Finger Strength Goals
Are my fingers strong enough to climb V8? There isn't a ton of information out there to be honest. Lattice have the biggest database and occasionally drip feed some nuggets of info such as Alex Megos can hold 130% of his body weight on one hand. Wow!! BEAST! Steve McClure posted on his facebook that he can 'only' do body weight or slightly less. Let's give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he can do 100% on a Rainman 9b day.
The best info I have found is a study conducted by Beast Fingers Climbing Research - "Optimising Muscular Strength to Weight Ratios in Rock Climbing" by Aman Anderson, published March 2018. TrainingBeta put the link up on their instagram a while back and I downloaded it. They actually include all of the test results in the paper Appendix. So I did my own analysis, with the hope that it would shed some light on where I need to be to reach my goals.
Here are some stats from the paper:
So young and light! They tested on a 19mm edge that was in-cut 15 degrees and used a load measurement device to determine the forces generated by each climber. I played with the data and came up with a couple of graphs. Note that the numbers are averages. I haven't shown the ranges and I haven't distinguished between male and female. I figured if I can hit the average values or higher, I should be good to go.
And based on these plots I have decided that the magic number, the target finger strength to weight ratio to climb V8 and 5.13 is...drum roll please....80%!
So I tested myself....
At the time of testing I was 175 lbs (79.4 kg). I used the lattice board, which has a 20 mm edge. Lattice recommend the half crimp but due to surgery a few years ago my right pointer finger is super weak and tweaky in the crimp position. So I opted for the open crimp.
I hung kettle bells off my waist and gradually increased the weight until I failed between 7 and 10 seconds. Here are the results:
Body Weight: 79.4 kg
Extra Weight: 28 kg
Total Weight: 107.4 kg
Strength/Weight Per Hand: 107.4 / 79.4 / 2 * 100 = 67.6%
When I did the test I was climbing V5s indoors pretty quick but was definitely stuck. Anything harder than V6 felt impossible and my results confirmed why. I simply wasn't strong enough to climb harder. Yeah maybe I could finesse my way up a V6/7 that fitted my style but my fastest route to becoming a V8 and 5.13 climber was to work on my strength to weight ratio and to hit that 80% goal. Game on.
The best info I have found is a study conducted by Beast Fingers Climbing Research - "Optimising Muscular Strength to Weight Ratios in Rock Climbing" by Aman Anderson, published March 2018. TrainingBeta put the link up on their instagram a while back and I downloaded it. They actually include all of the test results in the paper Appendix. So I did my own analysis, with the hope that it would shed some light on where I need to be to reach my goals.
Here are some stats from the paper:
So young and light! They tested on a 19mm edge that was in-cut 15 degrees and used a load measurement device to determine the forces generated by each climber. I played with the data and came up with a couple of graphs. Note that the numbers are averages. I haven't shown the ranges and I haven't distinguished between male and female. I figured if I can hit the average values or higher, I should be good to go.
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| I took the liberty of adding a couple of extras to this one |
And based on these plots I have decided that the magic number, the target finger strength to weight ratio to climb V8 and 5.13 is...drum roll please....80%!
So I tested myself....
At the time of testing I was 175 lbs (79.4 kg). I used the lattice board, which has a 20 mm edge. Lattice recommend the half crimp but due to surgery a few years ago my right pointer finger is super weak and tweaky in the crimp position. So I opted for the open crimp.
I hung kettle bells off my waist and gradually increased the weight until I failed between 7 and 10 seconds. Here are the results:
Body Weight: 79.4 kg
Extra Weight: 28 kg
Total Weight: 107.4 kg
Strength/Weight Per Hand: 107.4 / 79.4 / 2 * 100 = 67.6%
When I did the test I was climbing V5s indoors pretty quick but was definitely stuck. Anything harder than V6 felt impossible and my results confirmed why. I simply wasn't strong enough to climb harder. Yeah maybe I could finesse my way up a V6/7 that fitted my style but my fastest route to becoming a V8 and 5.13 climber was to work on my strength to weight ratio and to hit that 80% goal. Game on.
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