this porridge is too hot

This porridge pumped the fugg out of me: hangs_20110224_1.xlsx. Massive failure occurred around the halfway point.

This porridge was just right: hangs_20110224_2.xlsx

welcome to Hurtsville, population: me

It was about last Thursday that I said I would not do another 40-minute hangboard routine. That sentiment lasted until yesterday when I conceived of a 40-minute routine that would be harder. So, It sucked. But I’m psyched I did it. I did actually do it too. And I’m going to hold up this routine as my gnastiest to date. It was supremely gnasty and I believe it represents significant improvement in my endurance or, at least, in my hangboarding capacity.

hangs_20110221.xlsx

in a word: long

I went for the 40-minute set yesterday. It was long. It was more than I care to do again. Music helped. My skin started to fall apart causing me to miss an early set taping a tear on my right ring finger. That’s ok – I enjoyed the remaining 92 sets. Total time hanging was 15:18. By the time a pump started in my forearms, around minute 28, I was super warmed up; so it wasn’t the sharp, searing kind of pump. It was manageable. There never was much doubt I would finish. I planned this routine to span only 1.5 sine periods over its entirety. That meant back-to-back sets on constant holds. This turned out to be really enjoyable, giving me some time to acclimate in a single position.

hangs_20110216.xlsx

this would be easier with Tony

Yesterday’s hangboard session was good stuff. Finally my plan is coming together. Small holds felt small. Big holds felt pumpy. I’m getting a practical sense for how to combine varying durations and intensities to simulate what feels like a full-length sport route. So I’m getting pumped. And my performance, in these sets anyway, is improving, specifically and noticeably.

hangs_20110215.xlsx

Yesterday felt so good I’m thinking today I’ll increase an 18-minute set to 40. Super scientific, I know. But if I save my breath I feel a man like me can manage it. Clearly this would be easier with Tony Horton.

PS – This would not actually be easier with Tony. I would actually be really bummed if he worked out with me on the hangboard. Tony’s hair is stupid.

From Thursday With Love

It’s Monday but this hangboard set is from Thursday. It was a bit scary. Being my third consecutive day of hangboard sets, plus climbing, my fingers were feeling breakable. Note to self: warm up better (dumbass). And this set was generally difficult to get through. I was late on a few starts. On a fresh day, however, this same program would probably be no problem.

hangs_20110210.xlsx

This Excel workout generator I’ve got going here has evolved into something good.

Yeah fun last night on your property my animal though we’re trying to reach HI.

If you want to make getting phone calls not suck get Google Voice and enable the Voicemail Transcripts feature. It’s priceless. It’s like discovering an exotic island, teaching the natives to speak English real quick, then having them text you complex messages.

I had another go at an 18-minute hangboard routine yesterday. It was rad. That is, I finished it this time, and it felt not like death. My skin felt bad, I’m sure from a proper Tuesday at the Shed, but most of that went away after ~6 minutes. This was not a majorly pumpy ordeal to my surprise. There was moderate pumpination happening but nothing out of control. The short load/small hold sets felt easy while the long load/big hold sets were grueling – an observation I will take into account for today’s session.

hangs_20110209.xlsx

today’s weight: 176.4 lbs

stupid people don’t deserve to be strong

Yesterday’s hangboard session went down before I bounced over to the Shed for some proper fitness. I had intended to use the few minutes planned for hangs as a warm up. Instead I printed an 18-minute routine that shut me down at ~14:20. Clearly I am the master of my own impulses.

hangs_20110208.xlsx

This Excel workout generator now has a column for planning hold combinations. I added a rating scale for hold difficulty and mapped those values to a function that inversely corresponds to hang duration. There are some parameters that need tweaking.

Superboard Sunday

Since the Superbowl is lame I got some hangboarding in yesterday. This was my second go at a 9-minute set and it felt way less pumpy than the first. I did tweak the intervals a bit, increasing both loads and rests a touch, but I do not believe that is what made this seem less endurance-y-ish™. Rather, my recent focus on routes and the newness of these long sets has me improving quickly for the first little bit here, I believe. There are tons of opportunities for on-the-fly efficiency tweaking within the 9 minutes these sets cover and route guys are specialized in this skill. Some medium 2-finger and mono work even got incorporated toward the end. Which reminds me to remind me: put small holds in the sine valleys, not on the peaks (dumbass).

hangs_20110206.xlsx

Right now I’m just kinda using whatever holds I want during a set but I’ll figure out recording for that. Not recording would be like climbing a route and giving no consideration for the size of the holds – which sounded super stupid in my head but now that sounds rad.

hangboarding for that endurancey stuff

I get pumped when I climb routes. So. I’m going to try this enduro-hangboarding thing on my beastmaker for a while. Take 1:

hangboard schedules

This was harder than I expected. Which I expected. I’m thinking I’ll increase load and rest intervals and stay in the 9 minute range for a spell. I was switching holds as I pleased but am thinking of a way to apply a function to that as well. Since Google Docs butchered my Excel effort I’ll explain: I put a function to load/rest intervals, in this case a sine curve, for a continuous hangboard routine, in this case 9 minutes.

* Actually, here’s a link to the Excel file at DropBox (cuz Google Docs sucks): hangs_20110201.xlsx