Starting new log with new name, won't be hard to figure out who I am though.

Current Stats
5’11” Weight TBD BF% TBD (1/4 149lb 14.3% DEXA)

The plan is to put on size and getting better at climbing. Those two don’t typically go hand in hand but I’m tired of getting swallowed up by medium shirts.

Goals over next 6 months:
Gain 15lb
Progress from V4 to V7 climbing grade
Squat 5x245 DL 5x300

Starting fresh with this log, I will be getting a DEXA BF% scan tomorrow, here is my current physique if Loco wants to guess what it will come in at. Starting this year I was 149lb and 14.3% BF. If I had to guess I’ll be at 145lb and 13%. I have stubborn lower back fat that's never going anywhere and it's pointless to try and get leaner. The realities of natty training are very real.

Maybe I'll post front noodz if I feel like going through the trouble of hiding my face, probably not. I have the top 4 abs on leaner days.



I’ve climbed plenty of V6 graded problems but I think my gym grades soft and they were my style with a lot of projecting. I want to be able to walk up V5’s and project/send true V7’s by year’s end. Maximal finger strength and technique will be the two main focuses to get me there.

I track macros fairly religiously. Past two weeks I’ve been attempting to average 2,100 calories per day as a baseline. With my activity levels, maintenance could be more around 2,500-2,800/day.

Here are the last 14 days:



Current workout/climbing split looks like this:

Monday – Push
Tuesday – Legs AM Climb (Endurance) PM
Wednesday – Pull
Thursday – Push AM Climb (Max Power) PM
Friday – Pull
Saturday – Climb (Projecting) AM Legs PM
Sunday – Climb (Technique)

Just started doing barbell lifts again, will be attempting to add 5lb to squat 2x/week until I stall. Deadlifts I will take a different approach, adding 5lb/workout but basing frequency/intensity on recovery. If I can stay consistent with each even starting low on the weights I could be near my goals in 3-4 months.

Bonus couple vids from climbing gym yesterday. Haven’t done volume chins in a while and it shows, first thing first need to improve upon the rolling shoulders at the top of each rep:



Campus a V2, maybe V3 since it’s on the big wall:

Good to see some more climbing threads. Good luck!

IN.

Welcome back!

One of the best climbers I've climbed with was a former body builder, so you can definitely do both!

For sure, and I think climbing can definitely help in my aesthetic goals, but I'll have to come to terms with being heavier not hurting my climbing if I train the right stuff.

hate to say even some of my fitted T's are quite loose.

Went in for my 2nd DEXA Scan of the year today.

Back on January 4th my stats were
Total Weight: 148.7
Fat tissue: 21.3
Lean Tissue: 121.3
Visceral Fat: .79
BF%: 14.3%

Now today, July 3rd:
Total Weight: 145.8 (-2.9)
Fat Tissue: 18.3 (-3.0)
Lean Tissue: 121.3 (+/- 0.0)
Visceral Fat: .28 (-.51)
BF%: 12.6% (-1.7%)

Thought I might weigh a little less but overall I am pleased with the findings.

I gained fat/LBM in my arms and lost 3lbs of fat in my trunk. My legs also lost 2lbs of LBM which makes sense seeing how I’m severely undertrained.

Hopefully I get some muscle memory gains there now that I’ve reintroduced the barbell lifts into my training. The person there said I’m in a really good spot to start a bulk due to the low visceral and trunk fat #’s.

Current diet plan is to get the avg intake up to 2,400/day for 2 weeks and then continue to up to make the scale move. Traveling for fun this week and eating all the BBQ tomorrow so shouldn’t be too tough this week to hit calorie goals.

After the DEXA I realized I was super close to a Jewish deli I’ve been wanting to try. Decided to call it a cheat meal and went omelet, hash browns, biscuits and gravy. An estimated 1400 calorie gut bomb later I drove over to the climbing gym and did a phone interview from my car. Not smart seeing how it was 103 degrees out.

