Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Climbing, But Were Afraid To Ask

[rydra_wong]

This is a post where you can ask all the questions you're always wanted to ask about climbing, whether you've already started or are just beginning to think about maybe possibly kind of giving this a try.

Or maybe you've been climbing for decades, and have always wondered about that one thing, and by now it would be OMG TOO EMBARASSING to admit you don't know.

No topics are off-limit, no questions too clueless, so let rip and get answers from demi-n00bs experienced climbers.

Comments

[zennish]

My two cents here (as an un-athletic geek whose 'climbing' is more like 'flailing' atm) is that you won't know until you try. Much of climbing is core strength and legs, and until you get to the higher grades with the pinchy little holds, much of the bigger, fatter holds are nice and grippable. That isn't to say that climbing isn't going to hurt your finger tendons - chances are it will, at least a little at first - but there are many more techniques of climbing that involve using your hips, lowering your centre of gravity and leveraging yourself up without having to drag yourself up the wall with your fingers.

I would suggest finding a gym with friendly people and doing a drop-in class when your hands have been feeling happy for a little while. Stretch and warm-up your hands: v. v. important - I look like an idiot when flinging them around, but there you go. Ask the employees there what their absolute easiest routes are, and try it out super-slow. There may be holds that you absolutely cannot use, and hand/grip positions that will make you yelp. There's probably also going to be holds and positions that won't be any trouble at all. You might also find that your strength/skill exceeds your finger strength - in that case, you have to be very careful about not rushing your fingers to match your skill: generally speaking they both have to match or you start hurting.

Climbing may totally not be your sport based on your hands, but it totally might be, too! Like rydra says above, there's a whole bunch of climbing movements that differ from day to day movements.

tl;dr