Mere Mortal's Guide to Beasting the Beastmaker 45° Slopers

The Beastmaker 2000 is a wooden hangboard produced by a couple of lads in the UK and is now available worldwide. It's good. I've posted about it before. My board was in the first shipment to hit Australia back in 2009.

Anyway let's get down to business. You're reading this because you are a mere mortal like me and the Beastmaker slopers feel impossible to hang.

Beastmaker 2000 has three sloper angles: 20°, 35° and 45°.

Beastmaker 2000 grip layout

I naturally favour an open-hand grip and avoid crimps (opposite of most people) so when I got my board I could immediately do a couple of chinups on the 35° slopers. Some people I coach who are good climbers struggle to even hang these. Don't worry if this is you.

In your quest for the 45° chinup, you'll need to get comfortable on the 35°'s. 

Before doing anything

• Warm up thoroughly. If I go to my board now and try to hit the slopers I will immediately fall off. They'll feel impossible. It is vital to warm up these grips. Do some bouldering. Use easier grips like the 20° sloper. Spend 20 minutes or so building up the squeeze you're going to need.
  

Cheating

• Nestling your fingers into the ridges, using your thumb, or any other kind of malarky to provide assistance is only cheating yourself. I also find that it doesn't help with progression on the slopers. Follow my guide below instead.
  
  

Grip on the 45°s

A word on grip

• I always thought maximising the amount of skin on the wood was the key to success. However, as soon as I begun work on the 45°s, I realised that the best grip was two pads only as shown above.

Stage 1

• 5 chinups on the 20° sloper. Should be easy for most climbers.

Stage 2 - Beasting the 35°'s

• Deadhang the 35° slopers. If you're struggling, put one hand on the 20° and the other on the 35°. Hang this for as long as you can, then switch. You'll notice a tendency to barndoor as you do this because the grip on the 20° is much stronger than the grip on the 35°. Control this!
• Once deadhangs are no problem, start chinups. You will find it is hardest to control the down part of the motion. Make sure you have a mat under your board as you could fall hard on your tailbone.
• Work up to about 5 very controlled chinups (in a row). Once you're at this point you're ready for Stage 3.

Stage 3 - The Dreaded 45°s!

• You're not going to be able to deadhang the 45°s straight away. So we are going to share grips. One hand on a 35°, the other on the 45°. Deadhang, and twirl off gracefully (you'll see what I mean). Now swap. You're building up the squeeze power on the 45°s.
• Mixed-grip chinups. One hand on a 35°, the other on the 45°. Chinup (and down) cleanly. Swap.
• Multiple mixed-grip chinups. One hand on a 35°, the other on the 45°. Chinup (and down) cleanly TWICE. You're now on the cusp, hang in there. Once you can do THREE of these it's time. Get the video camera.
• Chinup the 45°s. You'll most likely slip off on the way back down. Keep at it and nail your first clean 45° chinup! FEEL THE POWER! Now update your Facebook status.

How often? How long?

• Let motivation be your guide. One or two sessions a week, with your other climbing and training should do it. From the point when I could do a handful of clean chinups on the 35°s, I was 10 sessions away from my first 45° chinup (doing 1-2 sessions a week). I was doing a fairly standard hangboard session (crimps, pockets etc.) with slopers thrown in at the end. Your mileage may vary. Let me know if this works for you.

Board/skin prep

• Get a big soft brush for brushing slopers between each attempt. Like a dustbin brush. Really helps.
• Chalk up, wipe off any excess, then breathe hot warm air onto your fingers.

Humidity

• In a stark opposite to regular rock climbing, humidity makes a HUGE difference - it's good! If it is cold and dry you are going to struggle your arse off. I did my first 45 chinup in pouring rain, 100% humidity and high temperature. I was training regularly and keeping notes, and this humidity manifested in ridiculous personal bests on the board.

Different boards

• I am assured that well-loved boards (UK Climbing Works) are waaaay easier to use the slopers on. Oils exuding from people's skin seep into the wood and affect friction. By all accounts, The Works' board is sticky.
• As you can imagine, 1° makes a big freakin difference. If you or someone else has installed the board on a surface that isn't exactly plumb, you're going to be in trouble, either in a good or bad way. Use an angle-finder to measure your slopers and ensure they're spot on.

If you have any other great sloper tips or frictional insights, please share in the comments.