Plan was to climb as a warm up, do my lower body workout then climb some more. Scrapped that after having a horrible 45min of climbing. Did video my two main projects. Here’s each.

#1 - let’s grade this as a low end V6. Pink sets are supposed to be V6-V8 but this is closer to V5 than V7 for sure.

Crux is this weird left hand move right before finish. You can see me screw around with the 2nd to last move trying to make this move better. The feet are super poor for doing a drop knee off the left foot. Really like this problem because it’s all contact strength which is a focus of mine.

Any beta guesses would be appreciated.



Second one is silly. Again in the pink set but the first 5 moves are like V3- and the finish is V6+. There is nothing on that finish hold and the volume shoves your center of gravity off the wall. I’ll call this a V5.



Came home, had a quick meal and cooled off. Went to gym and did the following;

HBBS
6x140
6x140
10x140

Sumo DL
5x210

Goblet squats 3x10
Walking lunges 3x16
Kettelbell swings 3x12

Just happy to not bail on first workout of this log lol.

The first problem having that left foot on seems to be hurting you. My initial thoughts are to drop the left leg off the wall, which you started to do. Did that not feel quite right?

Ideally, that will make move to the right hand a little more straight forward and will prevent you from having to do the super bunched drop knee. It may take a bit more strength to drop the left leg off given that the gaston is away from your body. The biggest benefit is going to be that it will force your COG to the right putting you in better position for the next 2 moves. For the move that you fell on I think you could either switch feet and backstep or keep your right foot on and back flag hard. Either way your hips have to be further right to minimize the barn door. Not sure if that helps or not. It looks a hard and tricky problem to me.

Next problem I have no suggestions. It looks like you were in good position but the finish hold was vile. Not sure what else you can do there. Maybe others will have something more productive to contribute?

Agree on the 1st problem, the weight needs to get further right but doing so makes the left gaston worse, wondering if I can make the right hand move off the left foot with the right leg back flagged or crossed through. That right hand is bad, but fine as a side pull. As soon as the weight starts moving right it becomes quite a bad hold.

When I first started working the problem I couldn't get the big right hand move to the volume/pinch so I'm 3+ moves further than when I started which is great. but now I'm just one crux from finishing maybe the toughest problem I've worked on and I think it might have 1 more week before being reset.

My last ditch effort will be to right gaston the 2nd to last hold then match left. This might be super tough at the end of a problem that move by move saps my power.

Pull Day A

Weighed Chins (underhand grip)
3x6xBW+30
8xBW+30

Underhand BB Rows
3x10x115

Lat Pulldowns 3x8
Cable straight bar pulldowns 3x10
Facepulls 2x10
EZ Bar Curls 4 sets
Kettelbell farmers walks 60 steps

Typically I'd finish this off with above the knee rack pulls but gym was crazy busy due to the holiday so subbed the KB farmers walks instead. Tried some 45lb bumper plate pinches but hands were too sweaty and I'm weak af.

Have you ever had any elbow issues with this volume of pulling and climbing 4 days a week?

I've never even been able to train pull-ups along with climbing w/o getting tendinitis. Even climbing 4 days a week can sometimes cause problems. I know of others who have no problems whatsoever. I am not sure why my elbows get angry so easily and am curious what your experience has been so far?

Had major elbow issues my first six months. Through process of elimination I determined it was likely attributed to accessory tricep work. Once I cut that out it helped a lot.

I do a ton of warm up before lifting and climbing. Especially important because I’m an old man. Mainly focused on shoulders, scapula and elbows.

But still my elbows do bark at me from time to time. Once they get warm they’re usually good enough.

Yesterday's calories (total guess, two massive cheat "meals")

150p/600c/100f = 3,900 calories

7/5

Push Day B
--Rushed due to personal obligation getting in the way

Press
6x105
6x105
5x105

Standing DB Press 3x10x30s
Incline DB Bench 3x10x40s
Cable side raises 3x12
DB side raises 4x12

Climbing Gym 3 hours
1hr free climbing, sent newly set V5-V7 grade, call it a V5.
Power Endurance on the tension hold board, quick video:



Nice thing about that board is the holds are mirrored, so did 6x on those pinches with 1min rest.

