Irish Climbing Coaching

LIMERICK, IRELAND (Irish Climbing Coaching) – Continuing on from our theme on ‘Motivation and Goal Setting’, we’ll move and deal with something that ties the psychological side of climbing and training (i.e. the preparation and mental side of things) with the physiological side (i.e. physical exercise). Though the two are very firmly intertwined in reality, it is far beyond the scope of these articles to go into it (guess you’ll have to come on one of our Coaching Workshops!!) As the step in developing your goals and maintaining your motivation, we are going to deal with the Periodisation. Periodisation is the method of varying your training periodically to prevent ’stagnation’ of the exercises and ensure the body is always having to adjust. It can be used to help maintain motivation levels and stave off boredom by changing things around every now and then. This is achieved by breaking your training into different phases, depending on the goals in mind. There are a number of different periodisation models and though all effectively achieve the same goal, research is conflicting as to which is best at eliciting gains (e.g. Buford, Rossi, Smith & Warren, 2007; Rhea, Ball, Phillips & Burkett, 2002). For the sake of simplicity, here we will deal with the most basic model, a Linear Model of Periodisation.

Macro, Meso and Micro-Cycles
In order to periodise your training, you need to break it down into ‘Blocks’. These blocks or cycles are targeted towards a specific goal and will contain the relevant training / exercises to realise your goal. A macro-cycle is a long cycle which may for example, last an entire season. This will contain a number of meso-cycles, shorter blocks of training which may last a few weeks and will each have a specific focus e.g. endurance, power-endurance, finger strength, slopers etc. Micro-cycles are then the shortest cycles and for this example will last a day/a few days.

Linear Periodisation
In a linear periodisation model, within a full macro-cycle, each meso-cycle builds on the foundations of the previous one. In climbing terms this may start with a 4-6 week stint of general whole-body conditioning, micro-cycles within this may only last one/a few days and may involve running/other cardio. activity or general low-intensity strength work. Each micro-cycle would vary slightly in activity, though still maintain the focus of generally conditioning the body for later training. This is a good time to start correcting any potential sources of injury that may strike later on. The next meso-cycle would then focus on long-term stamina training i.e. for long routes that generally don’t ‘pump’ you out too much. Building on this may be a meso-cycle of arm/shoulder strength whilst maintaining a few sessions to keep the stamina levels ‘topped-up’. So the basic concept is to start out with high-volume, low intensity activities and generally progress to lower-volume, higher intensity exercise. This all depends on the goal you are training for though, so again, must be directed towards your goals!

The Benefits of Periodisation

As well as keeping you ‘interested’ and maintaining your motivation levels, periodising your training keeps you more focused on your goals, makes your training more effective as your body is constantly having to adapt to changes and helps prevent injury and burnout as you’re not working the same thing all the time. This may seem complicated and may take a short time to get your head around it, the easier option is to just get a Climbing Coach to do do it for you…. Also it isn’t just something for elite climbers who train, it is very applicable to climbing itself and all levels of ability.

References:

Buford, T.W., Rossi, S.J., Smith, D.B. & Warren, A.J. (2007). A comparison of periodisation models during nine weeks with equated volume and intensity for strength. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 21(4), 1245 – 50.

Rhea, M.R., Ball, S.D., Phillips, W.T. & Burkett, L.N. (2002). A comparison of daily linear and undulating periodised programs with equated volume and intensity for strength. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 16(2), 250 – 55.