45 degree climbing holds - Upskill/ICP collaboration

I recently expanded my home climbing wall, adding a big 45 degree wall. It was the one key angle I had been missing. When I went through my hold collection to see which holds were most suitable for going on the 45 I discovered a bit of a pattern. Holds were either too big and juggy and I could campus on them. Or they were too small or slopey to do anything other than bump off or compress with because they were actually designed for less steep walls. And pinches. God, it seemed like everything I put on the 45 turned into a pinch. I have 500+ holds to choose from on my woody, and yet I struggled to find small, powerful edges that would work correctly on the 45 (edges which worked on my 30 and 40 degree walls often weren't good enough for the 45). So I started shaping some holds out of wood and they are great, if a tad unrefined :)

I was then approached by Rob from Indoor Climbing Productions (a very cool, local climbing hold company) who suggested I have a try at shaping up some holds using molding clay. That was quite a learning process! I knew what I wanted, but sculpting it in clay was something else entirely. Anyway, after some trial and error I shaped my first set, and Rob set about taking my initial designs and crafting the holds. I am stoked with the result. The holds climb fantastically. Some of them are little flat one-pad edges (great for powerful, long movements) and others are fiendish half pads which really require some power. Have a look at the pics:

Holds shaped in clay

The finished set!!

One pad

One pad, a micro jug

My favourite hold. You can use it on every orientation. Half pad.

Very powerful half pad hold. Love this one.

Little dogbone, less incut but bigger active surface.

So if you have a steep home climbing wall and are keen to check these out, you can pop over to Upskill Climbing Gear and grab a set. Make sure you give me some feedback too. I will be keen to shape and design some more goodies over the coming months.

Upskill/ICP 45deg Edge Set (S)

$40.00 $34.95

Add To Cart

Why you shouldn't build a campus board

Thinking of building a campus board? Please read this...

My article How to build a campus board is the most popular piece of content on my site. It drives more traffic to Upskill Climbing than any other article. And I feel bad about that. Why?

Because you shouldn't be campussing.

Wolfgang Gullich was climbing 8c+ and pushing world standards into 9a when he developed the campus board. He needed to develop specific levels of recruitment for the one and two finger pockets of Action Direct and other pocketed Frankenjura testpieces. And we all idolize Wolfy. So climbers around the world saw him build a board, and we copied him.

The issue is that Wolfy identified his prime weakness (recruitment) and built a device to train this. For him, this was the right thing to do. But for you - I doubt it. As a climbing coach, I can say that I have not met one climber in the last three years for whom recruitment is their prime weakness. Campus boarding will not help.

The repetitive movements do not transfer well to real climbing. And campussing is dangerous to boot. It's about the most dangerous training method there is. Most people think it's the fingers that suffer, but in most cases it's the elbows and shoulders.

What should you do instead?

If it's finger strength you're after, build up slowly on the hangboard, or do short, steep bouldering. Bouldering is useful because the moves incorporate real climbing, where you develop technique as well as strength.

It's time to turn our backs on the campus board. Unless you climb 8c and are gearing up for the Frankenjura!

See also:
The four things you need to train and aren't
and
What do I need to train? And how!?

Video: Dave MacLeod training on his home wall

Here's a recent video of training guru Dave MacLeod training on his home wall. Dave says "1 hour on my board equals about 2 in a climbing wall and 4 outdoors." He also notes that with the volume he's doing (i.e. every day) he's treading a fine line between training hard and getting injured.

Watch Tommy train. And talk about stuff.

Everyone knows Tommy Caldwell. He chopped a bit of his finger off (for weight saving?) but climbs like a man possessed. He seems to do everything well (bouldering, sport climbing, trad, bigwall), and because of this and his seemingly neverending supply of motivation, he is the man at the forefront of freeing massive routes on El Cap. Here, thanks to Cedar Wright we get a glimpse into some of the training he does.

A Day in The Life of Tommy Caldwell from Cedar Wright on Vimeo.

Psyche up video - School Room training

Need some motivation to hit some training?

Beastmaker doth come!

Over the oceans, around the world. Washed ashore like a piece of driftwood comes a wand of magical properties. Promises of strength echo around the vast reaches of the interweb.

It has arrived at my door.

Others would call it a very expensive piece of wood. I call it Beastmaker.

