing move to the side you are normally making your centre of gravity moving in an upside curve as you are stronger in the start of the move.

In the same way you could opt for doing an inside curve when you dynamically move upwards. This means that you should aim for a point below the next hold. This will create an inside swing to the next hold and you will climb like the best :-)