Then did 4x6sec with 5min rest deadhangs on a 10mm edge.

Then worked a V6 problem all crimps, about 6 moves total, 5x with 5min rest. Couldn't match finish hold 2x.

Good session, still feeling all the volume I put in this past weekend.

Today's calories
170p/276c/35f = 2,100 calories

Glad to see you back. Your strength is impressive. Especially the effortless campusing

BTW on your pink climb with the V6 finish, I am pretty sure a boulder is considered at least as hard as its hardest move no matter how long or short or easy the rest of it is, so that would make your 5 a V6 =)

Yea but I'm a reverse sandbagger, especially when the rest of the problem is such an easy cruise for me.

Today reminded me I'm an old man now, woke up feeling completely rundown. Plan was to do heavy legs+back since I'm going on a 3 day vacation but decided to not push my luck.

7/6

Squats
6x145
6x145
11x145

Step ups 3x16
KB Swings 3x12x16kg
Walking lunges 3x20 steps

Next 72 hours off will hopefully do wonders.

What layout is that on the tension board? The one I have been climbing on the layout looks different.

In general how do you like climbing on the tension board? I've been climbing on one about 2x a week recently and am loving it. There is a lot less friction on those wood holds than plastic!

Really nice dead hang numbers there, especially after doing a hard PE circuit. Very strong!

I should clarify, it’s not a tension board like the moon board equivalent. It’s a board with tension holds. None of the gyms I go to have a board like that.

I think when I finally get a house with a yard I might just build one lol. Seems like a ton of fun.

Estimated Calories during vacation

7/6 - 2600
7/7 - 2700
7/8 - 3200
7/9 - 2500

Avoided major blow-ups until Sunday which was like 2500 calories of cake/candy and 4oz of steak lol.

7/9 - Push Day A

Bench
5x135
7x145
4x155 (50/50 on a 5th rep)

Cluster Bench 23 reps (8/4/4/4/3) @115

Flat DB Bench up to 8x55s (5/1 tempo)

Cable flys 4 sets
Pec Dec 4 sets
Side Raises 8 sets

After watching the recent Isratel video on delt hypertrophy I realized I'm woefully short in side delt training, going to try to get 24 working sets a week in there.

Climbing session pushed back three hours due to interview.

Power endurance session - 2 hours

Free climbed for about 30min the headed up to tension board and 30deg system wall. Set a crimpy V4+ (mayyyyyybe V5 y’all judge) that I sent 4x with 2min rest. Then I set a pinchy V4 and sent it 3x. Set a super tough V5+ crimp route after that and failed the finished 4x.



Leg training in a bit.

7/10 calories - 200p/333c/31f = 2411

Leg Day A

HBBS
6x150
6x150
11x150

KB Swings 5x10x44lb
Walking lunges 3x24steps

Ended it there, got to gym super late and was wiped out. Today just didn't work out as planned but got 2 sessions in and diet was very good.

First beta advice I can give you ever:

On the final move of the crimp power endurance route, if you turn your right hip to the wall and switch feet, you can do the final move statically without barndooring

Would love that, would also love to fully lock off the previous move. Slightly out of my crimp holding grade to do either. But yea that last move isn’t easy off the left foot.

I think this is pretty solid advice. It looks like in general you climb pretty straight on with open hips. Perhaps the climbs you have posted have all called for it, but you may find some improvements in efficiency by incorporating a few more back steps, twist locks etc. Even in a more square open position I have found a slight hip twist into the wall with the hand I am moving can really help me keep tension on slopey/poor footholds. Having that extra bit of body tension at the end of a move can also help reduce the contact strength needed to latch a poor hold or just improve accuracy on holds that require precision.