Pic courtesy Beastmaker.co.uk

I've mounted the Beastmaker on my campus board. This was the position of my Moon Board and I really liked having it there as it allowed me to do some really innovative power/recruitment training I call "On-Off's" which combines the recruitment benefits of campussing with the grip specificity and hypertrophy of fingerboarding.

On-Off's Example 1: Start with your lower hand down low on a campus rung, your upper hand on one of many grip types on the board, and then explode upwards as far as possible with your lower hand, going as high up the campus board as possible, then match.

On-Off's Example 2 (harder): Start hanging with both hands on a low campus rung, campus one hand up onto the board (various grip options), then campus up beyond it in one fluid move as far as possible, then match.

Because the campus board is on an angle of 12°, I needed to build a kickboard to create a vertical mounting surface. This is pretty vital considering the Beastmaker has 45° slopers to hang! (these are NAILS, I haven't come close - yet!). The wood feels so nice to train on. I look forward to many sessions with my new toy.

The old much loved Moon Board got the heave ho over to The Coffin.

The Coffin

So amongst the other walls, boards and weird torture devices in Pain Land, we now have something new. I call it 'The Coffin', and you could definitely fit a body in it.

I built it on Sunday afternoon primarily as a hangboard-mounting solution. A lot of people mount their hangboards above doorways, but I wanted something that would be multi-use. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. I'll be able to include it in my longer circuits by climbing from one of my walls onto this, across it, and then back across on to the main wall. I'll probably also fill in the roof between this and the main wall.

The hangboard height sits perfectly at my hand level when they're fully extended above my head. Now, I'm just waiting on my Beastmaker board!

Pain Land accolades

The Upskill woody, Pain Land has picked up second place in Urban Climber's 'Show Us Your Woody' competition.

Representin' for Down Under.



They're continuing to run the comp, so if you've got some good wood, send it through.

Limited space climbing options

I think the lesson from the Beastmaker boys is BE INVENTIVE!

How to build a campus board

If you search the web, you'll end up with a whole bunch of different sites claiming to tell you how to build a campus board. The problem is, the whole point of having a campus board is to eventually be able to pull 1-5-9, at which point your body will turn into pure energy and you will become immortal. And you can't say you've done 1-5-9 unless your board is built to standard specifications.

The standard we should all be working to is the School Room Campus Board in the UK (pictured left).

Campus Board Standard Specifications

• Board angle: 12.5 degrees.
• Rung spacing: 22cm from top of rung, to top of rung.
• Rung depth/size: Anywhere from about 1cm to 3.5cm. Some wide boards have several different sizes on them. As a general rule, 6c - 7c climbers should choose a larger rung and 7c+ climbers should choose a smaller rung (about a pad depth).
• Rung incut: No! Purists say - perpendicular to the board! Unless you're going to buy something like the ready-made Metolius Campus Rungs which have a very slight incut.
• Degree of rung-edge smoothing: This is variable. Ensure enough to avoid undue pain, but not so much so as to decrease the effective flat contact surface.
• Rung friction: This is a variable based on wood type, smoothness, temperature, humidity.

Fun facts about 1-5-9 on the Moon Board

• 22cm spacing
• First movement of 88cm, second movement of 88cm*
• Total travel of 176cm
• *This does not take into account the fact of the shorter distance between rungs 8 and 9 on the School Room Board.

Things to watch out for

• Don't build your board all the way to the floor. It has to be suspended. Ideally, the first rung should be around eye level. If you build it to the floor you can't hang freely
• Pre-drill through your rungs to avoid them splitting when you mount them
• Drive your screws all the way through the rung, board, and into the supports behind, and finish each screw by hand
• Don't overtrain. First sign of pain = stop

Left: The original Wolfgang Gullich board in Germany

Keywords: campus board plans, campus board regulations, campusboard, campussing, training finger strength, training power, training contact strength








2010 edit:
This is the most popular article on my site. This saddens me :) So, now you know how to build one, here's why you shouldn't.

Using circuits to train power endurance

Circuits. The training tool of champions. There's not many top climbers I know of that don't use this technique, or something very similar. This is the cornerstone of my training, and the foundation of my Upskill Climbing Coaching regime. So what are circuits?

- 25 moves of hard climbing (60 seconds to complete)
- 3 minutes rest
- repeat (the exact same series of moves) x10

The difficulty should be pitched so you're failing right at the end of the last lap. That's perfect. Not only will you be building your power endurance, you'll also have a great benchmarking tool to see how you're progressing over time.

This image has some notes which explain how you might set up a circuit on a small home wall.

Upskill Climbing Coaching Videos

So here's some ideas for exercises you might like to put into your own training. Our Upskill Climbing Coaching 'model climber' in these exercises is Garry the machine. Thanks Gaz.

Assisted One Arm Lock-Off


Why they're good: You're building lock-off power, and also firing the muscles eccentrically (during the downward motion) which is a good thing. This is the exercise to do if you want to build up to a one arm pullup.

Eccentric Pulldowns


Why they're good: These are a favourite for building power. Your muscles are being put under greater than bodyweight stress as they are lengthening throughout the eccentric phase.

Frenchies


Why they're good: It's a pullup variation exercise. Locking off at 90 and 120 degrees is tough, especially when you're tired. Try doing a few of these in a row without resting.

Pushup Flys


Why they're good: Pushups are always a good exercise for climbers because we have a tendency to overdevelop our lats and shoulders and not develop the pecs enough which causes a muscular imbalance, and bad posture to boot. Adding flys with weights causes instability in the core, so the core has to fire hard to maintain tension through the body, which is fantastic for climbers.

How to build a climbing wall - and use it properly!

Home walls can be as simple or as elaborate as you want to make them, but for the purposes of this article, I’m going to discuss the ways in which you can use a simple two-panel wall (see diagram). This is the cheapest and easiest home wall to build. There are plenty of ways to train on these, but I’m going to tell you what worked for me. If you don’t have a home wall you can adapt this program to the local gym.

The setup

If you've only got a small two panel wall, 40 to 45 degrees should be the angle you’re working at. If you’re climbing routes, go for 40. If you’re mostly into bouldering, go for 45. Get as many holds as you can cheaply. Don’t be afraid to make some out of wood, and drill holes through river rocks too. Variety is key. No need for an overabundance of super jugs, just enough to warm up. This wall is small, so it should be difficult to climb on. Be careful of holds that have sharp angles and hurt to hold – avoid these!

Adjustable two panel wall. By "panel" we mean a 2400x1200mm sheet of 17mm plywood.

A warm-up circuit

Develop a problem that starts in a sit on the edge of the board, climbs up, traverses, down and back to the starting position. Nothing too tweaky. It should be reasonably difficult to climb and take a few goes to get the first time you try it. It should be roughly 12-15 moves. Once you’re happy with the moves and providing it flows well, mark it with coloured tape. That’s now your warm-up problem and once you’ve done it a few more times, you won’t fall off it. In future sessions, you’ll warm up by doing some skipping/jogging plus some push-ups and pull-ups prior to climbing, so you’ll already be pretty warm before getting on this problem. Down the track, you’ll aim to do two laps of the problem, then three etc. Remember to warm up gradually each session. Avoid a debilitating flash pump by taking rest when you feel that burning pump start to develop. By increasing difficulty gradually through the session you’ll be able to climb better, for longer.

Developing problems

After you’re warmed up, work by yourself or with a partner to develop problems. These will usually be between three and eight moves. Anything that you get within a try or two is probably too easy and need not be recorded, but if you have to work pretty hard for a problem, mark it up with coloured stickers or tape, and add it to your problem list. I use a spreadsheet. Give it an arbitrary number as a grade, and then you can compare this to future problems you do, and also easily sort the list based on difficulty. Once the quality of your climbing (your strength on moves) decreases, it’s time to rest or finish up with some stretching.

Future sessions

As you continue developing problems, your list will grow. Once you’ve got around 15-20 problems, you can alter your session structure slightly. What you can now aim to do is session your existing problems. Sort the problem list based on difficulty, and work your way through your problems which will gradually get more difficult. It’s amazing how your body learns how to do a given problem, and something that once took you 20 goes may go first or second try. You’re not only developing power, you’re also developing technique and knowledge of body positions. Once again, stop climbing before you start to thrash. Quality over quantity.

What some people don’t realise is that random climbing on a wall like this isn’t really training. To train effectively, you need to have benchmarks. A list of problems you can work against will allow you to chart your progress.

Good luck – and remember to keep it fun!

Building a Rockclimbing Training Plan

Someone recently emailed me with a question about training:

"Hi Lee, I have been training fingers about 2-3 times a week using a modified 'Moon' climbing session. Basic training for me at the moment is based on hangboarding and bouldering or bouldery routes (aka Nowra in winter). Do you have a session based on power endurance or resistance? I think this is where I am lacking? I have never really trained this effectively. Do you have any ideas?"

Sounds like you're really gunning for power and finger strength. That's great IF that's a particular weakness of yours. It was for me a year ago, and I've seen good gains by training like you are, but I wouldn't do it indefinitely.

My program is heavily based on Rockprodigy’s periodised training plan.

It focuses around there being three main areas you want to train (he also talks about ARC but you can read up on that)...

FOCUS 1. Hypertrophy (power, finger strength, building the muscles)
• 4-6 week phase length
• What you're doing now (hangboarding, 4*4's, powerful bouldering [up to 8 moves])
• I use the same system Rockprodigy uses for hangboarding and my hangboard log looks like this.
• H.I.T.
• free weights
• weighted hangs & pullups
• climbing with a small amount of weight on a weight belt (Don’t overdo this. Start with 2kg)
• static systems training

FOCUS 2. Maximum recruitment (making the most of the muscles you’ve built - making them "smarter")
• 2-3 weeks phase length
• Moon Campus session
• There are ways of training recruitment on a pullup bar if you don't have access to a campus board. They usually revolve around exercises that make you pullup as fast as possible, lower slowly to the bottom, and then explode back up as quickly as possible. Repeat.
• Limit moves. You can train recruitment on the bouldering wall by doing short (1-3 move) problems at the absolute maximum limit of your ability. Have a decent (1-2 minute) rest between tries.

FOCUS 3. Power Endurance
• 2-6 weeks phase length. You can expect to “peak” during this phase.
• Circuits on a home wall or boulder gym. Circuits are set problems usually 20 to about 50 moves in length that start and finish on the same hold. Training circuits involves completing the circuit in a set amount of time, and then having a defined period of rest (usually three times the climbing time) then repeating it. I do this 10 times with my circuits. If you don’t complete the circuit, get back on and keep track of which move you fall off each time.

• “Hourglass” at the climbing gym

mod route 3 times | mod route 3 times | mod route 3 times
hard route 2 times | hard route 2 times
extreme route once
hard route 2 times | hard route 2 times
mod route 3 times | mod route 3 times | mod route 3 times

• Projecting (several attempts on a hard climb) or doing volume at the crag.

FOCUS 4. Rest (gotta include this in the plan!)
• 1-2 weeks of rest
• Training doesn't make you stronger. Training shocks your body. Your body then tries to adapt and grow stronger to cope with the training stress. It can only do this effectively during rest periods. You accumulate stress in your body while you're climbing and training and even elite climbers must take off chunks (weeks) of time each year in order to heal up and get back to 100%. If you don't rest enough, you'll be forced to rest due to injury or a performance/motivational collapse.

What if I don't want to follow a strict plan?
If you don't want to phase them strictly like I've outlined, that's fine -- you can train them all together but it isn't as effective. Right now, I'm not doing the phased (or periodised) plan as such because I'm not setting myself up to "peak". But I do choose a training focus, work it for a while, then shift focus. If you keep doing the same training (e.g. climbing gym twice a week) your body will simply adapt and you won't get gains, you'll just maintain.

If you want to combine different elements into a single week of training make sure you do hypertrophy/power first, then maximum recruitment, then endurance work last. Two days rest after a power session is wise. I am training/climbing three or four days a week on average at the moment. Elite climbers manage to climb and train six days a week, but most of us will never be able to devote the time required to get to this level.

THE IMPORTANT STUFF!
• Start things gradually. Small increases in volume/intensity will ensure your body has time to adapt.
• Emphasise quality over quantity always. A quality one hour session is better than three hours of thrashing.
• Don’t train through pain. Stop! Or suffer the injurious consequences!
• Look at why you are failing on routes/problems. Focus on that for a while. Then repeat - find the next weakness and switch focus. If you keep doing the same training your body will adapt and you won't get gains, you'll just maintain.
• The biggest "secret" to improvement: Increase the volume and/or intensity of training and climbing you do over time.

Keywords: periodization, periodisation, supercompensation, phased training, training cycles